Floods in VIC - everyone ok?

[The Duckmeister]

Melbourne has some crazy random floods. Anyone remember the 2010(?) ones? I was at southern cross station on that day waiting for the skybus to the airport when it started getting bad.
The bus still left but within a few min there was water seeping in through the side door, looking out the window there were cars half under water and fucking hailstone icebergs floating around! And this was around north/west melb before we'd even left the city

we somehow made it to the airport - all cheered the driver.. then kinda realised that the airport had been smashed too so all the flights were delayed by like 6+hrs!

Bits of the Maribyrnong, particularly in the eponymous suburb are well-known for flooding, even when other areas aren't affected.

Into the centre of the city, Elizabeth St is built over the course of an old creek; if you look across the river from Southbank, you can see a quite large stormwater outlet that aligns with Liz St, which is a remnant of the old creek. In a heavy deluge in 1972 or '73, Liz St returned to its original state and flooded. My late grandfather worked in the city as a tailor, and recalled the occasion with an oft-retold tale... He had to pick up a pair of trousers from a client a few blocks away, so the easiest thing to do was walk there & back. The flood occurred between the out & back trips, so he had to walk through the water on his way back. So rather than mess up his own daks, he changed into the client's daks - in the middle of the city - 'cos they needed fixing up anyway, and it didn't matter if they got wet.

 

[SummitFever]

Was staying in Melbourne once when a huge downpour filled the street below with about half a metre of water. Was garbage day and when the garbage truck came along its bow wave sent a whole bunch of parked cars floating off in various directions as it passed.

Good luck and best wishes to any of you burners suffering with this latest stretch of rain.

 

[Chriso_29er]

Local area has been mostly ok through this.
Not so much the massive downpour we had this afternoon.

Didn't stop the local 4wders having a bit of fun.

 

[beeb]

That's pretty keen for a 4WD without a snorkel.

 

[Tubbsy]

That's pretty keen for a 4WD without a snorkel.

Plus the fact that surprises like this could be lurking beneath:

 

[beeb]

Plus the fact that surprises like this could be lurking beneath:

View attachment 393791

Meanwhile for those cars you can see in the background of your photo...

Spoiler

 

[Asininedrivel]

That's pretty keen for a 4WD without a snorkel.

It's cool it's a Jeep it's not like there's anything of value there.

Stuff like this must be why the SES guys say "you must not drive through floodwaters" 5,000 times every press conference.

 

[Chriso_29er]

That's pretty keen for a 4WD without a snorkel.

Typical Jeep driver haha. Probably the first time it's been off road.. and it was still on road.

 

[Chriso_29er]

Here's what it looked like in the main street next suburb along!

 

[ozzybmx]

Typical Jeep driver haha. Probably the first time it's been off road.. and it was still on road.

We were staying in Bright and went up to Hotham for lunch. Came across a bloke waving me down at a carpark... there it was, a black Jeep Wrangler stuck on top of a pile of iced snow that had been cleared into the corner of the carpark and this turnip decided to drive over it in his '4WD' that had never seen any action apart from Melbourne hook turns in its life.

It was balanced on the belly pan, rocking back and forward. I gave them advice on vehicle setup to prepare for getting off the ice pile, what to do as the vehicle rolled off and where to stop... then snatched them off the top of the ice pile.
I unhooked the snatch strap and started rolling it up, they drove off without even saying thanks.

 

[rockmoose]

We were staying in Bright and went up to Hotham for lunch. Came across a bloke waving me down at a carpark... there it was, a black Jeep Wrangler stuck on top of a pile of iced snow that had been cleared into the corner of the carpark and this turnip decided to drive over it in his '4WD' that had never seen any action apart from Melbourne hook turns in its life.

It was balanced on the belly pan, rocking back and forward. I gave them advice on vehicle setup to prepare for getting off the ice pile, what to do as the vehicle rolled off and where to stop... then snatched them off the top of the ice pile.
I unhooked the snatch strap and started rolling it up, they drove off without even saying thanks.

Now THAT is surprising. Especially from a Jeep owner.

 

[cammas]

I don’t see the Youies opening back up this weekend as it would have got smashed last night, as the Bacchus to Geelong road was closed again this morning due to flooding, we only copped the edge of it in Bacchus and it was pretty horrendous

 

[mike14]

Melbourne has some crazy random floods. Anyone remember the 2010(?) ones? I was at southern cross station on that day waiting for the skybus to the airport when it started getting bad.
The bus still left but within a few min there was water seeping in through the side door, looking out the window there were cars half under water and fucking hailstone icebergs floating around! And this was around north/west melb before we'd even left the city

we somehow made it to the airport - all cheered the driver.. then kinda realised that the airport had been smashed too so all the flights were delayed by like 6+hrs!

I needed to get a regional train out from Spencer St (after wading through knee deep water down Little Bourke St near the Myer.
The roof actually collapsed forcing them to close the train part of the station. Of course they did this by cancelling all the trains, lowering a barricade and providing no advice what so ever to the hundreds of people who suddenly realized that they had absolutely no way to get home.
I honestly thought there was going to be a min-riot break out and I almost got in a dust-up with one of the security guys while trying to explain to him that they needed to get someone out there with a microphone and a plan to help all these people out. Absolute shambles.

Fortuntely for me I managed to find a mate who had decided to head out the same way in his car, so managed to grab a lift.

 

[beeb]

I don’t see the Youies opening back up this weekend as it would have got smashed last night, as the Bacchus to Geelong road was closed again this morning due to flooding, we only copped the edge of it in Bacchus and it was pretty horrendous

View attachment 393821

Did you say road closures?

This is up around my region:

 

[The Duckmeister]

OK where I am, even though it's reclaimed swamp, so low & flat. The creek near my place runs underground for a few km, but in heavy rain it spouts up through vents in the tunnel & runs above ground. Its channel was well-filled but not overflowing.

Further downstream where it runs in a more natural course, it's about 700mm higher than normal. There's a canoe jetty where I launch to go for a paddle. It's two-level, with about 200-250mm difference between them, and the jetty frame & deck are about 250mm. Normally the water is a bit below the bottom of the lower beams, but when I went for a look after work the upper deck was barely above the water, and a photo I saw from this morning showed it completely under! Some low-lying properties that back onto the creek have water all the way to their back verandahs!


View attachment 393427Edit: pic taken after last week's intense dumping, with upper jetty deck just breaking the surface. It's about the same level now. Kinda impressive effort for a normally semi-tidal creek!

Visited this spot on my local a couple more times since it was this high. On Monday the level was 620mm below the top of the jetty deck (barely visible in this pic). After last night/this morning's rain it has risen 100mm.

EDIT: For geographic context, the beach is about 200m out of frame to the right, the mouth about 7km further down from this view. Bay tide has a small influence here, but not much. About 5km downstream from this vantage point there is a natural choke point in the creek, narrow & shallow. This reduces the tidal influence upstream, but also backs up water coming down.

 

[The Reverend]

Melbourne has some crazy random floods. Anyone remember the 2010(?) ones? I was at southern cross station on that day waiting for the skybus to the airport when it started getting bad.
The bus still left but within a few min there was water seeping in through the side door, looking out the window there were cars half under water and fucking hailstone icebergs floating around! And this was around north/west melb before we'd even left the city

we somehow made it to the airport - all cheered the driver.. then kinda realised that the airport had been smashed too so all the flights were delayed by like 6+hrs!

I arrived in Straya in 2010 and it's one of my most striking memories. People surfing through street on surfboards. Crazy

 

[Mattyp]

I don’t see the Youies opening back up this weekend as it would have got smashed last night, as the Bacchus to Geelong road was closed again this morning due to flooding, we only copped the edge of it in Bacchus and it was pretty horrendous

View attachment 393821

This was the BP at little river this afternoon when I was heading back to Melbourne.

 

[Cardy George]

Cheers! I'll have a chat to Jezza too, we shared a camp in Melrose, they're good people, he'll tell me what he knows.

In the meantime, the river is full!

There's a track at the base of the cliff that leads to a little beach. It's currently under that dark patch of water.

Quoting myself so you can click on the pictures.

It's getting up there. From what I can work out we're about 4 meters over our average height, give or take. Echuca peaked at roughly 9 meters over their average. Happy to be corrected.

 

[fjohn860]

Quoting myself so you can click on the pictures.

It's getting up there. From what I can work out we're about 4 meters over our average height, give or take. Echuca peaked at roughly 9 meters over their average. Happy to be corrected.

That's one way to negate the rigmarole of using a lock

 

[cammas]

Yarra flooding again was okay in the city just licking the edges again but once I got towards Richmond I got “You shall not pass!”
So I scrambled up the grass and had to take the road for last kilometre.