‘Unprecedented flows’ as floodwaters approach Australia’s Murray River
By Selma Milovanovic and Richard Willingham
January 21, 2011 COMMUNITIES between Kerang and Swan Hill will be on high alert in the coming days as floodwaters flow north and reach the Murray River. As the levee surrounding Kerang held on and the Loddon River began to recede yesterday, the State Emergency Service said the town would be isolated for up to three days after the last road out was closed. Further east, as Pyramid Creek began to rise, numerous homes along the creek were set to be inundated. The SES warned that most of the rural levees downstream of Kerang would be breached. In the north-west, Brim, Beulah and Jeparit are expected to be the focus of flood activity today while communities north of Kerang prepare to face flooding from the weekend. ”Already we are seeing unprecedented flows in the northern parts of our state,” said SES director of operations Tim Wiebusch. ”We still have a very wide and expansive span of water that is not necessarily going to keep to its natural courses, and we will see that spread right across that northern part from Kerang to Swan Hill, moving into the Little Murray River which comes back into the Murray at Swan Hill.” In Dimboola, in the state’s north-west, the Wimmera River peaked yesterday afternoon, flooding five homes. After police confirmed that an unauthorised levee was built over a freight train line at Beulah, Mr Wiebusch warned landowners that anyone conducting significant earthmoving to build levees without consulting authorities could be legally liable if they affected the movement of floodwaters downstream and the ability of hydrologists to predict flooding. …
Towns on alert as floodwaters flow north 
By ROHAN SULLIVAN Associated Press
Posted: 01/20/2011 07:20:30 AM PST MELBOURNE, Australia—A surging river Thursday flooded and isolated the latest community hit in Australia’s deadly flood disaster, straining a levee serving as the main protection between the muddy waters and residents’ homes. The flooding in Kerang, in the southeast state of Victoria, follows weeks of massive flooding in northeastern Queensland that the government says could be the nation’s most expensive natural disaster ever. It shut down much of Queensland’s lucrative coal industry and has caused 30 deaths. The floods appeared to have claimed another life when the body of a 3-year-old boy was found Wednesday in floodwaters near his family’s home in the small community of Marthaguy, in New South Wales state, south of Queensland. Officials said Thursday they were still investigating how the boy died and had no further details. Walls of water miles (kilometers) wide are now surging across northern and western Victoria in the wake of record rainfall last week. Seventy-two Victorian towns have already been affected by rising waters, 1,770 properties have been flooded and more than 3,500 people have evacuated their homes. Floodwaters in the Kerang region are the highest they’ve been in more than 100 years, said Kim Healey, a spokeswoman with the State Emergency Service. Up to 1,500 homes in the town could be inundated if the levee holding back the water from the swollen Lodden River gives way. It has held out so far, but water levels were expected to remain high for several days. “The primary concern is the ability of the levee to withstand high flood levels for an extended period of time,” Healey said. Other communities were at risk of inundation for the next few days as water levels continue to rise in several areas. Residents of Dimboola, a town of about 2,000 in the state’s northwest, were asked to evacuate Thursday as the Wimmera River that runs through the community surged higher. “This flood event is still far from over,” said Tim Wiebusch, director of operations for the State Emergency Service. “We are likely to see this flood emergency continuing for at least another seven to ten days.” …
