IN FULL: Tasmanian authorities give an update on weather emergency | ABC NEWS

all right go ahead well good afternoon everybody firstly can I thank again our emergency services our power Crews and road crews who are doing phenomenal work right around our state it's very difficult and dangerous work at times uh particularly with the conditions we're still seeing warnings that will be appearing over the coming days so we want to acknowledge the important work of our emergency responders as we go through this event thank you to the community for responding so well uh we are seeing um flood and storm impacts right around our state and tasmanians have really uh stepped up to the plate uh providing support for their neighbors for their family members and loved ones in a whole range of different ways the uh Premier has been in the north of the state today meeting with Crews and volunteers up there and I've been in the dant Valley this morning and want to acknowledge all of the work from our partners in emergency services but across Civil Society uh people like the Red Cross local government and others who've been providing important Services as we work through this difficult event there are now um we are now seeing impacts to businesses and homes uh in particular areas of flooding and the emergency services will be providing an important update in this area I want to stress uh to the community that our crews are working as hard as they can to ensure uh that uh services are uh put back on for communities uh but we acknowledge that that is taking some time uh overnight we've sadly had two workers who've been injured while they've been undertaking their work and it's our hearts go out to them and their loved ones and it's a reminder to our community uh that we have people uh doing very difficult work in very trying conditions and um we appreciate the community's understanding as we work through that it also demonstrates why so important that we follow the warnings from Emergency Services if the road is closed or emergency services are providing you information and instructions please follow those warnings particularly when it comes to our roads if there is flood water on the road please turn around if it's flooded forget it uh we want our community to um follow those warnings as well it's important to stay updated so download the Taz alert app it's your single source of Truth for what you need to do in an emergency and it will provide notifications for areas relevant to you so with that I'll pass over to our Emergency Services could you please introduce yourself to start yeah okay good afternoon Simon Lewis Here senior meteorologist with the Bureau of meteorology now we've clearly seen very destructive weather conditions over the last uh 24 to 48 hours including widespread destructive wind gusts across the North and the west of the State Overnight last night those included gusts of over 110 Colm hour at both Bernie and devonport and notably we had record wind gusts for Lon CEST and Airport of 130 km perh and at King Island of 157 km hour fortunately the strongest gusts and the the windiest conditions have now passed uh but we're not completely out of the woods so we are starting to see winds and gustiness ease across the state today uh but we will see we do have a severe weather warning for early hours of tomorrow morning uh just for the the Le slopes of the western tear so that could affect places like mole Creek uh where they could see damaging wind gusts just reintensification over the last 6 to seven days across many parts of the state the most significant flooding is occurring in the derent river catchment uh where we're currently forecasting record levels just below Meadow Bank Dam um and that's translating to a flood Peak expected near the major flood level this evening about mcari Plains fortunately further Downstream at new Norfolk uh it doesn't look as though we'll see quite such significant flooding with the flood forecast for their currently expected to remain minor we also do have flood warnings across many other flood caps across the state uh including moderate flooding for the Mery the Meander uh the southesk and the northes and minor flood warnings current for the mcari river and the uh fing sorry the Fourth River how bad are the um conditions expected to peak in the M Cory Plains area tonight so we're expecting the flood uh the river level to reach about 6.7 M uh so that's right on the major flood level for that River catchment mcar Plains and what have been the highest rainfalls over the last 24 hours uh so we've seen sort of 40 to 60 mm in the west of the state um and yeah that's really just contributed we haven't really seen super significant single day totals uh it's really over the last 6 to seven days where we' seen accumulated Falls of 200 to 300 mm across that part of the catchment that's led to this flooding are you expecting more rain to continue moving down over the next few days and for flood levels to remain quite High uh so for most of those catchments the flood levels are peing today or later today um we will see an easing in the rainfall over the next 24 to 48 hours uh particularly much lighter totals expected during Tuesday however as we head into Wednesday and later on in the week we will see some moderate rainfall redeveloping in the West in particular of the State uh so that could slow the um the rate at which the rivers drop um but that's much more moderate rainfall than what we've seen so far so we're not expecting that to lead to you know really prong oned High Peaks or new flood Peaks we've got a significant number of houses still out of power uh what are you looking at in terms of damaging winds around the St uh so as I said we're expecting it to ease quite a bit uh during tomorrow with the exception of that area just in the Lee of the western tiers which could see some damaging gusts overnight tonight um but generally tomorrow we should see a lot less uh wind around from Wednesday we'll start to see northwesterly winds increasing be fresh and Gusty but absolutely nothing like we've seen over the last uh two or 3 days so just fresh and Gusty winds continuing from Wednesday probably through to the next cold front which is expected to cross Friday night now that cold front is nowhere near as strong as the ones we've seen the last couple of you know Friday night and last night so not expecting those sorts of extremely destructive winds to reoccur at this point and the rainfall has been a little bit on and off does that mean that there's a higher chance people could get caught out by it a sudden River Rise uh certainly the rainfall is becoming more showery um so that means the the totals are less widespread across the catchment um and we haven't seen we had thunderstorms over night last night which can lead to some really locally intense Falls which uh can lead to some of those like flash flood type situations we're not expecting thunderstorms for the next couple of days um but we will be keeping an eye on how that develops uh towards later in the week and towards the weekend is there how great is the risk of flash floods uh it's decreased now that those heavier Falls um have sort of eased off we just rainfall totals today have just been sort of 5 to 10 ms so not too significant um but as I said we'll just be keeping on how this next front develops later in the week just to confirm on warnings you did you say you're not expecting to have to upgrade any of those warnings that are currently in place uh we always monitor the warnings extremely carefully and so um at this stage it's looking like we've got most of the rainfall in the catchments that uh would lead to significant changes to the warnings but as always we're monitoring those River levels and if we see anything we'll be updating the warnings uh one other thing I should mention it's quite cold at the moment we've got snow lines down to around 500 M um so there's a bushwalkers alert out I know there's people out in the back country and it's it's quite cold and there's quite a bit of snow around we're expecting that snow line to stay low through till about this evening and then that will go up rapidly overnight tonight so much warmer conditions during the middle part of the week and that can contribute to the the river levels as well can't it yeah so the snow is a bit of a double- EDG sword uh it means that at at the moment um some of that rainfall about The High Ground will have been captured as snow um that will probably melt during the week and so that can help to prolong the enhanced flows in the river catchments great thank you very much thank yous yes um good afternoon M executive director SC so we've seen another wild night of uh of weather across the state with extensive destruction in particular in the north of State this time and um in around the greater list area um sces responded to 347 uh requests for assistance last night and that's coming off a busy week that's seen around 760 requests for assistance since Tuesday with this prolonged weather event that that we have been working through the damage and destruction we saw last night was uh wind driven primarily uh broken windows uh broken ruls a lot of down trees and there's a lot of debris out there so we do ask everyone continue to remain safe we're also monitoring um extensive um more sorry we're also monitoring minor and moderate flooding across the state in particular the river systems in the north there are currently 20 um warnings that are are in place with one emergency warning to evacuate uh which is in the uh dant River uh in around the meadow Bank area um we're continuing to monitor these conditions um overnight we are expecting um some damaging winds uh tonight um we're continuing to work through um the assistance so work through the request for assistance that we have at the moment um and our crews are doing an amazing job and uh and continue to do so they're obviously fairly fatigued at this point after several days of action and we're rotating those Crews to make sure that they're they're looking out for themselves we ask the community continue to monitor um the alerts and the warnings um at on the Tas alert website or the Taz alert app um to maintain um awareness of what the conditions are in around those conditions are changing a little bit there will be changes uh to warning so please continue to monitor the conditions and behave behave a in an appropriate manner to the conditions and ensure that um you're making um good decisions and staying safe do you know how many SCS workers are currently out there helping people I think we've had almost every SCS member um that are on our books that have been um in around helping the community over the past week um in particular um we're we're trying to rotate those Crews so that we we have you know got some rest there and managing the fatigue of those Crews so you know it's about 700 fantastic volunteers across the state that have been uh reacting over the past uh past week were the two Injured Workers SCS workers no they weren't can you provide more details on those injuries at all uh they weren't SCS workers Felix will you be right to answer some more questions just on the isolated communities in the D Valley um what's the situation around there West away and son have you received any calls from for assistance from people in those communities yeah so there's a fair bit of work going that went into the preparation for that event over the past 24 hours um or in fact the past 48 Hours we've tried to get to to door knock out to those areas in conjunction with the Tasmanian police and Tasmanian fire service been door knocking those areas to make people um aware of uh the the dangers that that may come as part of the flooding um we've asked a majority of those people in those impacted areas that are either going to be inundated or impacted by those flood waters um to evacuate and we continue to to work with the community to to monitor those conditions uh there will be areas that are going to be isolated over the next 24 to 48 hours and we ask people make uh make informed decisions and understand the danger in around the areas that they they're going to be living or working in how many more assistant requests are you expected over the coming days we're hoping to see that the there there's going to be a bit of a drop in the request for assistance over night you know fingers crossed that we get a little bit of a break in the weather to to rest our crews um and also obviously U manage the backlog of request for assistance and we're triaging at the moment what's the situation with the Met back down do you expect to have better releas yeah so it's an automated system at the moment that's factored into the flood modeling that that uh that was covered by the the bureau um earlier so again we're going to see those peaks of that uh that water flow uh tonight um up to around 2000 um through to midnight down through that uh down through that river system the evacuation cent in north um we know they didn't have a heap of traffic overnight if they had any more now since those blood warnings were increased earlier today for the no the last thing last thing I heard there was n registrations in around the uh that evacuation Center a majority of those had been from um from the Caravan Park um previously that had been previously evacuated by the local Council as a cautionary measure um my understanding is the majority of people that have evacuated have probably moved to family and friends and around the area which is you know more than reasonable and how has the SCS found um the the behavior of the community have communities been willing to listen and get out of impacted areas or is the SCS concerned by reports that some people have been embarking on bushwalks yeah look um we just asked the people you know really monitor the conditions act act in the safe way for the most part the community been fantastic they you know they've been re Ive to the information that we've been pushing out um and you know what we do ask those that are in those impacted areas if you do have the opportunity you know obviously we're requesting that that you do evacuate so you don't put yourselves or anyone else at risk the new nor mayor said she'd heard reports of some people playing in the flood flood waters or going swimming how dangerous is behavior like that if it's true yeah look flood waters are are are very very dangerous we ask anyone to please do not play or walk or drive through flood waters um it is a serious situation um you know the last thing we want to see is a loss of life through through people just not behaving or or not um not assessing the risk correctly yeah and how would you assess the level of risk to to people's lives at the moment and I mean we heard from bomb that the the risk of flash flooding seems relatively low yeah look um just stay away from flood waters is is what we're encouraging so there are going to be areas that they're becoming inated over the next 24 hours in particular those Peaks through tonight stay away from U flood waters stay safe um if you need um assistance for 132500 or if it's life-threatening place called triple Z there was there was a media report this morning that a woman was stranded in the D Valley uh and in Native dialysis do you have an update on that situation so I'm not tracking that um that situation um with the T Network outages what kind of challenges does that pose working in some areas of the yeah obviously if if you know if if there is a phone outage it does make it difficult for people to request assistance U we try and maintain awareness of where those outages are and we and and have a bit more of a presence in around those areas so that we can be aware of what the situation is and you know working with our Emergency Management um Partners in particular um Tasmanian police to um to to ensure that we're um reaching out to those that potentially could be in danger and what's your advice to people that maybe can't access the Taz alerts page because they don't have phal internet connection um we ask them to to remain in a a safe location if you're able to if you think you're in danger and you're able to evacuate do so and move to um obviously move to High Ground um but we do ask everyone to be absolutely as as cognizant of the danger um and the emerging situation as they can do you have an idea of the number of people in the D chosen not to evacuate I don't have those figures in front of me at the moment and we've heard in the past there's been issues around communicating to Residents when they do need to evacuate are you confident that those communication channels are where they need to be in the case that you do need an emergency evacuation yeah so we have already you already issued that that emergency evacuation so and and we put a lot of effort into reaching out to the community yesterday say that those people who were going to be endangered if we thought their property was going to be either isolated or inundated um that were the people that we contacted yesterday so hopefully they've been able to make an informed decision great thanks very much Jason commander of southern district with Tasmania police so from a police perspective in the 24 hours to 8: a.m. this morning we attended around 585 uh incidents Statewide uh not all of those associated with the current weather um but a significant amount certainly were in relation to storm issues and trees across the road and damage issues um our focus is is in relation to road closures and evacuations in respect to road closures there's currently around 50 roads closed across the state uh and our evacuation uh focus is clearly in the dant Valley uh we have an increased uh police presence in the dant Valley with a Ford command post established at the new norfol police station uh to coordinate uh evacuation activities in the DU Valley um we were assisted last night by a large number of TFS and SC volunteers uh and sworn police officers who managed to um managed to dwn off quite a number of houses last night and provide some advice around evacuation those activities continue today um in anticipation of the you know the continuing issues with flooding of certain areas so we've got quite a number of people on the ground uh engaged in those evacuation activities um our our focus is community safety we want to make sure that the community are safe and we just urge people to assist us with that uh by not entering flood waters by not disobeying uh Road close uh signs um and keeping up to date with information the Taz alert website um is the official source of information in relation to community warnings and they can also be obtained from the Tasmania police uh website ABC like a radio as well also um issue the alerts as well so we just ask the community to stay informed to heed the advice in relation to road closures uh and evacuations if you don't need to be in those areas please don't be there uh please don't be on those roads if you are driving uh on the roads in hazardous conditions uh just remember your safety remember your distance between the vehicle uh you're driving the vehicle in front of you um headlights on U slow down and and and be cautious with your driving so Community safety is is Paramount important to us and how have you found the behavior of the community have they been obeying those Ro closures yeah as a whole we've been um you know really happy with um people making sensible decisions uh and not entering these Road closed areas and and flood waters so we've been pleased with the response so far and how's your Workforce going in terms of fatigue given that it's been a couple of days now you have you got the staff you need to be able to rotate those Crews yeah we do so we're constantly uh looking at our rostering and and bringing people in um but at this point in time you we we forecast out uh that we'll need people on the ground for a number of days to come and we're working through that that planning process how many um officers do you have deployed in the North and the South of the State uh in the south of the state particularly in relation to the dant Valley so we have extra resources in the dant Valley we've got up to 20 police officers uh up the D Valley I couldn't um tell you the the resources in the the north of the state at this point is it disappointing to hear there has been two people that have suffered injuries and are they from Tas police no they weren't from Tasmania police and and certainly our thoughts go with those two workers who were uh injured um you know assisting with the current weather event and we certainly wish them a very speedy recovery do you know which who were they with um I believe they may have been State growth or contractors for State growth all right and moving forward do you hope that the number of road closures will continue to go down um we will'll continue to monit that over the coming days but I think as we heard from the bureau and from uh the SC where expecting you know conditions like this for a few days to come yet so we we'll just continue to monitor that and and close roads and open roads when appropriate T networks y good afternoon everyone um Ben Duffy fault lead from Tes networks um obviously overnight we faced uh unprecedented uh number of aages across the state to give some background at the height of the storm activity last night we saw about 47,000 customers um impacted across the state that was mainly around the North and Northwest to give us some indication um North we have currently about 21,000 customers impacted by that outages up there the South we're looking at about 1,033 and in the Northwest is around 13,000 so it's clear that the North and Northwest have been severely impacted uh from a asset perspective we've seen extensive damage to power lines wise down poles down um and our crews are working tely uh today to assess that damage and restore where we can um we will see significant delays in restoration um obviously we're working very hard with local government uh to provide um of safety throughout the state at the moment we have around 12 um community centers available to those members of the community that are impacted um I'd strongly advise all of our customers to refer to our tab Taz networks website for outage information oh great okay so is that roughly 35,000 now so without power yeah at at present we're around 37 35 37,000 and what have been some of the the key contributors to those power outages yeah we've seen extensive damage we've seen a lot of wires down um we've SE a lot of poles down which obviously caus huge impacts to our Network um importantly the safety advice to the community is please stay clear of those wires um ensure you stay 10 m away and assume that those wires are live um obviously our focus is to ensure the safety of the Tasmanian Community the safety of our staff and the safety of our Emergency Management Partners can you give any indication of when some of these customers will have their power back we are looking at probably significant delays again um I'd urge our customers to refer to our website um we may see significant delays up to the next 5 days um but we'll be working as hard as we can to restore power where we can and among those 37,000 how many have been how many hours have some of them been without power we have seen some customers without power for up to two days um and we're again prioritizing those customers as quickly as we can the industrial action has been suspended hasn't it yeah that's not impeding our response and you have a shed any sorry go ahead Ben you got to that are you a to shed any light on how um the the phone network is going yeah we have seen some managers across the state obviously that is impacting some of our customers in relation to phone recep um it does impact some of our staff we're currently really relying on the TG Network which is obviously the whole of government Network um to ensure that we have communication uh within the field and throughout our emergency Partners you know how many I mean cell towers are down what or of I don't have that exact figure at the moment sorry cool thank you I think that's cool all right y sorry guys give me two seconds um so I'm understand the premier will be out later but I sorry can you I'm just I was good to go Josh got no I was just asking it away I was just going to say understand the premier is going to be out later but you're taking questions on other issues yeah I'll take a few obviously um yeah we'll start disc this one yeah we'll start with the injuries probably um can you shed a little bit more light on that and exactly who's being affected yeah so last night a couple of uh road crew workers were injured as they were um doing some work to repair from storm damage so as I mentioned our hearts go out to them I understand um some of their injuries U quite severe though non life-threatening um and it's a good reminder for all of us uh just the important work that they do and the and the risk that people are taking so that they can help others in our community at the moment that's why when we say we really appreciate the tesmanian community's patience uh it's because the safety of our workers and our Emergency Services Crews who are out there among the worst of it at the moment trying to help others uh are front of Mind we've heard this been some interruptions to cell phone communication um this is obviously a test Al for the government radio network how is that holding up yeah so my understanding is that the Tes grn um is doing well but look I might look to our um operational team if there's any further update you want to provide on the tgn Noor issues y but I might say just generally as well it's um it's been a really important investment so that all of our um uh land manager and Emergency Services crews are able to communicate across the one platform TZ networks is part of that our sces fire police and others and it's an important step forward particularly as we're dealing with difficult events that require a large degree of coordination in remote areas just on the Northwest Regional Hospital how long did it take to move to a generator was their period where the hospital had completely no power uh look I'm happy to provide uh happy to follow up with colleagues to provide an update on that but um my understanding is that the generator power um uh was kicked in as the electrical um Supply was disrupted but that Supply is back on now and are you confident that all major hospitals and District hospitals um have the power that they need and the generators they need if they lose their main power look this is an evolving event of course so um we may see further outages uh over coming hours and coming days but uh there is backup Supply available to these important facilities can I also to the community just reiterate that uh we need to prioritize uh particularly vulnerable cohorts of people and um critical infastructure as well so uh as mentioned we've had power out to Major hospitals they are of course our highest priority so uh when community members may be experiencing delay at their homes just we want to reiterate our thanks for your patience as we work through prioritizing uh those important facilities just check is the Northwest Regional hosital hital and other major Hospital have power outage uh look my yeah so my understanding is that there have been District hospitals that have been affected but the Northwest Regional hospital um is the um uh the the main one of the of the three major hospitals there been any consideration about declaring you know disaster area or an emergency sort of Declaration in the uh look so we're continuing to work through this event and of course we'll take advice from our Emergency Services leaders now the premier and myself have been in touch with Federal colleagues regarding recovery assistance and uh recovery assistance has already been made available to people in the dant Valley as well as people in the central highlands now we'll be monitoring this evolving situation over coming days if there are any other areas that need to be prioritized in terms of disaster relief assistance uh and we thank the federal government as well as our partners in local government uh for their assistance yeah and we heard earlier that businesses continue to be affected by this does that mean that you're considering increasing the level of assistance to support those businesses yes so the disaster Arrangements that we have uh in this country uh have a um a range of different um protocols that we step through as the emergency unfolds uh that includes uh if we see increased flooding uh in certain areas and other damage so we'll continue to monitor that situation we've got um obviously a range of Assessments that we make but we are not we are noting that there are more businesses and households that are being affected by flooding as the Water Works its way through our catchments and for um just to clarify what's the the largest amount of financial assistance people can be eligible for So currently uh under the Declarations that have been made for the dant Valley and the central Highlands it's 250 for an individual and up to $1,000 for a family and obviously this is a an unfolding event it's still live so we'll continue to make assessments around that and are you confident that we've learned lessons from previous flood events around how to communicate with communities and and prevent any loss of life that's right we've seen significant improvements to the way that uh we respond to flood events in Tasmania after the tragedies of the 2016 flood 2022 was was um a an outstanding example of the learnings that have that we've seen in our emergency services around the way that we respond and coordinate together uh and that was a very important test for us so the Tasmanian Community can be confident that our Emergency Services have the tools that they need and are well coordinated uh and ready to respond to this event but of course we also um uh implore the community please uh follow the instructions of E services and stay up to date as well it's everyone's responsibility to ensure that the community is safe at the moment that includes right down to families and households making the right decisions making informed decisions so they can stay safe and um I kind of touched on this earlier but if people can't access the Taz alerts page are you confident they can still keep up to date that's right so ABC local radio is our national emergency broadcaster and it's important uh that if you are um unable to access telecommunications or power uh that you have uh a battery radio available in your emergency pack great I can go to other issues now that's okay um so the AE is today uh talking about a surge in workers compensation claims and says the number of teachers leaving within 5 years is up by 97% how can the state government uh reduce those figures when there's expected there'll be cuts to the education sector in the budget uh look we're looking to increase uh funding for schools and uh we acknowledge the important work that our teachers do right across our community they um do such phenomenal job teaching the Next Generation and we acknowledge um the sometimes difficult circumstances that can happen as well if they're dealing with um uh children with some behavioral issues uh but uh as part of the election campaign we made significant commitments in terms of further support for teachers that are working in hard to staff schools and we acknowledge the amazing and important work that they do each and every day a teacher that stood alongside the AE today um talked about maybe introducing welfare offices for teachers who are suffering from mental injuries um is that something you think the government would be open to consider in oh we're always uh looking to see what more we can do to support our teachers noting that the important work that they do and sometimes times in difficult circumstances as well great um oh and uh we heard a little bit more about the the northern prison this morning and groups including um the abigal legal service I believe have welcomed that um from your perspective as Minister do you think that this is the right move for that that Community uh as far as the um the change within all the prison uh yeah so look um uh this is an important decision from the government and we're looking to increase our investment into Rehabilitation and the risten prison site uh and that's um that's important we want to ensure that if people have done the wrong thing that they're held to account uh but that we don't see that kind of offending again in the future cool think oh oh school closures sorry sorry I was going through a list of things um how many do we know how many schools were closed today yeah pass over to the operation might have to sorry yep well we can provide a Works cool thank you thanks everybody appreciate thank you everyone thank you