Tropical Cyclone Maila
In early April 2026, Tropical Cyclone Maila formed in the Solomon Sea between Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea. It intensified into a Category 5 severe tropical cyclone and brought destructive winds, flooding and landslides that affected more than 150,000 people across both countries.
On 12 April 2026, the Australian Government announced a $2.5 million humanitarian assistance package to support the responses in Solomon Islands and Papua New Guinea. As part of this package, Australia’s humanitarian investments provided support to both the affected countries. The Humanitarian Logistics Capability (HLC) delivered essential relief supplies, the Australian Humanitarian Partnership (AHP) worked through their in-country partners to support locally led humanitarian action, and Australia Assists deployed a 2-person Rapid Response Team (RRT) within 48 hours of RRT activation. The RRT’s role was to provide direct support to Papua New Guinea’s National Disaster Centre (NDC) in humanitarian response and coordination efforts, particularly in logistics and information management.
Arriving on the ground
Tropical Cyclone Maila devastated homes, roads, food gardens and cut access to isolated communities and islands in Papua New Guinea and the Autonomous Region of Bougainville. On Monday 13 April 2026, Australia Assists 2 RRT members – Brian and Peter – arrived in Port Moresby to begin their 2-week deployment supporting response efforts. Shortly after arriving, they met with Papua New Guinea’s National Disaster Centre (NDC), as well as NGOs, UN agencies, and other personnel they would work with closely on the response. Already supporting the NDC in response were 2 Australia Assists deployees embedded in the NDC, Darren and Steven, who assisted the RRT in introductions to key partners in Port Moresby, Milne Bay and Autonomous Region of Bougainville, ensuring the RRT were able to hit the ground running.
Port Moresby was not directly impacted by Tropical Cyclone Maila. The most severe impacts occurred in the east of the country. The NDC decided to split up the RRT support to focus on the Autonomous Region of Bougainville and Milne Bay. Peter was chosen to go to Bougainville, while Brian would go to Milne Bay.
One driving factor to split the RRT up was on the flow of information management from regional areas towards the coordinating centre in Port Moresby and Peter and Brian were quickly tasked with ensuring effective communication from on the ground to the NDC. ‘They needed information to do their jobs – to understand the situation and to decide about resource allocation,’ said Peter. ‘But they also understood that to get that information, they needed to support the teams – in the case of Milne Bay, the provincial level, or at the Autonomous Bougainville regional level. Those teams played that critical role of coordinating that local level response but also feeding the information up’.
Supporting the Bougainville response
Peter’s history with Bougainville started 2 decades ago, as an Australian Youth Ambassador for Development. Flying into Buka Airport, Peter felt a sense of nostalgia, noting he was ‘appreciating coming into Bougainville after 21 years.’
The night before Peter’s arrival in Buka, the Autonomous Region of Bougainville had been put into a State of Emergency, the first time a State of Emergency was declared for the whole region of this scale.
‘We were really tasked with doing whatever we could to help,’ said Peter. ‘My boss was the Deputy Controller… I demonstrated very quickly that I was willing to be completely transparent and take instructions from her. Any time you can respond to requests, and you can deliver something that will make someone’s life easier quickly, suddenly you start to be a very trusted member of the team.’
One of the key initiatives Peter supported was the design and implementation of a needs assessment tool in Bougainville. ‘With Bougainville, they’re really set up for more small, localised disasters, like landslides or volcanic eruption, and not for collecting large amounts of data from a large area,’ recalled Peter. As Peter arrived in Buka, the UN had begun rollout of a mobile data collection tool that required no internet to use. Peter was tasked with training people on the data collection tool, training approximately 50 people who would then travel across the region, from southern Bougainville to the atolls to the northern region.
Towards the end of Peter’s 14-day deployment, information started flowing in from across Bougainville. ‘As I was leaving, it was streaming in,’ recollected Peter. ‘I think they got like 150 or 180 wards out of 240 wards from across Bougainville, which is just phenomenal. Suddenly, you had this rich data set showing the humanitarian needs, where the people were, and their situation. That was really valuable.’
In addition to this, with the assistance of the UN, Peter supported the accessibility of information flow to the Autonomous Bougainville Government. ‘Anytime that the people in Bougainville wanted the information, they had to ask someone in Port Moresby to give it to them,’ noted Peter. ‘Whereas now, for the first time, they have their own direct access to the data set for Bougainville, and you can see they’ve got a dashboard on the website now with a rich amount of information.’
Supporting the Milne Bay response
When Brian arrived in Milne Bay, Alotau’s Provincial Disaster Centre was operating at a high tempo, out of different premises due to a recent power outage. In Alotau itself, there were few visible signs of the disaster. The greatest impact was scattered across Milne Bay’s remote outer islands, where limited information and cut off telecommunications made it incredibly difficult to plan out a humanitarian response.
‘What had come back was through limited communications or word of mouth from boats that may have been visiting in that area or had contact with some of the outer island communities,’ said Brian. ‘Everything was second-hand information and had to be grounded in truth, because it’s very difficult to make operational decisions when you don’t have the facts.’
A multi-partner operation to deliver humanitarian assistance and gather critical information from the outer islands of Milne Bay was facilitated by the provision of Papua New Guinea’s patrol boats to support the response. The operation lasted for 5 and a half days across 8 outer island communities, delivering essential relief supplies. At this point, international aid had not arrived in Port Moresby, so the response was a localised effort.
Brian supported the operation with humanitarian partners from IOM, Red Cross, Milne Bay provincial authorities, and a local NGO, the Sea Women of Melanesia. For Brian, the inclusion of Sea Women of Melanesia was a highlight for him, connecting with a local women led NGO strengthened the Gender Equality, Disability and Social Inclusion (GEDSI) lens of the humanitarian response. ‘At the post-mission meeting, one of their members gave a very impassioned and moving report on the findings that they had come across,’ recalled Brian. ‘They had very strong knowledge, they were great.’
In the outer island communities of Milne Bay, Tropical Cyclone Maila had destroyed food gardens, one of the main sources of food for these communities. Despite this, Brian was in awe of the resilience shown by the outer island communities of Milne Bay. ‘They’re remote, they’re very self-sufficient and incredibly resilient,’ noted Brian. ‘The people had experienced this sort of thing before and were resilient – but they were also aware of the danger and the risks that they now faced, due to their lack of food security.’
Through this humanitarian operation, the provincial authorities and their partners delivered humanitarian supplies, including essential food staples (rice, flour, biscuits and cooking oil), as well as family, hygiene, mother and infant kits, and fuel to support their power and transportation.
It also collected critical information, recognising that the humanitarian response would be prolonged and would require many months of support. ‘The crops are nine months away, assuming there’s good weather,’ said Brian. ‘The locals knew this; it was no secret to them.’
Despite this, Brian felt optimistic that this humanitarian operation was the first step towards an effective humanitarian response.
‘With the information we’ve got, with the messages that the Sea Women of Melanesia had spread, with the work we’d done in ensuring that the provincial administration now knew what they were facing. We had grounded the truth, we’d given them the information, and we’d prepared that next step, so that they can move forward with their response.’
Building for the future
As immediate relief efforts gave way to longer-term recovery, the work continues today.
Although Peter and Brian supported different parts of the Tropical Cyclone Maila response, both shared a common purpose: supporting local authorities to strengthen coordination, improve decision-making and leave behind systems that would continue supporting communities long after they returned home.
For Brian, one moment continues to stay with him:
‘As we left every island, to see the whole community on the beach waving goodbye, very grateful and excited. It’s heartwarming to see… That’s the reason you do humanitarian work, to make a difference.’
Since Tropical Cyclone Maila, the Australian Government through Australia Assists has continued supporting the Government of Papua New Guinea and the Autonomous Bougainville Government through additional short-term deployments, helping strengthen response and recovery efforts and build preparedness for future disasters.
Disclaimer: The information and views published here are the individual’s own and do not necessarily represent the partner organisation, Australia Assists or the Australian Government’s views, positions or opinions.