TULLY, Australia: Australia’s biggest cyclone in a century shattered entire towns, pummelled the coast and churned across the country on Thursday, terrifying locals but remarkably causing no known fatalities.

Shaken residents emerged to check the damage after Severe Tropical Cyclone Yasi hit land at about midnight, packing winds of up to 290 kilometers an hour in a region still reeling from record floods.

Officials and locals said that 90 percent of the main street in the small Queensland town of Tully, south of Cairns, had “extensive damage,” while the coastal community of Cardwell also suffered “significant devastation.”

Regional hub Cairns, a center for foreign tourists visiting the Great Barrier Reef, was spared from Yasi’s worst with problems largely restricted to fallen trees and minor damage to buildings.

No deaths or serious injuries were reported, although police said that severed mobile phone networks were hampering efforts to check on two men who may be missing in the Cardwell area.

Officials said that good planning, strong public warnings and the fact that the storm veered suddenly southward, away from Cairns—home to 122,000 people—saved the region from the catastrophic losses that had been feared.

Near the storm’s “ground zero,” families had cowered as roofs were ripped from homes, and some 10,500 people huddled in evacuation centers as the storm raged with a roar like a jet engine.

In Cardwell, aerial pictures showed house after house with its roof shorn off, a shattered church also had its roof blown away, and the town was covered in mud left by surging ocean waters.

At nearby Port Hinchinbrook, dozens of luxury yachts swept from their berths were piled on each other like discarded toys, while the marina lay empty.

Power blackouts darkened 177,000 homes across the region, including the city of Townsville, as emergency workers battled into the worst-hit towns, hampered by roads cut by floods and falling trees.

Despite the devastation, three babies were born during the tempest, including a little girl who was brought into the world in an evacuation center. The baby’s mother ruled out naming her “Yasi.”

Swiss mining giant Xstrata evacuated its Mount Isa and Cloncurry mines as the storm headed further inland, after being downgraded to category one. But the coal ports of Hay Point and Dalrymple Bay reopened, as well as sugar harbor Mackay.

About 75 percent of Australia’s banana supply was estimated to have been affected, while damage to sugarcane crops was put at roughly Aus$500 million.

The storm’s size and power dwarfed Cyclone Tracy, which hit the northern Australian city of Darwin in 1974, killing 71 people and flattening more than 90 percent of its houses.

It was also twice the size and far stronger than the category-four Cyclone Larry that caused Aus$1.5 billion ($1.5 billion) of damage after hitting agricultural areas around Innisfail, just south of Cairns, in 2006.

The maximum-category five storm, reportedly large enough to cover most of the United States and with winds stronger than Hurricane Katrina, followed widespread flooding that left much of Queensland under water.