Mosi River Mitigation Dam to Ease Flooding
The construction of the $1.9 million flood mitigation dam in the Mosi River is set to help retain water upstream and minimise flooding in flood prone areas in Nadi.
The Minister of Waterways Mahendra Reddy officiated at the construction of the damn yesterday. Located in the Nausori Highlands, this is the fifth retention dam to be constructed. It took the contractors - Civil Engineering Limited-eight months to complete the project. “The Nadi River drainage basin is complex due to its topography and land use pattern. Rapid development in recent years in the lower catchment has significant impact of the basins in terms of runoff coefficient and massive soil erosion,” Mr Reddy said.
The total catchment of Nadi River is 516 km2.
Mr Reddy said millions of dollars in damages had occurred due to severe floods in the Nadi River basin. “In 2009 the costs of damage were $112 million and $85 million in 2012.
“The function of in stream structures is to retain/detain flood water upstream and gradually release from the bottom outlet through culverts. This will reduce the flood levels and magnitude downstream,” he added.
Roko Tui Ba, Iosefo Vereivalu thanked Government for their assistance as the impact of climate change through changing weather conditions was one of the threats in Fiji affecting people’s livelihood. Mr Reddy added the dam would retain water upstream during a heavy rain which could stop the flooding downstream. Mr Reddy said one of the major problems people in Nadi was flooding but they hoped that these retention dams would combat it.