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  • 16 hours ago
An entire Northern Territory community has been evacuated ahead of major flooding this weekend. Hundreds of people have been forced to leave the isolated community of Daly River, 200 kilometres south of Darwin.

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00:00The entirety of the Now You Daily River community, well over 250 people have now been evacuated
00:10with the majority of those people now staying here in Darwin at the showgrounds where an
00:15evacuation centre was rapidly stood up to ensure people had a safe place to stay until it is safe
00:22to return to their community. We've been told around 38 vulnerable people have been put up
00:28at a nearby hotel in order for them to receive an adequate level of care. The rest of the evacuees
00:35who are staying here at the evacuation centre will be spending at least the next week if not the next
00:41fortnight sleeping on mattresses and camp beds until it is deemed safe to return home. Now the
00:47Bureau of Meteorology is predicting that the Daly River could reach a major flood level of around
00:5314 metres over the weekend. Now floodwaters that high could result in damage to homes as well as
01:01power and water issues and as well could present a genuine risk of saltwater crocodiles in and around
01:09the community which is something that emergency services have been telling the community to really
01:13stay vigilant about once they're able to return home. But the Bureau also says that the peak of this
01:20disaster really isn't expected until early next week. Once the waters hit those peak levels they
01:26will begin to slowly recede at which point service crews will be able to go into the communities and
01:32assess the level of damage and then at some stage once it is deemed safe people will be repatriated back
01:39to the community. So there's still a long way to go and at this stage it could be another two weeks until
01:46families who are staying here will be able to return home to their community.
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