Murray farmers on flood watch

Farmers with waterlogged properties on the Murray River are alert as floods head their way.

Torrumbarry locals have worked frantically for 16 days and nights to build, fortify and repair nearly 19 kilometres of levee on the banks of a rapidly rising Murray River.

Now they can only wait and see what happens when floodwaters reach the hamlet, 30km northwest of Echuca.

Avocado farmer Andrew Crossman has 600m of that levee spanning his property and is up three times a night checking for leaks and breaches.

“If it goes pear shape we lose the trees and house and our two businesses, so it is pretty stressful. It had been all consuming building the levee, every bit of energy was focused on getting that right,” he said.

Mr Crossman said the whole of community engagement and participation was “incredible” in getting the levee built.

“We just banded together and got it done. The river is only rising 10mm to 20mm a day at the moment, but two weeks ago it rose 400mm overnight and there was a real sense of urgency.

“It is now a very slow burn and wait and see and hopefully the levees will protect us.”

Avocado farmer Andrew Crossman standing on the levee built between the rising Murray River and his Torrumbarry property.

Meanwhile, further upstream, Tangles Conner said the driveway of his Boundary Bend sheep and wheat property, about 90km north of Swan Hill, is already under 600mm of water and inaccessible by anything but motorbike.

But that is not even close to his main concern as Boundary Bend sits near the junction of the brimming Murray and Murrumbidgee rivers.

“They are telling us to expect about the 1993 level, but I think it’ll be more than that,” he said.

“From Tooleybuc to Boundary Bend there are four rivers that run into the Murray and the Lachlan and Macquarie rivers run into the Murrumbidgee, so it is running water out of half of NSW, and it all comes in just after Swan Hill,” he said.

“If you start adding all the figures up the water better not come all together. We have 80 to 90 gigalitres running by every day now. If the Loddon can hold off before the other stuff gets here that will be a bonus, it is all about the timing.”