The town’s residents are being invited to share their flooding experiences with CSU’s Emergency Management Lecturer Ian Manock as he looks to identify the best and most effective flood warning systems.

Mr Manock said it was important to study the ways a community is notified about local flooding, both formally and informally.

“We are, as a western society, becoming more and more reliant on services and being provided for,” he said.

“What we will be looking for with Molong is what sort of informal systems they use.”

The study will be compared to a similar one conducted in Bangladesh, where citizens rely solely on informal communication such as word-of-mouth for flood warnings.

It is important to understand how much Australians rely upon informal warnings to gauge the amount of funding that needs to be spent on formal warning services, Mr Manock said.

“We aim to use the experiences of the communities to identify strategies that can improve community preparedness, enable government agencies to better understand community expectations, and hopefully reduce the impact of future flooding on these rural and semi-isolated communities.”

Molong was picked as Australia’s case study following its extensive experience with flooding.

Mr Manock will be discussing with the community their expectations relating to warnings, response and recovery.

The public can have their say at the Molong Community Hall on Wednesday, February 8 at 7pm.

erin.somerville@ruralpress .com