A 20-metre stretch of grass usually separates the Caloundra Power Boat Club from the water.
But waves were on Tuesday lapping at its floor as Tropical Cyclone Alfred zeroes in on the Queensland coast.
Water has slowly crept closer to the beloved Golden Beach venue in the countdown to Alfred, breaching the club floor and leaving debris strewn across the ground.
The venue has found itself exposed to the elements, denied the protection of Bribie Island’s slowly eroding northern tip.
Club manager Shane Anderson is bracing himself with Alfred expected to cross between Brisbane and the Sunshine Coast late on Thursday or early Friday as a category two system.
“The next 48 hours is going to be quite negative,” Mr Anderson said.
Not everyone shared his concerns, with a group of women playing mahjong at the club while in the car park there was a flurry of sandbagging activity.
“People are just trying to be out doing their daily business at the moment and I hope they don’t get caught out,” Mr Anderson said.
Growing up in the far north, Mr Anderson knows cyclones can be dangerous.
The club has been sandbagged inside, with windows taped and furniture tied down to ensure it does not become projectiles in damaging winds.
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He kept his fingers crossed it would be all for nothing.
“I’m hopeful that on Friday we’re going to go ‘we did all that work for nothing’ and that is the best-case scenario,” he said.
The ocean has continued to gnaw away at the southern end of the Sunshine Coast as Alfred tracks towards land.
Photos and videos posted online show more water washing across the northern tip of Bribie Island, forming a distinct channel where it began breaking across last week.
Erosion has exposed remnants of World War II’s Fort Bribie, on the eastern side of the island, which some people have never seen before.
A local charter boat operator who has been documenting the changes at Bribie Island over the past week has predicted hundreds of metres of the northern tip will be lost by the time Cylcone Alfred has passed.
Wally Boor, of Caloundra Charter Company, said the water was rushing through a point he visited four days ago, just south of the Lions Park on the island, pushing sand and dead vegetation through.
Mr Boor said the water was also washing over another spot a few hundred metres south where he had been able to beach his boat days before.
“My we’ll lose another 400-600m from the top,” he said.
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Mr Boor said the sea had already had significant impact before the arrival of the cyclone.
“We’ve only had three metres so far and they’re expecting six metres,” he said.
Maritime Safety Queensland has suspended vessel movements at the Port of Brisbane due to heavy swell and unsafe conditions, meaning ships will ride out the cyclone off the Coast.
Sunshine Coast mayor Rosanna Natoli told a media conference that modelling had been carried out showing homes in low-lying areas of the Coast at risk of storm surge and flooding.
“The Sunshine Coast community is used to being inundated when we have those wet-weather events,” she said.
“A lot of our region near the coast is low lying, so some of those areas will know, and they are sections of Coolum, Minyama, Golden Beach, there are section of Maroochydore, so a lot of areas that traditionally are impacted during wet-weather events.”
Homes in Golden Beach and Pelican Waters are among those in low-lying areas being door-knocked by police warning of the potential risk once Cyclone Alfred crosses the coast.
Pumicestone Passage Catchment Management Board spokesperson Jen Kettleton-Butler has continued to call out authorities over a lack of action to prevent breakthroughs on Bribie Island, which she said had left Golden Beach and Caloundra at risk.
“We have built our communities at the edge of the ocean under the assumption of ongoing protection from that island,” Ms Kettleton-Butler said.
“When it was at threat of eroding over the last 20 years, time after time after time, locals have called out to the Sunshine Coast Council and state government to do something about it.
“Unfortunately, they didn’t listen and, unfortunately, we’re at this point now.”
Federal Member for Fisher Andrew Wallace said he had raised the issue with both state and local governments over the years.
He said he had met with locals, as well as Councillor Terry Landsberg and state Member for Caloundra Kendall Morton this week, and had briefed the federal Minister for Emergency Management, Jenny McAllister, and the Shadow Minister for Emergency Management and Water, Perin Davey.
“This is an issue beyond politics, and it demands immediate attention and vigilance,” Mr Wallace said.
