Damaging winds, heavy rainfall and life-threatening floods are expected after the storm made a sudden shift toward Queensland.

Significant damage and power outages are possible in the densely populated region of Queensland, where tropical cyclones impacts are not uncommon, but direct landfalls are.

Cyclone Alfred is set to bring damaging winds and heavy rain to Australia's east coast when it makes landfall as a category 2 storm later this week. It's the first cyclone to hit the region in since Cyclone Zoe in 1974.