Baralaba North mine shut down as flooding cuts roads to site

A Central Queensland coal mine has been temporarily shut down after flooding made accessing the site impossible.

At least 270 Baralaba North Coal Mine workers are waiting to return to work after contractor Golding decided to temporarily shut down the mine’s operations earlier this month.

The open cut coal mine was closed on December 2 due to severe weather impacts and flooding, a Golding spokesman said.

He said flooding had cut access to the site via access roads.

“The decision to temporarily cease operations has been taken to prioritise the safety and wellbeing of our people-without full and safe site access to emergency response services, operations could not continue,” the spokesman said.

“We understand that this has unfortunately impacted our workforce, but their safety is our priority.

“We look forward to being able to gain safe access to the site as soon as possible to recommence operations.”

The Bureau of Meteorology issued flood warnings for most towns in the Dawson Valley last week, with flooding impacting Taroom, Theodore, Baralaba and Jambin.

The Dawson River at Theodore peaked at 12.24 metres around 1am Tuesday, December 7 and is currently at 11.76 metres (moderate flooding) and steady.

The Dawson River at Theodore is expected to fall below the moderate flood level (11m) during Thursday and fall below the minor flood level (8m) during Friday.

Major flooding is expected along the Dawson River downstream of Theodore.

The Dawson River at Moura is currently at 11.60 metres (moderate flooding) and rising.

The Dawson River at Moura was expected to peak around 11.60 metres Wednesday morning and remain steady at this level for the next few days. The river level is expected to ease from Thursday into Friday.

There are currently no observations for the Baralaba manual station, however based on the nearby automatic station downstream of the weir, it is expected that levels at the manual station are above the major flood level (9m) and the Dawson River Bridge, and rising.

The Dawson River at Baralaba is expected to continue to rise during Wednesday.

The river level is likely to peak between 11.50 and 11.80 metres Thursday afternoon.

This is above the April 2011 peak flood height of 11.00 metres but significantly lower than the March 2010 peak flood height of 12.50 metres.

River levels are expected to remain high this week, and ease from the weekend.