By that time, moving furniture and possessions was too late.
Bendrups is a Medal of Australia who has been an SES Volunteer for 17 years and is President of the Victoria SES Volunteers Association and Vice President of the National Association of SES Volunteers. She said she decided to speak out after what she saw on the floor last week.
Faye Pendrops has been a SES volunteer for 17 years.attributed to him:Paul Jeffers
“Residents of Maribyrnong did not have accurate information about the size of the flood, and notifications were sent to a very limited number of residents and were later expanded to many others,” Pendrops said.
“Few people know there is a relief center or where it is, and few have any idea what to do and what to do or how long it might take.”
Jeff Craber, a former Melbourne water expert who was in charge of Melbourne’s flood warning service from 1989 to 2003, said the warning issued to communities near the Maribyrnong River Friday morning was delayed by six to nine hours.
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He said publicly available flood data for the Maribyrnong River system – which shows upstream water levels in Daruit rose above seven meters last Thursday – should “ringing alarm bells” at Melbourne Water to issue a major flood warning for Melbourne.
“When you reach certain levels in Darraweit, Maribyrnong will have a big flood,” he said.
The rivers above five meters in Pula on Thursday evening should have also been another red flag for authorities, Kraber said.
When asked Tuesday about modeling, state Emergency Management Commissioner Andrew Crisp said Melbourne Water is responsible for providing the data used to issue warnings, in consultation with the Bureau of Meteorology.
Ron Sutherland, who has been a manager at Melbourne Water for two decades, said there should have been a six-hour warning for homes in Maryburnong.
Prime Minister Daniel Andrews visits the Incident Control Center in Shepparton.attributed to him:AAP
“What they had was the police knocking on their door saying there’s water at your gate, so evacuate,” he said. “Not good enough.”
Authorities said earlier that the water rose much faster than modeling expected. John Bates, an SES event observer, said last week that the modeling was “complex,” including forecasting rainfall, and mapping watersheds and tides.
“They knew something was coming,” Bates said, “but…it was definitely more massive than I knew.” “He turned up really fast. And surprisingly fast for all of us.”
Less than two weeks ago, Pendrops sent an email to local politicians and community groups to warn them of the “precarious situation” at the Footscray SES unit, which serves local government areas in Marybyrnong and Melbourne.
Floods devastated the town of Rochester in central Victoria.attributed to him:Justin McManus
It said the unit was operating out of an “unfit for purpose” facility in a corner of the Maribyrnong Council Operations Center warehouse. It also said that SES removed the sole remaining rescue truck in Footscray for deployment to another unit after the agency removed most of its fleet of heavy vehicles from service across the state due to faulting issues.
The Footscray unit was also left with one inflatable lifeboat after one was handed over to another department, leaving it with only two utes and a boat.
Pendrops said that at 8 a.m. on Friday, before her shift began, she went to a police checkpoint near the Maribyrnong River and told the local officer that more streets were expected to be flooded.
The police officer said she would tell them. “I don’t know who they are,” Bendarbs said. “But nothing happened. Two hours later, the houses were flooded. These residents could have given enough warnings to at least move their belongings or their cars, but they didn’t.”
Residents near the Maribyrnong River transport their flood-damaged belongings. attributed to him:Louis Asquiy
She said in normal circumstances during emergencies in northwest Melbourne, SES is activating its headquarters in Sunshine to serve as an incident control centre. It was not activated late last week, she said, instead managing the disaster from the relief center, which does not have the same equipment or communications resources.
Asked about Bendrups’ criticism, a spokesperson for SES said it has issued a number of public information products and warnings to the Maribyrnong community, which kicked off with a knob on Tuesday.
“An hour and a law were issued on Thursday, followed by emergency warnings and knocking on doors for evacuation early Friday morning,” the spokesperson said.
Meanwhile, the Met Office’s Michael Efron said on Tuesday that while floodwaters were slowly receding across Victoria, rain and thunderstorms would develop again from Wednesday, particularly in the northern parts of the state.
Rainfall is not expected to be as heavy or as widespread as last week, but there may be local waterfalls of up to 50mm.
Residents of Shepparton and the nearby towns of Moropna, Orval, Murchison and Killala West were told it was too late to leave. In the state’s northwest, Kerang residents are bracing for rising floodwaters that could isolate the town for a week, while an emergency warning is asking people to move to higher ground in place between town and Loudoun Weir on the Loudoun River.
On the Campaspe River between Echuca and Bendigo in northern Victoria, the flood-hit town of Rochester is still under an emergency warning asking people to move to higher ground. Downstream along Campaspe, Echuca is also under emergency warning.
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On Tuesday afternoon, the small town of Parma on the Murray River was asked to evacuate immediately because significant flooding is likely to exceed or resemble the 1993 floods.
Andrews said about 380 roads remain closed across the state, while 200 have reopened. In all, there were more than 14,700 requests for emergency payments and 55 collection points for sandbags.
Everyone is stepping in to help and sandbags have helped avoid water in most people’s homes, said Sarah Sweeney, who lives on Abernethy Street in Shepparton.
“Those who were here across the flood waters, it was actually a real community. Everyone was outside, helping each other and checking on each other.” “I think the anxiety levels have gone up a little bit today as everyone has been able to come back to it.”
The small riverside town of Moropna is usually reached from Shepparton by a four-kilometre bridge, raised over the river flats and dotted with red gum.
The road has been closed to flooding since Saturday, but on Tuesday afternoon the road opened to emergency vehicles and pedestrians, with a steady procession of people on foot, bikes and horses crossing to see how the closed community was doing.
Only the pub and bottle shop were open, as army trucks and emergency service cars roamed the main street.
Some streets in Moropna experienced significant flooding, with homes still covered in water above window sills.
The bridge itself was “bubbles” in sections, with the road bulging over the water underneath, and there was the audible sound of water flowing under the asphalt.
On both sides of the road there were a few dozen kangaroos, both live and dead.
Mooroopna locals Shelly Perry and Bill Weston have returned to their home for the first time since it was flooded. attributed to him:Jason South
And the living stood, blinking, on the grass, forced onto the hard ground by the ledges as the swollen Goulburn River rushed past.
The dead lay with a pink cross on their chests, a sad by-product of the collision with evacuation vehicles, in which animals and humans were forced to share what was left of the dry land.
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In the older part of the small town, the low houses were still flooded with brown flood waters yesterday and largely empty of residents.
Shelley Berry and Bill Weston left for the nearby town of Ardmona during a torrential downpour, but returned to their 100-year-old hut on Tuesday afternoon to find 20 centimeters of water still gushing across their floors.
“We really wanted to go back because not knowing what happened was horrible,” Berry said.
“In this case, reality was better than our imagination.”
The couple had hoisted the refrigerator onto a motorbike jack, put their sofas on the tables and held the curtains so they couldn’t soak up the floodwaters.
They are worried about rain that is still expected, but they feel lucky compared to some.
“We have a dry place to stay and we are healthy.”
With Mickey Perkins
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Originally published at Melbourne News Vine
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