Timaru Flood Room winding down, Wednesday May 26, 4.00 pm

Environment Canterbury is winding down the operation of its Timaru Flood Room, as rainfall continues to weaken across South Canterbury and river levels are dropping.

The room has been open for the last two nights, from Monday morning, with hydrologists and flood controllers monitoring the rising rivers hourly and ensuring local authorities, emergency services and Civil Defence were kept informed.

All rivers remained within their stopbanks over the past three days. However, the intensity of the rain in many places meant there has been and continues to be a lot of surface flooding.

Rainfall intensities today have been down to 1-2 mm/ hour, compared to 10 mm/hour on Tuesday and early this morning.

The Timaru, Waimate and Mackenzie District Councils emergency operations centres are now closed. The Waitaki District Council’s emergency operations centre is remaining open.

For footage of the South Canterbury flood http://www.timaru.govt.nz/emergency-management/479-heavy-rain-footage-may-2010.html or www.timaruherald.co.nz


For information regarding road closures, go to:
http://maps.aa.co.nz/traffic/roadwatch


River levels and rain recorders:
http://ecan.govt.nz/services/online-services/monitoring/river-flows/
http://ecan.govt.nz/services/online-services/monitoring/rainfall/