Floods in South Australia: River Murray residents’ agonising wait for disaster to arrive

Along the Murray, residents are anxiously watching the water slowly creep towards their homes, doing what they can to avoid the devastation of flooding seen upriver.

Rocky Warren wonders where it’s all going to go. The horses, the chooks, the alexandrine parakeets, the alpacas, the cats, the classic cars and motorbikes, the lucerne, the trucks. Mr Warren lives just outside Swan Reach with wife Leanne and the water is coming ever closer.

On one side there is a creek, on another a quickly filling lagoon and not too distant is the River Murray, heading to levels not seen in almost 50 years.

Sometime in the next month, most of Mr Warren’s property is going to be underwater. The 60-year-old is expecting the water around his house to rise another 2.5m before it starts to subside. That means one of his sheds will be 1m underwater, while another could be 2m.

“It’s all getting a bit worrying now,’’ Mr Warren says. “Overwhelming’’ is the word he uses.

MAPPED: What will go underwater at 120GL, 140GL and 160GL daily flows

Rocky Warren with his collection of classic motorbikes he needs to move to higher ground. Picture: Tom Huntley

He has already taken time off from his day job at the council; he and Leanne also run a variety of businesses including driving school buses and emptying septic tanks.

“The worst thing is no one can tell us what we are going to get,’’ he says.

The predictions have certainly shifted quickly in recent weeks. Last month, before monster storms dumped buckets of water on Victoria and NSW, the Murray was expected to peak at between 80GL and 90GL a day flowing over the border.

Last week that was raised to 120GL, a figure not seen since 1975, while this week it was raised again to 135GL.

All along the Murray, people like Mr Warren living within easy reach of the expanding river system, are preparing for the worst.

Mr Warren is moving what he can into the upper storey of the house, while trying to find storage for valuables such as his motorbikes and safe haven for his animals.

Some will go to his mother’s shed but finding storage when everybody else along the Murray is doing the same is not straightforward.

The road to his house will be closed soon, but it’s not clear when, and he intends to stay as long as the power holds out. He even has a portable toilet ready to go upstairs when the septic system gives out.

There is a last-minute rush to finish building a new shed. He hopes it will be done by Tuesday and be able to store some items by hanging them from the roof or by putting them on top of 44-gallon drums.

View of floodwater at Brenden Spicer's holiday home. Picture: Tom Huntley

Mr Warren is adamant about one thing though. “I’m not whingeing, I’m not blaming the council or the government.’’ This, he says, is part of living by the river. He just needs to prepare.

Not far from Rocky are Deb and Peter Rosewall. The couple from Coromandel Valley had been planning a family Christmas by the river. Instead, the retired couple are now moving belongings to the highest point of the house.

They have just completed a renovation of the shack and worried the water will rise so high it will reach the upper level. They say they will stay as long as they can because being back home in Adelaide is also stressful.

“It is hard when we are down there and wondering what is going on up here,’’ Mr Rosewall says.

All along the Murray there is worry and stress. There is the knowledge something big is happening but just how big is unknown.

Vision of the destruction caused by floods in Victoria, NSW and Queensland in the past 12 months no doubt adds to the concern.

Garry Fyfe senior manager River Murray Operations at Lock 1 in Blanchetown. Picture: Tom Huntley

But, for many, like Mr Warren, there is also an acceptance. The Murray floods from time to time. The Riverland is full of markers showing just how high the river reached in 1956, 1974, 1993. The message is clear enough. You can’t stop it, all you can do is prepare the best you can.

Builder Brenden Spicer arrived at his still under-construction river getaway to rescue his old ute. He is another looking for new Christmas plans.

Mr Spicer’s next-door neighbours have water lapping their concrete porch. The water only needs to rise a couple more centimetres to be doing the same at his place.

He points out a muddy mark, about 60cm off the ground, on next door’s house that was left by the 2016 flood. When asked how high he expects the 2022 version to reach, he points another metre higher.

Standing on Mr Spicer’s porch, he points out the usual course of the Murray, It’s about 75m away. All the land between here and there is usually dry. Now if he takes a few steps off his porch it will be up to his chest.

Despite his fears it will rise higher than he can do anything about, he is laying sandbags and geomesh and plans to be back as soon as possible afterwards to clean out the mud that will be left behind.

Brenden Spicer watches water lap at his holiday home. Picture: Tom Huntley

“If you leave it, it gets stinky,’’ he says. “It (flooding) is a natural part of the river, there is no point in complaining about it, but it is a pain in the arse.’’

At Lock 1 at Blanchetown, Garry Fyfe, senior manager of River Murray operations puts the current amount of water flowing through the system into a different perspective.

The locks and weirs in the Murray are used to regulate the flow of water in the river. Because there is so much water in the system all the locks above No.1 are now fully open and the Blanchetown facility will probably join them next week.

The difference in levels from upstream to downstream sides of the lock is usually around 3m. On Thursday it was 100mm. The lock hasn’t been fully open for six years.

Mr Fyfe says the usual flow of water is 6GL to 7GL a day. It is now about 60GL and when it hits 70GL the river levels on both sides of the lock will be even.

At that point, the buoys which are in place to divert boats to the lock will be moved and river traffic will no longer need to use the lock.

“We’ve had high flows for the last six months, anything above 40GL is unusual,’’ he says.

Mr Fyfe says because many of the flood plains and backwaters are already saturated, most of the now 135GL predicted to cross the South Australian border in December will make its way as far as Blanchetown.

“It is entirely likely, what comes in will go out,’’ he says.

It also means high water levels are likely to persist in the Murray for at least three months.

Nathan and Carly Case filling sandbags at their holiday home in Blanchetown. Picture: Tom Huntley

At Blanchetown, Carly and Nathan Case are placing sandbags around their house. They have tied up their pontoon on water that is already 3m above its normal level.

There was a family working bee on the weekend with grandparents keeping an eye on the children who are only aged one and four.

“My parents came up to look after the kids while we did the sandbagging,’’ Carly says.

The couple, who live in Grange and own TCM Electronics, have just renovated the place they bought four years ago. They have been moving possessions upstairs but Nathan is fatalistic about what may happen.

“If it gets in, it gets in’’.

Carly though is worried about the impact it will have on people all over the river.

“People don’t realise the impact that it has had and will have,’’ she says.

“There will be tens of thousands of people impacted by this.’’