Australian floods submerge towns, coal exports hit

Daniel Munoz in Reuters: Military aircraft ferried supplies to an Australian town slowly sinking beneath swollen rivers on Monday, as record flooding in the country's northeast severed roads and ports, curtailing coal exports and devastating farmland.

Floods covering an area the size of France and Germany combined submerged the Capricorn Highway, the major traffic artery through Queensland state. …Floodwaters have brought most coal mining operations to a halt in Queensland -- the state exporting the majority of the coking coal produced in Australia. Sugar cane production was also hit as was -- to a lesser extent -- the grain harvest. The state's premier said recovery would take weeks….