Katherine flooding nears peak as 'major flood' risk to remain until Sunday

Major flooding in Katherine is nearing its predicted peak of 19.2 metres, with water from the Katherine River inundating parts of the town.

Floodwaters have entered the town centre and overwhelmed the town's levee system.

Significant water is rising around the visitor centre and shops, with water rushing in from the direction of the levee, which has held back a large body of water for most of the day.

In 2022, the Northern Territory government built a high concrete wall through the middle of town to prevent catastrophe from a smaller flood.

At almost two metres high, and 10 to 15 metres wide at the base in parts, the levee stretches from Knotts Crossing Resort along the eastern side of the town to the Stuart Highway.

Shortly after 4pm on Saturday, NT incident controller Shaun Gill confirmed the levee had not broken, but said CCTV had caught poor behaviour from some residents.

"We have noticed on CCTV today that a number of people are treating it as a recreational object and are jumping from the levee into the flood side," she said.

"I can only say, stop it – it's reckless behaviour putting lives and public infrastructure at risk."

'Whole of Katherine under threat'

Authorities are warning "the whole of Katherine is under threat now", with "major flood risk" expected to remain over the Northern Territory town until Sunday.

NT Police Incident Controller Shaun Gill said two flood rescues were carried out in Katherine overnight "where people were trapped into houses".

He said the power had gone out in about 90 homes across Katherine as of Saturday afternoon, with Power and Water crews responding.

There are no evacuation orders in place for Katherine, but Acting Commander Gill urged residents concerned about their properties to sandbag if appropriate or move to a shelter.

"The flood conditions are only going to get worse in the short-term," he said.

"The whole is Katherine is under threat now.

It comes as a tropical low hovers over large parts of the Top End this weekend, with Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) forecasting this wet season could become the 10th wettest on record.

Katherine River to peak at 19.2m

BOM's Shenagh Gamble said Katherine River was "slowly reaching a peak" with flood risk expected "to stay above major" levels until Sunday.

The Katherine River reached the major flood level yesterday, with BOM reporting floodwaters at Katherine Bridge were at 19.17m as of 8:51pm today.

"[Katherine River] is expected to reach a peak of 19.2 metres during tonight," Ms Gamble said.

"Once those river heights have peaked, we expect it to stay above major at the Katherine community and township for about 24 hours, so we expect it to stay above major through the weekend into Sunday."

BOM said "major flooding above the April 2006 flood level" — when the river peaked at 19 metres — was occurring this morning at the entrance to Nitmiluk Gorge.

The expected 19.2 peak at Katherine River would likely submerge the town's high-level bridge.

NT Police Acting Commissioner Travis Wurst said authorities were continuing the monitor water levels in the Katherine CBD.

"There is some water that has come into the CBD and that's come up through the drainage system," he said.

"We're not seeing that impacting on any of the commercial or business premises within that environment."

The low-lying Aboriginal community of Miali Brumby, also known as Kalano, which is on the outskirts of Katherine has been cut off by floodwaters.

A significant number of buildings in the community have been surrounded by water and inundated on the ground floor. 

Hundreds in shelters

Katherine's flood emergency warning was triggered yesterday, with the local hospital evacuated and closed, the Stuart Highway cut off and emergency shelters set up. 

NT Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro said although the hospital had closed, two "vulnerable people" remained at the facility and needed to be evacuated to Darwin.

On Friday, a temporary emergency department was stood up at the St John Ambulance NT headquarters on Chardon Street, which Mrs Finocchiaro said 20 people had already used for medical assistance.

About 500 people across the Katherine region were sheltering in local schools by Saturday afternoon.

Shelters are open at Katherine High School and MacFarlane Primary School, both on Grevillea Street, and at Casuarina Street Primary School on the corner of Casuarina Street and Needham Terrace.

Local landscaper Ben Hockey has been up since well before dawn, frantically helping distribute sandbags to fellow businesses on Katherine's main street.

He's working alongside a small group of dedicated locals, but told the ABC they don't have enough sandbags or volunteers. 

However, Mrs Finocchiaro assured the Katherine community there were more sandbags available, with two more truckloads of sand on its way and thousands of hessian bags prepared.

The local SES has been in touch with Mr Hockey to try to coordinate sandbagging efforts.

Palumpa, Daly River evacuated

The nearby remote communities of Palumpa and Daly River (Nauiyu) are being evacuated as a result of the extreme weather in the Big Rivers region.

Emergency flood warnings remain current for the Daly River, which is expected to reach major flood level on Saturday afternoon. 

Acting Commander Gill said all residents from Palumpa had been evacuated by air, with road access to the community cut due to rapidly rising floodwaters.

The 200 evacuees from Palumpa will be staying at Marrara Indoor Stadium in Darwin.

Acting Commander Gill said most of the Daly River community had been evacuated on Saturday afternoon, with "13 helicopters at any one time", but there were still about 80 people left.

In a statement, the NT government said: "Due to inclement weather the helicopters were grounded."

"Eighty people still in community are being transferred by boat to 5 Mile, then bussed to Wooliana, where they will stay overnight before being airlifted out tomorrow (by helicopter)."

Residents from Daly River are being evacuated to Foskey Pavilion at the city's showgrounds.

Locals in the remote Indigenous community only returned home late last month, after earlier rains caused Daly River to flood.

About 160 people were also evacuated from the remote community of Jilkminggan to Mataranka today, Acting Commander Gill said, with 100 self-evacuating, and the other 60 ordered to leave by police and transported by boat.

Meanwhile, flooding peaked in Beswick yesterday and fell below the major level this afternoon.

Moderate flooding in Beswick is expected to continue across the weekend, with an evacuation centre there — located on higher ground — opened to those in need yesterday.

All Beswick residents have been relocated to top camp.

"We anticipate this will take a while, and we're planning for it," Acting Commander Gill said of the flood response.

Tropical low brings rainfall

BOM senior meteorologist Rebecca Patrick said the bureau was monitoring tropical low 31U, which had made landfall north-east of Katherine.

She said, while there was a "low chance" of the weather system developing into a cyclone, heavy rainfall across the Top End was possible.

"As we see that tropical low move from the Gulf of Carpentaria across the Top End, we might see an increase in rainfall," she said.

The BOM's track map shows 31U is expected to sit near Katherine today, stretch in opposite directions to cover Daly River in the west and the remote community of Ngukurr in the east — splitting the weather system in two — on Sunday, before it is forecast to reform and dump rain as far north as Batchelor and southern parts of Darwin tomorrow afternoon.

It is not the first tropical low over the past fortnight to bring heavy rainfall, with one stalling over Central Australia in mid-February before travelling further south last weekend.

BOM's Felicity Gamble told ABC Radio's Country Hour program earlier this week the "stationary system" had drawn in moisture from the north and dumped "very high rainfall totals" across the outback.

One of the NT's wettest seasons

Ms Patrick said the Top End had experienced "a fairly consistent and active wet season", while further south December and January in the NT had been "relatively dry".

But she said last month was a different story.

"We had a number of heavy rainfall events with thunderstorms, as well as that tropical low that moved southwards and sat around the south-eastern parts of the territory for basically the second half of February and dumped a lot of rainfall," she said.

"In the southern parts of the NT, we've seen rainfall more than four times the amount that we'd normally see in February.

With March expected to continue bringing "above-average rainfall", she said the season could still progress to a higher place on that record ladder.