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| CLASS ACTION BREWING: Flood gates opened on Wivenhoe Dam. |
NO ONE was available to take charge of the floods crisis at Wivenhoe Dam because the relevant senior bureaucrats were on holiday, flood inquiry documents reveal.
John Bradley, then director-general of the Department of Resource Management and now Anna Bligh's right-hand man, went on holiday on December 25, 2010, leaving his deputy, Debbie Best, in charge.
But Mr Bradley had removed Ms Best as his authorised delegate in respect of dam safety in August, 2010, nominating instead Kate Jones's top adviser Terry Wall - who was also on holiday.
Mr Wall returned from leave and took over on January 10. Mr Bradley cut short his holiday by a week and was on deck the following afternoon.
By that time the dam engineers were muddling through without help from senior bureaucrats.
On January 10 and 11, as the crisis escalated, they sought advice from Seqwater's principal engineer, Barton Maher, and dam safety director Peter Allen, No. 4 on Mr Bradley's list of approved delegates.
The engineers asked Mr Allen late on January 10 to approve a delay in releases as Wivenhoe approached the safety-critical level of 74m set by the manual - so that big dam outflows would not coincide with flows into the Brisbane River from Lockyer Creek. But Mr Allen was reluctant to permit this for more than a few hours.
The $15 million flood inquiry made no findings or recommendations relating to dam safety or the 74m "trigger" level for strategy W4, under which protecting the dam becomes the priority, rather than preventing downstream flooding.
The flood inquiry's 654-page final report, which recommended the dam engineers be investigated by the Crime and Misconduct Commission for making false reports about their actions, focused almost entirely on January 8 and 9, even though most of the testimony last year focused on the height of the crisis on January 10 and 11.
www.CourierMail.com.au
20.3.12
