By Geoff Strong and Paul Rovere
FLOOD is a sneaky enemy. Unlike bushfire, it does not arrive in a roar of flame and stifling smoke; mostly it invades as a quiet trickle that steadily rises and undermines as it pours through people's homes, businesses and lives.
Twice in the past five months, the people of Charlton, on the fine loam wheat land of north-western Victoria have watched in despair as the Avoca River let loose its water to wreck their town.
The main street of Charlton under floodwater.Credit: Brodie Watson
After a decade-and-a-half of drought when their soil became dust, the water of life they so desperately craved finally came as the vehicle of destruction, a half-metre higher last Friday than it had in September.
Now more so than even in September, the future of this town of 1300 is on hold as people once again weigh up whether to rebuild their businesses and lives, or to just walk away. Although there is talk of it being a one-in-100-year flood, people are nervous it might happen again in years or even months. In the midst of this anxiety are stories of ingenuity, stoicism, good luck and bad.
There is the couple, Ron and Lyn Good who, as a pre-retirement investment, took over the recently refurbished Foundry Palms Motel just a week before the water washed them out.
Publican Rick Walklate, fought to keep water out of his East Charlton Hotel's cellar, assisted by a stranded pumper crew from a local CFA brigade. Consequently he was able to open his dining room Wednesday night to provide the town its first sit-down meals.
Paramedic Harry Brindley, his ambulance station and home gone to the flood, kept working through the crisis, snatching fragments of sleep on his ambulance stretcher between patients.
The post office did open on Wednesday with postmaster Russell King doing a limited mail delivery by bicycle because all the motor bikes and cars were wiped out. But a question mark hung over the timing of Tormey's supermarket's re-opening, as a team from IGA's Melbourne headquarters arrived to help with the extensive clean-up.
There was unemployed 20-something Dayne Steel, his own home gone, who is helping feed the town as joint manager of the emergency food bank. Keeping some sense of normality is said to be essential to a wounded town's morale. People are concerned this event could trigger its slide into a ghost town.
Most of Charlton is on the river's flat eastern bank where 80 per cent of homes and businesses were inundated. On the western side on a slight rise the locals refer to as ''the hill'', is a victim of that quest for normality. Brian Watson, on the point of exhaustion, runs the town's only surviving takeaway outlet. Mr Watson said he desperately wanted to shut down so his family could attend to their own house, which was devastated, but locals pleaded with him to stay open at all cost.
Proof of flood's sneakiness is what it leaves when it subsides. Unless it comes as a raging torrent, like in south-east Queensland, its departure leaves things like buildings still standing. Sure, there are shop windows burst under water pressure, roads washed away and fences pushed over, but compared with the acrid smelling charcoal remains from a bushfire, flood's aftermath is deceptive with most structures intact, most vegetation still green. Damage tends to be internal, both for buildings and lives.
About two days after Charlton's water receded and mud had been scraped from the roads, most houses and shops had burst their ruined innards on to the footpath for collection. Furniture, clothing, fridges, books and food lay in a heap, converted by the water from the intimate accessories of life into landfill.
And in the air there is a distinct smell, partly an irritating pungent dust from the dried river silt combined with a stench of swamp gas from stagnant pools of water.
A few blocks from the main street is the hospital, a cream brick sprawl of buildings, the oldest dating from 1965, a symbol of deceptive flood damage. About a half-metre of floodwater ran through the complex, destroying low-lying equipment and flooring, but Ken Round, president of the East Wimmera Health Service, is worried the main part might have to be demolished.
The oldest building is constructed of sturdy double brick with a cavity between the walls where the floodwaters can lie and bacteria breed, destroying the ability of the hospital to remain sterile. ''It will be three to six months before we can re-open anyway. We will have to do tests to find what bacteria have lodged between those walls. If it is harmless that will be OK; if not, we might have to redevelop the whole hospital and maybe we should do it on another site.''
Meanwhile, Mr Round and the town's GP, Dr Stephen Webb, had been charged with finding a site for a tent field hospital sent by the state government as a temporary health clinic, which was dispatched on Thursday morning.
Dr Webb whose home and clinic were damaged, had been available to write prescriptions for patients, but getting the medications was difficult because floodwater had destroyed the pharmacy in the main street. Last week, a team of cleaners had been brought in for the second time in five months to shovel boxes of fragrant talc and blister packs of pills into rubbish skips.
Down the street, one of the town's two banks, the Bendigo, had its ATM running by Wednesday afternoon, a blessing for many who had run out of cash. The bank's local president, Peter Rogan, said they had been dismayed when building their new branch, that the local council insisted it sit half-a-metre above street level in case of flood.
''We laughed at them at the time, but I guess they've got the last laugh now. When it flooded the only serious damage we had was the carpet,'' Mr Rogan said.
Across the street, the bakery belonging to Allan Tallentyre was not so lucky and his family and employees spent most of the week cleaning the place out. They had lost thousands of dollars of stock, including $1000 worth of flour alone. By Wednesday, the electricity was back on but key equipment still had not passed crucial tests. He said he was hoping to be back in production early next week.
Next door at the Beatniks Cafe and Restaurant, proprietors Sue Lane and Cher Sinnbeck are hoping to be able to offer a limited pizza menu by next weekend if their pizza fridge can be repaired. They said they were doing it to help the town's morale, but they were unsure of the long term. ''I guess we have to factor in how often this kind of flood is going to happen,'' Ms Lane said.
Like them, the operators of the town's historic art deco Rex cinema and the popular furnishing shop House to Home are questioning the viability of re-opening, but at least they are busy cleaning up their premises.
Much more ominous for the town's future are the mud-stained shops and houses that have been left untouched.