Crikey it’s wet

[onetrack]

I was reading about a poor bugger today, just out of Swan Hill (at a place called Mellool) - he bought a 2600 acre farm only 2 months ago - and today, only 6 acres of that farm isn't under water!!

 

https://arr.news/2022/11/10/district-flood-impacts/?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=australian-rural-and-regional-news-this-week_3

 

 

[Jerry_Atrick]

7 hours ago, old man emu said:

You know it's pretty wet when the frogs start coming inside out of the rain.

Just make sure they bring a baguette..

[old man emu]

"Sacre bleu! l pleut. Il pleut toujours" dit le petit Armand, l'ennemi juré de Molesworth"

 

"Molesworth" will have you racking your brains.

[facthunter]

No. I'm patient. I'll wait till you inform us.. I don't want "racked brains" Nev

[onetrack]

Nigel Molesworth, by Geoffrey Willans and Ronald Searle.

 

http://ronaldsearle.blogspot.com/2006/07/molesworth.html

 

Edited November 14, 2022 by onetrack

[onetrack]

The torrid weather has claimed another victim - a major derailment about 30 kms W of Geelong. What a mess! They'll have to build a road in to the derailment point, just to get the cranes in.

 

This will be a multi-million dollar loss, and the ATSB have another major investigation to carry out.

 

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-11-14/freight-train-derails-at-inverleigh-near-geelong/101649594

[facthunter]

IF the inland rail had just been built, How would it have fared?    What would flood proofing it cost? The whole thing doesn't stack up already on Proper  cost benefit analysis. Nev

[Old Koreelah]

2 hours ago, facthunter said:

IF the inland rail had just been built, How would it have fared?    What would flood proofing it cost? The whole thing doesn't stack up already on Proper  cost benefit analysis. Nev

Probably not Nev, but lots of national infrastructure wouldn’t pass such a test.

We inland people were very excited to have a rail corridor coming past us. It had the potential to enormously reduce truck traffic and the associated damage on our roads. Cudos for politicians for over-ruling the bean-counters to get the project started, but…

 

Several national firms want it used as an express service between major centres, potentially by-passing the rural communities who thought they would finally get a better link to take their produce to our ports.

[facthunter]

Clive  Palmer wants it to  link his stranded assets to the Reef Ports. That's why HE spent 80 million on adverts to keep Labor out. for 2 elections.. Barnaby owns land near the Pilliga. . Doesn't pass the PUB test. and never will.   The rail connection from Alice Springs to Darwin fell into disrepair about the 60's.  It's easily disrupted by weather events.   Nev

Edited November 14, 2022 by facthunter

[kgwilson]

Any rail link that reduces the number of trucks on our roads is a good thing IMO. Less traffic and less greenhouse gas pollution.

[Yenn]

I didn't think there was a rail between Alice and Darwin, until little Johnny got it done in the nineties. About the only good thing he ever did.

Could the fact that the railways run on embankments, which act as dams, slowing the flow of water have any effect on the flooding we are now seeing. I have been saying for years that the railways cause flooding, Maybe I am correct?

[old man emu]

Well, you only build embankments along railways to keep the tracks at the same level as they cross a depression in the land as the level on wither end. The depressions are created by water erosion over the ages so it syands to reason that they indicate where water flows.

 

 

To allow the amount of water that makes a flood to pass under an embankment, you would need several passages under the embankment and a long slipway on the downstream side to reduce erosion at the exit. Don't forget what Bernoulli told us about fluids passing through restricted passages. The water speeds up, which is an acceleration. The water has mass. Put the two together and you get a force. So the water exerts more force as it exits the pipe, so it can erode the surface more than the water folowing towards the entrance to the pipe.

[facthunter]

Yenn I'm pretty sure there was the remains of an Alice-Darwin line when I used to regularly fly to Darwin in the mid 60's. Nev

[red750]

     Day 1                                                     Day 2

[facthunter]

The Hobart Bridge was worse. Nev

[Old Koreelah]

3 hours ago, facthunter said:

Yenn I'm pretty sure there was the remains of an Alice-Darwin line when I used to regularly fly to Darwin in the mid 60's. Nev

The old narrow-gauge track never made it past Laramar, less than half way to Alice Springs. Thirty-odd years ago I helped a mate scour the abandoned track for iron sleepers; we only found bent ones. Because of termites, they were re-used in stockyards and fences.

[onetrack]

The biggest single problem is the railway engineering planning not allowing for peak flood flow with their culvert sizing.

Even the iron ore railways of the Pilbara have had massive culvert washouts, and they plan for huge flood flows from cyclonic rain events.

 

 

[facthunter]

i've seen some of the remains  between Darwin and Katherine If I recall correctly.  Nev

[pmccarthy]

I seem to recall it at Batchelor - did it run to Rum Jungle mine?

[onetrack]

The WW2 railway ran from Darwin to Birdum. There was a rail gap between Birdum and Alice Springs.

The Americans were stunned at the abysmal state of our railways (and roads) when they arrived in Feb 1942. 

 

The Ghan from Adelaide to Alice Springs couldn't carry half the American equipment, thanks to low axle loadings - and the speed of the Ghan was excruciatingly slow.

So the Americans promptly set to with their construction equipment in Feb 1942, and built the "North-South Military Highway", from Alice Springs to Darwin.

 

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/North_Australia_Railway#:~:text=The North Australia Railway was,Palmerston and Pine Creek Railway.

[onetrack]

The military convoy set speed on the North-South Military Road was 30mph maximum. This was done to economise on scarce fuel, even scarcer tyres, and to try to lengthen vehicle component life.

Heat was a killer, nearly all the vehicles in photos show bonnet sides missing, and open cabins were all the go.

Truck tyres overheated, and had to cooled by driving through special water-filled tyre-cooling troughs that were set up at regular intervals.

 

Despite all that, the N-S Military Road carried the biggest percentage of all the military freight Northwards from Adelaide in 1942 and 1943.

That, despite the authorities still running around 7 trains a day on the Darwin-Birdum line, during this period.

 

Only after the Japanese threat to Darwin and Northern waters subsided in late 1943, could American cargo ships finally start landing their cargoes into Darwin Port.

But even then, Darwin Port handling facilities and massive tides still limited the amount and type of cargoes arriving in Darwin.

 

https://www.awm.gov.au/advanced-search?query=North+South+military+highway&collection=true&facet_type=Photograph&facet_related_conflict_sort=10%3ASecond World War%2C 1939-1945

[Old Koreelah]

7 hours ago, old man emu said:

To allow the amount of water that makes a flood to pass under an embankment, you would need several passages under the embankment…

On the broad plains south of Gunnedah is a multi-span concrete bridge.

A few years after it was built, someone had a look underneath: two long concrete piles were hanging in space over a deep gully gouged out by recent floods. (Given the many heavy trucks which had passed over it, this is a tribute to how over-engineered it was!)

 

The engineers had built the road surface above the plain. Shallow floodwater that normally spread out over the plains were now channelled into a narrow gap where the bridge had been installed. The water sped up, cutting a gully several metres deep.

[facthunter]

Which is exactly what you would expect IF you thought about it.   Nev

[onetrack]

Regular bridge and culvert inspection should be a feature of council and road authority programmes. To not do them leaves them wide open to lawsuits. 

They were done regularly many years ago, but no doubt, improved concrete bridges and culverts, and cost-saving measures, ensured they were seriously reduced in number.

[Yenn]

While the water that can get through the culverts and drains is speeding up and gouging the surface, the water that can't get through them is backing up, until eventually it flows over and scours out the ballast under the lines. Plus it raises the level of every bit of water upstream and slows the flow.