Strange timing

As soon as the Brisbane flood occurred, there began some claims that the Wivenhoe Dam should have been maintained at lower levels given that the forecast was for a particularly wet la Nina summer.

Of course, given that only a couple of years ago the dam had reached 17%, common sense suggested you would not lightly reduce the levels below the full level for drinking water. (Everyone knows by now that it can hold double that amount for flood mitigation.) In fact, as the Australian reminds us again today, the State Opposition between October and December last year were calling for the dam to hold more than its "normal" drinking water capacity to help off set the next drought. (How the Opposition can make political mileage out of what happened in January remains something of a mystery, then.)

Yet now that there are insurance companies circling and trying to find ways to avoid payments, and an enquiry has just started to look into the whole question, the State government has already decided to empty the dam by 25% as a precaution.

This just seems strangely premature to me. Who, apart from Dr Dragun (who seemed to be the first off the cab to criticise the dam being kept at 100%), has been advising the government about this? Are hydrologists as fractious a group as geologists (the latter seemingly containing a disproportionate number of climate change sceptics?) Is the weather bureau fully confident of further torrential rain in the next few months that could not be handled by faster water release once a bad weather system is on its way? Otherwise, why not wait for the full enquiry, which has just started?