I am from Australia, but live in London. My dad, he lives in Cairns, which was right in the path of the eye of Tropical Cyclone Yasi.

We had been keeping in touch rather closely on the few days leading up to the cyclone reaching land, and a few hours before it hit he said: "I've had a couple of beers and a couple of glasses of wine and when it gets here, I'm going to punch Yasi in the head".

In reality, with the evacuation centres not accepting animals, and my dad loving his dog as much as he does his daughters, all he could really do was hole up in the centre of his house and hope for the best.

I received the final text message from him three hours before Yasi hit land; then his town lost power.

Meanwhile, all I could do was listen to the Australian broadcaster ABC stream through my computer, monitor the Bureau of Meteorology website and watch the satellite cyclone images (attached) with a sense of dread.

I was glued to my computer that day, and admittedly, did very little work, despite being on work time.

Thankfully, Australian reporters, and even intrepid Tweeters, kept the news coming throughout the worst of the cyclone, relying on generators to keep the up-dates rolling.

Even more thankfully, Yasi shifted a little south just before is broke land, meaning that my Dad's town was spared the brunt of it.

Eventually I received the following text from my Dad: "We are all ok, no damage to house. We are very relieved".

So, too, was I; and never more thankful for the power of the internet.