Wednsday 17th June 2009

 

After an early start, we met on Ilingas beach at 10.15am for an introductory talk and already at this time the temperature was 28 degrees and rising – a far cry from the grey and gloomy British summer. With anticipation we set off walking up the steep gorge, which was net with as much enthusiasm as was expected by Alan. Nevertheless, it was a rewarding walk that allowed us to appreciate the surroundings that we found ourselves in, as well as the scale of thee 2000 flood. In total we climbed to an altitude of 250m above sea level and despite covering less that a mile and a half we still needed multiple stops to cope with the heat and gradient – not helped by the loose gravel underfoot that was deposited by the events of the 200 flood.

 We stopped for lunch at 12pm, after which we got down to work, measuring factors needed for Manning‘s Equation. This would allow us to calculate peak velocity and therefore allow us to measure peak discharge . The factors measured were: slope angle and wetted perimeter – both using a clinometer and tape measure – and width of the river bed, measured with the tape measure. We proceeded to do this for a total of 9 specific sites chosen for their signs of flood evidence such as stripped bark, , striations , deposited boulders and visible distinctions between previous vegetation and new growth.

Our final site at the base of the Gorge was a man made flood relief tunnel built after the 2000 flood to protect the road from future floods. After a long day of collecting data, we walked the 30mins back to the hotel and the whole group headed to the sea for a refreshing swim – the perfect end to our first day.

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