Army sends reinforcements for Kimberley flood rebuild

More defence personnel will arrive in stricken Kimberley after the PM promised help to rebuild.

Lach McClymont at inundated Kalyeeda Station in the St George Ranges. Picture: Camille McClymont

More defence personnel will ­arrive in Western Australia’s stricken Kimberley on Tuesday after Anthony Albanese promised the federal government would help rebuild and restore the ­remote communities left devastated by record flooding.

With much of the Kimberley remaining cut off from the rest of the country, and with damage bill estimates now exceeding $1bn, the Prime Minister arrived in the ­region on Monday and met Fitzroy Crossing locals left homeless as a result of the floods.

Hundreds of people have been evacuated from Kimberley towns and remote Aboriginal communities in recent days after ex-Tropical Cyclone Ellie dropped vast sums of rain across the region, inundating homes and devastating key roads and bridges.

 

Mr Albanese said the people he had met in Fitzroy Crossing were determined to fight back.

“We’ve seen people who have lost just about everything as a result of this one-in-100-year flood,” he said.

“We’ve seen massive infrastructure damage particularly to the crossings into Fitzroy Crossing that will take some time to repair.”

He said it was extraordinary no lives had been lost.

“When you go and look first-hand at the damage that was done, for example, to the bridges and roads, you see the power of this water,” he said.

The number of Australian ­Defence Force personnel in the Kimberley is expected to increase to 200 by Tuesday. Five army helicopters are due in the coming days, joining three air force transport planes already in the area.

Premier Mark McGowan, who also toured the region on Monday, said early assessments suggested more than 100 homes in and around Fitzroy Crossing had been damaged. Around 85 per cent of the homes in Fitzroy Crossing are state housing.

Kalyeeda’s flood-damaged stables. Picture: Camille McClymont

“What was noticeable was the damage to infrastructure. The roads and the bridges were heavily damaged and that’s going to take some time to repair,” Mr McGowan said. “That’s going to be difficult over a longer period of time than we would hope because getting those things fixed will be difficult … We can’t provide a time frame on that but that’s going to affect travel and a whole range of things for the Kimberley for some time to come.”

The state and federal governments have begun making disaster recovery assistance available, with people in the area now eligible for up to $800 each. Some households will be eligible for up to $10,000 in house and contents repairs.

The main bridge into Fitzroy Crossing suffered extensive damage during the flood peak, but the West Kimberley town of Derby appears so far to have avoided major damage to the bridges connecting it to the rest of the country.

Kalyeeda Station from the air. Picture: Twitter

The WA opposition, meanwhile, said the damage bill from the floods could exceed $1bn and called for the state government to avoid repeating the mistakes that marred its response to Cyclone Seroja, which smashed into the Midwest region in 2021.

The Australian on Monday revealed just a tiny portion of the grant assistance promised in the wake of Seroja had reached the ­affected communities.

Opposition emergency services spokesman Martin Aldridge said there was an astronomical task at hand to ensure those affected were able to rebuild quickly.

Mining giant Rio Tinto has ­offered accommodation for up to 40 people at its shuttered Argyle diamond mine in the Kimberley to house either locals unable to return to their homes or for workers who travel to assist in the rebuild.

Mr Albanese said he was mindful of the mental health toll on those affected by the disaster.

Pastoral stations across the ­region have also suffered a major impact. Pastoralist Camille McClymont said her family’s cattle station had been turned into an island, leaving her, her husband and their year-old son accessible only by helicopter.

“We’re very restricted in what we can even do to start the clean-up process. You feel that isolation a lot more when you literally can’t leave,” she said. “Other than that, we’ve had so much support from the community.”

WA emergency services on Monday delivered drinking water to the family, who expect to be cut off for weeks if not months.