Carnarvon Caravan Park in, in north-west WA, was evacuated on the weekend as ‘once-in-a-decade floods’ hit the area … but questions are being asked about why people weren’t told to get out earlier.
Tom Wainwright told the ABC he was told to evacuate from the park at 3:45am on Saturday.
“We just grabbed the pets and what we were wearing and our phone, and off we went,” he said. “We were told to prepare for flooding, that’s all, we weren’t warned or told about a possible evacuation.”
Shire of Carnarvon president Eddie Smith said he was not sure how the caravan park had missed out on the information.
“I find it unusual that they weren’t given the message because there was plenty of messaging going out by the shire, by DFES, by the police,” Mr Smith told the ABC. “So, I’m not sure how that particular caravan park missed out.”
As the floodwaters recede, Mr Wainwright is now anxiously waiting to get back into the park and assess the damage, but he said he expected his caravan to be a write-off.
“Obviously there’s no power, there’s no water, so once that’s all assessed we’ll be able to go back in,” he said.
The deluge caused by a tropical low across the north-west of Western Australia, set rainfall records in Carnarvon and Minilya.
The Gascoyne River peaked at 7.1 metres at Nine Mile bridge on Saturday morning.
The Bureau of Meteorology said the Gascoyne River flooded every 10 years, on average, with the last significant flood in December 2010, when the river peaked at 7.7 metres.
Main Roads has reopened the North West Coastal Highway from Overlander Roadhouse to Carnarvon, restoring the Carnarvon-to-Geraldton route, which is south of the town. However, it could be a week before a road north of Carnarvon is reopened.
Main Roads spokesman Dean Roberts said North West Coastal Highway remained closed north of Carnarvon from the Blowholes through Minilya to Burkett Road.
“We have 10 kilometres of road which has been completely washed away with the severity of the floods,” he said.
The north-west of WA has not been the only part of Australian that has seen campers scrambling for higher ground recently. The camping area at Wings Wildlife Park at Gunns Plains were also completely flooded over the weekend.
whinnying grey nomads if it.s passing down rain over several hundred kilometres and as most caravan parks and camping grounds are in low lying areas how much common sense do you need to know your likely to get a flood and make sure your on high ground instead of blaming someone else
Horses whinny what’s that to do with grey nomads
What a mess. Apparently this section of the North West Coastal highway was washed out in 2010. Same 10 kms. Maybe time to rethink the rebuild.