Thousands of Queensland flood victims are about to learn if they have won a class action case with a potential payout of hundreds of millions of dollars.
A judgment on an action involving more than 6800 people hit by the 2011 floods in Brisbane and Ipswich will be delivered in the NSW Supreme Court in Sydney on Friday following a marathon legal battle.
The action alleges water levels at Wivenhoe and Somerset dams, about 70km northwest of Brisbane, were mismanaged in the lead up to a deluge which made flood damage worse.
Seqwater, the state government organisation responsible for managing dam water levels, has defended the case launched against it by Maurice Blackburn Lawyers.
The law firm says, if successful, the claim could be worth hundreds of millions of dollars.
But despite the potential for a massive payout, former Ipswich councillor and claimant Paul Tully says there is an "air of despondency" among some of those in the case because of how long the process has taken.
"It could easily drag on for another two years," Mr Tully said on Thursday of a potential appeal of Friday's judgment from either party.
"I guess there is still an air of despondency. Even with one day to go, people aren't supremely confident.
"They're just keeping their fingers crossed and hopeful the right decision will be handed down - it'll be a big decision whichever way it goes."
The floodwaters hit 23,000 properties in January 2011 and spawned the so-called "Mud Army" of volunteers who helped to clean up the city.
At Goodna, in nearby Ipswich, Mr Tully said the floodwaters rose up to the roof of his two-storey home within a matter of hours.
The action is being heard in a NSW court because class actions could not be brought in Queensland until 2017.
It is able to be heard south of the border because an applicant from NSW, who owned a flooded Queensland property, filed a claim in their home state which then opened the gates for thousands of Queenslanders to join in a class action, Mr Tully said.
The 2012 Queensland Floods Commission of Inquiry - separate from the class action - had found Wivenhoe Dam engineers had not followed the dam's operating manual in the lead-up to the floods and the manual was ambiguous, unclear, impartial and not up to date.
Australian Associated Press
