There are a range of government funded projects underway to help Victoria recover from the floods of early 2011 and to boost Victoria’s capacity to deal with similar floods in the future.

Some of the projects funded by DSE’s Water Group include:

Lower Loddon Irrigators Recovery Package

Announced by the Minister for Water on 27 April 2011, this three-part assistance package totalling $21 million is designed to help irrigators on the Lower Loddon floodplain recover.

Details of the package are available on the Department of Primary Industries website.

Flood warning system recovery

$6.34 million will be invested for the repair and improvement to the flood warning system for the timely prediction of flood peaks.

This will include repairing and replacing stream gauges and flood warning equipment that were damaged in the floods, collecting and assessing flood data from the recent floods and addressing gaps in the flood warning system.

Floodzoom

Floodzoom is a web based tool for mapping floods and their impacts on communities. The $12.1 million tool will use weather forecast models, satellite observations, river gauges and hydrological modelling to improve warnings and emergency response.

Emergency services can use Floodzoom as a more accurate prediction of flood behaviour to co-ordinate response to reduce flood impacts.

The community can view the Floodzoom maps to see likely flood movements, and in turn take actions to assess their own flood risk and reduce damages.

Planning and scoping of the Floodzoom project will be undertaken during 2011/12, and it will become available from July 2013 onwards.

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