December 23, 2010.

Environment Canterbury’s river engineers are making excellent progress in repairing stopbanks along the Kaiapoi and Waimakariri rivers which were damaged by the Canterbury Earthquake on September 4.

The earthquake damaged the stopbanks on the Waimakariri River downstream of the Old Highway Bridge, the stopbanks along the Kaiapoi River, and those at Kairaki Creek.

“Overall, progress with the earthquake recovery programme for the overall flood protection system has been excellent,” says Tony Boyle, principal hazard analyst at Environment Canterbury.

Major stopbank damage will be completed by Christmas.

With these repairs in place there will be minimal risk of Waimakariri or Kaiapoi River stopbank breach for river flows of up to 3,000 cumecs which is the equivalent of a 30-year flood event. The stopbanks have coped well with the increased river flows which peaked at around 1100 cumecs due to this week’s heavy rain in the Southern Alps

The remaining moderate and minor repair works are due for completion by March 2011 and this will increase the flood capacity to the original 4,700 cumec flow which is the equivalent of a 450-year return period flood event.

Environment Canterbury is monitoring river flows throughout the Christmas and New Year period. Information is available online at http://ecan.govt.nz/SERVICES/ONLINE-SERVICES/MONITORING/Pages/Default.aspx or by calling the Environment Canterbury 24 Hour River Report info line, 0900 RIVER (74837). Charges do apply.

Flood alert information will be posted on the Environment Canterbury website home page, www.ecan.govt.nz.

ENDS

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