Water flows over Dungowan Dam spillway

The dam, 50km south east of the city, is just one-tenth the size of its big sister Chaffey Dam, the main city supply, and spilled water just after 2pm yesterday.

The overflow signalled the 57-year-old dam had reach- ed 100 per cent capacity.

Earlier in the day, Tamworth Regional Council water people were holding their breath, having watched for an agonising few days as the dam inflow continued steadily, but with a downward slide.

Overnight yesterday the dam had reached 98.33 per cent and there were concerns the maximum would not be reached – unless there was more rain in the catchment.

“We had some inflow of just over seven megalitres in the last day, but it has slowed right down now and I doubt we will crack it,” water sustainability officer Ian Lobban reported early yesterday.

“The inflow has really been constant for the past two weeks, since we had that really cold spell and snow up in the catchment above the Peel.”

But the news just got better over the next couple of hours – and Dungowan Dam water-watchers reported the spill and captured the early moments on their camera, meaning the dam was 

holding 6300 megalitres – but releasing the overflow down its spillway to flow into the creek which eventually flows into the Peel River downstream.

At present, Dungowan is supplying all of the Tamworth city supply and has been for a few weeks, as the council takes advantage of its higher levels – and more volatile changes in capacity because of its relatively small size.

Dungowan Dam water is also historically of “better quality” and an easier mix to fix for consumption for domestic use. The council is also intent on conserving some of the water in the city’s major supply dam at Chaffey.

Chaffey, with a capacity of some 62,000 megalitres – and currently being augmented to hold 100,000 megalitres – continued to take in runoff as well yesterday.

It stood at 51.7 per cent and holding 33,135 megalitres.