Authorities are working to restore access to the remote South Australian mining community of Roxby Downs, after floodwaters washed away a section of the highway in and out of the town.
The Olympic Dam Highway is the only sealed road into the town in the state's far north, but it was cut on Saturday by a wash out amid heavy rain.
That damage has put pressure on the town's supermarket, leaving the local population of approximately 4,500 people facing temporary supply shortages.
Work to restore the road has begun but, late yesterday, Roxby Downs Council chief executive Roy Blight said it was too early to tell when the highway would be ready for traffic.
"The road to the south is vitally important, from a community access point of view, and, obviously, for supplies into Olympic Dam," he said.
"The other issue obviously is the matter of supply — of food, fuel — into Roxby Downs, together with essential materials for the operation of Olympic Dam."
Roxby Downs is the closest town to BHP's Olympic Dam mine site, which is a few kilometres away, and its population is partly comprised of transient mine workers.
"There's good communication happening in the community and we've reached out to BHP and Andamooka to make sure the outlying areas are also being attended to," Mr Blight said.
He said the Olympic Dam airport remained operational.
The Roxby Downs supermarket has run out of bread, and Woolworths said there was reduced availability of some items but other essentials were still available.
It expects a delivery scheduled for today will be delayed by about 24 hours.
"It's hoped road access will be re-established tomorrow to allow our truck to deliver stock to the store by Tuesday," a Woolworths spokesperson said.
"While there is currently reduced availability of some items, we continue to have key essentials available and will be working to increase stock levels as soon as our deliveries can resume."
Other remote towns also affected
Spud's Roadhouse operator Clinton Stephenson, who is based in Pimba about 85 kilometres away, said fixing the highway could take several days.
"The road is still not passable, it is closed still," he told ABC Radio Adelaide this morning.
"With the damage that was done, it is going to take a bit of time.
"It's probably going to be a few days before they can get it up to a stage when heavy vehicles [could use it]."
The remote communities of Woomera and Andamooka have also been effectively marooned by the damage to the road.
Andamooka Observatory operator Leila Day said the town's main street was submerged by floodwaters on Saturday.
"Most of our roads are dirt, so they're pretty wet," she said.
Ms Day said the Olympic Dam Highway briefly reopened to light traffic, including cars, on Sunday night before it was shut again, and is currently impassable.
"We're expecting another deluge so they've had to close it again," she said.
"Everyone's bunkered down at home, cleaning up.
"Roxby Downs is the main hub for Andamooka, Woomera and Pimba. It supplies all of those towns."
State Emergency Service (SES) duty officer Brenton Clarke said it was not the only outback road to have sustained damage, and that efforts were now underway to fix them.
"A number of councils in the area will start to reassess those roads," he said.
The SES said there had been 400 requests for assistance over the past few days, many of them in the state's north.
Janice English told ABC's Regional Drive program more than a dozen cars were stranded on the Sturat Highway, about 5km south of Glendambo.
She said trucks were also stuck due to the deep floodwaters.
The closure of the road means traffic to the town of Coober Pedy in the state's far north has been cut off.
Several people stuck in floodwaters were also rescued by SES crews, including a driver whose vehicle was swept away, seeing him wait on top of his car in the middle of a raging creek for several hours.
Widespread flooding across South Australia's north and west over the weekend was caused by downpours in the wake of ex-Tropical Cyclone Tiffany.
Several locations had set "all-time records" in terms of rainfall, in what was a "highly unusual weather event", the Bureau of Meteorology said.
"We have seen falls over the last three or so days around the 200-millimetre mark," forecaster Bonnie Haselgrove said.
