Upper Yarra
Tuesday, 1 November, 2022
$1.8 million for new raptor rehab centre
Thousands of homes without power
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Mail Labor releases its first budget
Local nominated for Vic Senior Aus of the year
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A Star News Group Publication
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Region drenched The region has seen a major drenching in the past week with homes, businesses and roads all being affected by extreme downpours. Tuesday 26 October saw close to 75mm of rain in around an hour and a half, with a fiveminute window of rain falling at an astonishing 120mm per hour in the Lilydale and surrounding areas. Most parts of the Yarra Valley were affected, including Lilydale, Seville and Coldstream. All local emergency crews including local CFA brigades, Healesville SES, Lilydale SES and Upper Yarra SES have all been working around the clock to assist the community. Lilydale SES Unit Controller Shaun Caulfield said the unseasonal rain was one of the heaviest and most intense downpours the region has seen in some time. “I was in the car at the time and it was pretty hectic, to say the least. A lot of people have called us because they were concerned about rising water and they’ll be okay, but it’s certainly impacted quite a number of properties,” he said. “About 40-50 properties have had significant water go through them and are going to have damage to carpets and flooring. We’re lucky at the moment we haven’t had anybody that’s needed to relocate from their residence but it’s going to be a significant repair bill for a lot of those homeowners.” Lilydale SES responded to 210 jobs including 24 floodwater rescues as a result of the storm cell event. Mr Caulfield said sadly they did see a lot of people that were still driving on flooded roads. “While it’s easy to say it was flash flooding, it certainly didn’t come down that suddenly that people were stuck on a road as it suddenly flooded,” he said. “The roads were already inundated with water and people were still making choices to drive into deep water, we had one instance of three cars that all driving to the same flooded road and all somehow got stranded.” It wasn’t long before the Upper Yarra also saw mother nature’s strength with more rain
Local residents and business owners spent the morning cleaning and surveying the damage, with this car being picked up by the water. Picture: PARKER MCKENZIE
The car submerged by flood waters in Yarra Junction.
arriving later in the week, flooding Yarra Junction badly affecting businesses and homes. Water rose to over a metre deep in some parts of Yarra Junction - flooding businesses, lifting cars and causing widespread damage late into the evening on Thursday October 28. On the morning of Friday 28 October, residents and business owners were busy cleaning
points, the carpet was knee-high with water.” Several road closures still remain in place due to flooding and damages, with traffic being diverted off the Melba Highway in Yarra Glen from flooding and off the Warburton Highway between Warburton and Millgrove due to land slippage. Turn to pages 4-5 for more on the flooding
YARRA RANGES
up the aftermath and surveying the damage caused by the flooding. Local business owner Ash said when he arrived at his real estate agency, water poured out of the front door when it was opened despite sandbags placed at the entrance. “It’s a mess, the whole place was full of water,” he said. “It was pouring out of the power
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