Residents of the north coast town of Ballina are preparing for a tense night as floodwaters from two saturated catchments converge on the town, following a week of heavy rainfall that has caused devastating flooding and cost nine lives across southeast Queensland and Northern NSW.
The State Emergency Service issued an evacuation order for the town centre on Tuesday afternoon, directing people there to leave by no later than 7pm.
The Ballina Hospital was being evacuated due to the rising flood waters. NSW Ambulance and the SES temporarily relocated 55 patients to Xavier Catholic College where a makeshift emergency facility has been set up.
Flood waters from the Richmond River were expected to peak in Ballina on Tuesday night, coinciding with high tide.
The town has been on high alert since Sunday, eyeing flood waters from the saturated Wilsons River catchment, which peaked at 14.4 metres at Lismore on Monday, and Richmond river catchment, which has caused major flooding at Coraki, Bungawalbyn and Woodburn on Tuesday.
Some houses in West Ballina were flooded on Tuesday, but the waters swiftly receded. They are expected to build again to coincide with a 1.3 metre high tide on Tuesday night and a 1.8 metre king tide on Wednesday morning.
Authorities are predicting a one-in-500-year flood.
Upstream at Lismore, the flood waters have damaged hundreds of homes and businesses and are not expected to fully drain for several days, because water will have to be pumped out of areas surrounded by the flood levee.
It’s not known how many people remain stranded, and police have confirmed the body of an elderly woman was discovered by a concerned neighbour at a Lismore home on Tuesday morning.
The SES conducted at least 230 rescues in the northern rivers area on Tuesday. Power and telephone access has been cut, with high flood waters hampering repair efforts.
Water was lapping at the doorsteps of shopfronts in Ballina late on Tuesday morning as NSW police urged residents to stay out of the central business district.
The SES issued an evacuation order for South Ballina and low-lying areas of Ballina in the early hours of Tuesday. By 7am it said it was too late to move people away from the town and instead the SES advised people in low-lying areas to move to higher ground.
In North Ballina the canal has broken its banks, threatening homes and businesses and cutting off residents.
I am spending the morning evacuating in Ballina. Here’s Tamar St at king tide with the council chambers on the right pic.twitter.com/2eiciBKqX4
— Tessa Flemming (@tessa_flemming) February 28, 2022
“Rising flood water is beginning to make it unsafe to evacuate the area,” the SES said on Tuesday morning.
“Burns Point Ferry is closed and Wardell Bridge is inundated. You should immediately move to the highest safe place now, such as higher ground or inside a sturdy multi-storey building to upper levels as high above water levels as possible. Do not leave your location unless it is safe to do so.”
People were warned to take their pets, warm clothes, any medication they need, and insurance documents and move to the highest place in their area if safe to do so, and to keep moving as the water rises.
The emergency services agency warned that residents may be trapped without power, water, or other essential services, and “it may be too dangerous for NSW SES to rescue you”.
The NSW emergency services minister, Steph Cooke, said: “We must prepare for the possibility that lives have been lost. While I would love to think, and I truly hope, that we will not see any deaths from this event, I think that it is unrealistic that a disaster of this magnitude will mean that there are no lives lost.”
She urged residents across Sydney and the NSW south coast to prepare for a possible evacuation order as the low moved downwards.
Seventeen local government areas, including Ballina, have been declared natural disaster zones, while 26 evacuation warnings have been issued, affecting 40,000 residents.
On Monday Ballina was used as a base for rescue efforts for Lismore, 40km upstream, where the Wilsons River peaked at 14.4 metres – the worst on record for the northern rivers town.
The water broke over Lismore’s flood levee on Monday morning. It was higher than levels recorded in both 1974 and 1954, and is not expected to drop below major flood levels – 9.7 metres – until midday Tuesday.
Rescues continue in Lismore
More than 4,000 people were rescued by emergency services or neighbours in the area on Monday and overnight, according to Lismore’s mayor, Steve Krieg, but many people remained isolated on Tuesday morning.
Krieg told Channel Seven on Tuesday morning that nine people were still unaccounted for and 400 people were waiting to be rescued.
“The police have launched their boats to go out and start that, we also have three army helicopters in the area assisting with winch rescues, so our number one priority today is to make sure every citizen is accounted for, safe and well,” he said.
“I know there was 4,000 rescues performed yesterday by emergency service and civilians which is an incredible community effort – we’ll leave the rescues to the professionals today.”
Up to 50 people and livestock were rescued after they were stuck on a bridge in Woodburn overnight, with thousands more homes expected to be affected. The Richmond River was at 6.3 metres and rising when they were evacuated.
Dozens of people have spent the night stranded on the Woodburn bridge with their cars and horses. The Richmond River may peak near 6.9m this afternoon, above the 1954 peak of 5.42m pic.twitter.com/tgMcoe3XMN
— Gavin Coote (@GavinCoote) February 28, 2022
There were 70 Australian defence force personnel aiding with emergency response efforts in Lismore, with 100 more being deployed on Tuesday.
In Ballina, the SES has said up to 7,000 homes could be inundated. The Ballina shire council mayor, Sharon Cadwallader, told the ABC the town was expecting a one-in-500-year flood.
“The water will move slowly, but all predictions, all flood modelling that staff have done, we are facing a one-in-500-year flood and that is a serious situation for Ballina,” she said.
The NSW premier, Dominic Perrottet, said while the crisis was now focused on the north, heavy rainfall was “very quickly” moving south to metropolitan Sydney.
He said there had been 6,000 calls for assistance across the state.
“To all people, particularly across the east coast of our state, these issues may come your way,” he said. “So if those evacuation orders are made, if those evacuation warnings are made, we need to get ready, we need to work together to get through this as a state.”
Dean Narramore, a Bureau of Meteorology meteorologist, said it would be a “wet couple of days” in all of metropolitan Sydney, with minor to moderate flooding possible.
More than a dozen flood warnings were in place across the state, with record flooding at Wilsons River at Lismore and new flood records set along the Tweed River.
The river peaked at 6.51 metres at North Murwillumbah, 4.8 metres at Tumbulgum and 2.95 metres at Chinderah.
At Grafton, the Clarence River peaked at 7.66 metres, just below the levee height of 7.95 metres. Flood waters were peaking at Ulmarra at around 6 metres while Maclean was peaking at about 3.3 metres, near the town levee level.
