Flooding is not just about inundation - isolation is also a significant issue

Maitland's flood in retrospect (Part II)

The flood of the past week or so caused much inconvenience to farmers and other residents of the Maitland area. Farmland was inundated by cold floodwater, with significant negative implications for grass and crop growth: lucerne suffers root rot when subjected to lengthy inundation as it has been on this occasion. In addition much fencing has been damaged or destroyed, and sheds and farm machinery have been damaged and hay lost. There have been significant livestock welfare and evacuation issues as well with cattle and horses.

As always, several roads were cut. Many people became completely isolated in terms of road access. Floodplain residents from Luskintyre to Millers Forest were badly affected by this. So too the residents of Gillieston Heights who experienced their first bout of days-long isolation since the 'superstorm' flood of 2015. Oakhampton Heights was also cut off for a long period, as was Hinton.

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Before 2015, Gillieston Heights had never been cut off from access to Maitland: its only access problem appeared to be from the flooding of Testers Hollow which has occurred, on average, about every 3-5 years for several decades. In 2015 there were serious problems of food supply given that the then sole shop on Cessnock Rd quickly ran out of supplies. Now there is a small supermarket, but it was quickly stripped of meat, bread, milk and other items. It had to be resupplied and this was possible only intermittently by the volunteers of the State Emergency Service in floodboats.

The new pharmacy and the medical centre also had difficulties in staff getting to work and in the pharmacy's case in maintaining stocks of medications. One fast-food outlet, unable get staff in to run or supervise operations, could not trade for days. Two others needed to be supplied by floodboat, the SES keeping them going. Gillieston Heights has more retail and service self-sufficiency now than it did seven years ago but it still a 'dormitory' suburb reliant on larger centres like Maitland and Green Hills in East Maitland, and it struggled again by being cut off from the outside world. Prices for groceries bought locally are usually higher than elsewhere.

Parents have to continue to pay child care fees to keep their children's day care places even though they cannot get them to day care for the time being.

This time around a baby with breathing problems had to be rescued and taken to hospital by floodboat and a small child with tonsillitis needed attention. A COVID-affected woman wanted to have her baby's heartbeat monitored, and a heavily pregnant woman had to be transported to Maitland by Unimog (a high-clearance army vehicle) with her family.

There may have been other medical emergencies experienced by the residents of Gillieston Heights. Meanwhile residents, including children, suffered the 'cabin fever' brought on by isolation a common ailment when isolation is prolonged and normal routines, social contacts and work activities are disrupted. People are having to postpone medical appointments.

In such circumstances the chances of alcohol being abused, sometimes leading to domestic violence, are increased though incidents of that nature have not been reported from Gillieston Heights. Casual workers, unable to access their workplaces, are not being paid.

All this is a reminder that flooding is not just about inundation. Isolation is also a significant issue that needs to be managed, but it is often little considered in the process of planning suburban development. Isolation can produce very severe consequences, especially medically. Indeed people can die because of delays in getting them to hospital.

Or they can die as a result of driving into floodwaters. That happened in 2015 when an elderly Gillieston Heights woman, needing milk, drove to Maitland to obtain it. Her small car was washed off Cessnock Rd on the return journey and she drowned.

In Australia, entering floodwaters is the most common cause of death during time of flooding. We seem unable to resist it. Most, especially young men, survive, but a few do not.

Train services have been suspended for days, and for only the third time since they were constructed in the 1970s the floodgates to the west of the Maitland Railway Station had to be closed and sandbagged. Driving on the New England Highway was frustratingly slow at times, as was also the case on roads within the Maitland area which became congested because other roads were impassable. The road damage is considerable, but the council (having been one of those 'declared' a natural disaster area by the higher levels of government) will be helped with the repair bill.

Despite the significant damaging consequences including the restrictions on lives which the flooding caused, residents of 'urban' Maitland proper were little affected in terms of normal life. Water did not flow from the river down the Oakhampton Floodway to threaten the Long Bridge, as it will in larger floods than this one. Large-scale evacuation was not needed, but some rescues were. Only a few houses took in water, and fortunately no deaths appear to have occurred.

This flood has been far less damaging and traumatic than many others in Maitland's history. The levees appear to have performed well though briefly there were concerns about structural integrity at one location on the ring levee at South Maitland. There will be damage to the flood mitigation scheme to repair as there always are after significant floods.

Farmers will be the people most affected financially by this flood, as they almost always are, and they often cannot access the help they need from government. Others, particularly the residents of Gillieston Heights, will probably remember the flood as a time of frustration, boredom and 'stir craziness'. Some will feel it has been worse than that.

Chas Keys is a former Deputy Director General of the NSW State Emergency Service and the author of two books about floods in the Maitland area (Maitland, City on the Hunter: fighting floods or living with them? (2008) and Maitland Speaks: the experience of floods (2020)). The second of these books can be obtained from McDonald's Bookstore in High St.

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