Worse to come for inundated Townsville

WATER from Townsville’s bulging dam could flood up to 100 homes under a risky plan to save the city from widespread flooding.

Major releases are underway from the Ross River Dam, but Townsville mayor Jenny Hill says there are no guarantees the plan will work.

Between 90 and 100 homes downstream from the dam were evacuated yesterday, as the city deals with a one-in-100 year event.

Water releases will exceed what’s usually allowed under Townsville’s emergency action plan, but Ms Hill said authorities had no choice with more days of torrential rain ahead.

“What we’re trying to do is to get ahead of the system, so we reduce the risk of any further flooding in the city – but that’s not guaranteed,” she said.

The dam was at 186 per cent of capacity on Friday afternoon, its highest level since it was built 48 years ago.

All three dam gates were open and spilling and the Ross River was dumping a record amount of water into the sea.

The massive monsoonal deluge has caused floods, flash flooding, power outages and at least three landslides.

Wulguru local Kerry Guinea was tucked up in bed when a massive roar heralded a landslip that inundated his Townsville yard with tonnes of mud and rock.

“It sounded like a jet roaring,” he said. “I went out in the dark and there was mud everywhere, there’d be hundreds of tonnes, it’s huge.

“Our house is fine but it’s come through the bottom of the neighbour’s place, and the houses next to that have rock and trees all around them.”

Soldiers were mobilised to help sand-bag vulnerable properties in Townsville.

The Bureau of Meteorology said the Townsville area had been swamped with more than a year’s worth of rain – it usually gets 1.1 metres.

Some areas could get up to 400mm a day, for the next few days, due to a very active and slow moving monsoon trough.