Townsville's storm season brings lightning, power surges, flooding, and extended outages. If your business IT isn't prepared, a single storm can wipe out equipment, data, and weeks of productivity. Here's your pre-season checklist.
Power surges from lightning strikes are the number one cause of storm-related equipment damage in North Queensland. Every piece of IT equipment should be connected through a quality surge protector — not a cheap power board. For critical systems like servers and NAS devices, invest in a UPS (uninterruptible power supply) that provides both surge protection and battery backup to allow clean shutdown during outages.
Check your existing surge protectors — they degrade over time and may no longer provide adequate protection. Replace any that are more than 3-4 years old or have taken a significant surge.
Before storm season hits, verify your backups are actually working. Don't just check that the backup software says it ran — do a test restore of a few files to confirm the data is intact and recoverable. If your only backup is an external hard drive sitting next to the computer it's backing up, a flood or surge could take out both. Make sure you have an offsite copy — cloud backup is ideal.
If your team can work from the cloud (Microsoft 365, Google Workspace), a power outage at the office doesn't have to mean a complete stop. Staff can work from home on laptops using mobile data or home internet. Test this before you need it — make sure everyone can access email, files, and critical systems remotely.
Take photos of your IT equipment and record serial numbers, purchase dates, and approximate values. Store this documentation in the cloud (not just on a local computer). Check your business insurance covers IT equipment damage from storms, surges, and flooding.
Know what to do when a storm hits: power down non-essential equipment before the storm arrives, unplug equipment from the wall (surge protectors help but direct lightning can overwhelm them), and have a plan for who to call and what to prioritise when power returns. We offer pre-storm preparation and post-storm recovery services — give us a call before the season starts.