River Murray floods: Blanchetown Caravan Park owner Cassie Davies reflects on the devastating damage

The owner of a flooded River Murray caravan park has gone back to her destroyed business and home – sharing a heart-wrenching video showing the carnage.

It’s taken nearly two months for Cassie Davies to summon the strength to return for a tour of her caravan park, which has been underwater since December.

And as she surveys the still-inundated park on a pedal boat, the emotion is raw.

Davies and her husband Adam Powell have sunk their life savings into the Blanchetown Caravan Park and the prospect of the damage still invisible below the swollen River Murray surface is overwhelming.

“Wow,” she says, as her voice falters. “It’s just so hard to fathom that this was once our beautiful park.

“And all our semi-permanents’ hard work that they did to make their places look like a little home. Oh my golly gosh. It’s hard to even imagine …. It’s just devastation upon devastation.”

Ms Davies is filming as she speaks, and the footage shows the tops of dozens of sheds, cabins and caravans – all still flooded, and many pushed over on 30-45 degree angle, such has been the power and flow of the water.

Cassie Davies with her son, Tyler Powell, 15, in front of what’s left of Blanchetown Caravan Park in Paisley. Picture: Matt Loxton

Cabins and caravans have been tossed around by the floodwaters. Picture: Cassie Davies,

Stained brown lines on the walls suggest the water has dropped more than a metre since it peaked a few weeks ago, but most buildings are still more than a metre under water – others a lot more.

The River Murray is likely to return to its channel in a few weeks, but the Blanchetown Caravan Park – not to be confused with Big 4 Blanchetown Riverside Holiday Park across the river – sits in a natural bowl. The remaining water will need to be manually pumped out (an expensive process) before clean-up can even begin.

The couple purchased the park, located in the tiny township of Paisley on the opposite side of the river from Blanchetown central, in 2018. They decided to uproot their lives in Melbourne and move to the park in an effort to provide a future for their son, Tyler, now 15, who is autistic.

Ms Davies’ voice quivers again as she explains the guilt she carries for convincing her family to make the move. She later apologises for getting emotional. “It is still so raw,” she says.

The park went from bone dry to completely under water in the space of 48 hours back at the start of December. The water gushed in from the rear on a Saturday morning after busting over a bank further upstream. By mid-afternoon on the Sunday, the water had reached the park’s office and shop area.

The remains of Blanchetown Caravan Park after floods in Paisley this week. Picture: Matt Loxton

Flooding at Blanchetown Caravan Park. Picture: Cassie Davies,

“If you had to describe it you would say it was like someone had just dropped an atomic water bomb at the back of the park,” she says. “There were people all in just disbelief.”

About half of the park’s 70 or so semipermanent residents were able to remove their vans, but many of the structures are permanent or built around vans that are no longer mobile. These are the ones that remain under water.

Ms Davies’ heart goes out to her beloved park residents, many who had spent countless hours and money turning their weekend getaways into tiny pieces of riverside paradise.

“The only way to describe it is like one of those massive hurricanes or cyclones they have in America,” Ms Davies says as she continues to pedal around the park.

“Oh God. Wow. Look at this … I can’t even fathom the clean-up. It’s just going to be huge … I guess here we’re just going down the road we used to all walk down to go to the river.”

She’s streaming the video on Facebook, and tries to pick out the families who own the various structures poking their roofs above the water. But there’s still too much water to be certain which roof belongs to which family.

Tyler Powell, 15, with his mum, Cassie Davies in temporary accomodation in Paisley, while Blanchetown Caravan Park is underwater. Picture: Matt Loxton

“There’s the little shed we had the kids’ bikes in,” she points out. “We’re coming up to the back of the office. The back of the shop is all falling apart there. Oh gosh. I don’t even know what to say.”

The anxiety of what she might discover has prevented her from jumping in a boat to check out the park until now. Unsurprisingly, this trip is not allaying any of that anxiety.

She passes by the shelter that covers the park’s jumping pillow. The pillow, which cost a small fortune to install in 2018, is still under water and unlikely to be salvageable. The amenities block will probably need replacing. Ms Davies reckons the repair bill could easily top $1m.

Ms Davies and Tyler, who goes to school in Swan Reach, have been living in a cabin they were able to move up the hill on to land near the Lutheran church. There has been no income from the park, so Adam, an engineer, has temporarily relocated to Sydney to work and pay the bills.

Flooding at Blanchetown Caravan Park. Picture: Cassie Davies

The Blanchetown Caravan Park sign this week. Picture: Cassie Davies.

The same sign when the water was at its peak. Picture: Cassie Davies

When they were looking at their insurance premiums in March last year, they noticed their flood coverage had skyrocketed. After two years of Covid and travel restrictions, the purse strings were stretched to the limit, so they opted out of insuring against flood damage.

“We didn’t want Adam to pack up and leave and go back to his industry just to pay for flood insurance,” Ms Davies says. “I mean, I’m kicking myself now.”

The couple don’t believe in GoFundMe pages and are trying to find someone to design and make some quirky Blanchetown Caravan Park bumper stickers they can sell to anyone who wants to support the park’s recovery.

And once the water subsides, she plans to invite premier Peter Malinauskas for a walk-through to see the damage.

“Photos just don’t do it justice. You’ve physically got to be in there to understand the devastation,” she says “I know people say ‘oh, you need to get over it’ but what people don’t understand is that it’s your home. It’s also your business. It’s your life. It’s everything – everything packaged into one.”