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National

Kingston-on-Murray Caravan Park in SA's Riverland evacuated after levee defects identified

South Australia's River Murray flood emergency is continuing to intensify, with one Riverland caravan park under orders to evacuate, and residents of another preparing to potentially follow suit.

The State Emergency Service (SES) has issued an emergency warning for the Kingston-on-Murray Caravan Park.

The SES said there was a risk of floodwater threatening the safety of people in the park.

Park residents and visitors are advised to evacuate immediately.

According to the caravan park's Facebook page, it has been closed to guests since November 28.

SES state duty officer Dave O'Shaughnessy said an assessment found defects in the levee last night.

"At around 6pm last night our engineers had completed an assessment on this levee and some defects were noticed at the levee so basically those defects were something which could've led to a failure and failures can happen at any time," he said.

"So, we made the decision to notify the members of that caravan park that they needed to leave."

Although the park was closed to visitors, some residents remained on site and the SES was aware of eight people in the park at the time.

"Each of those have found help through family, friends or connections but we know three of those identified presented to the relief centre last night," Mr O'Shaughnessy said.

"Once we identified the fact the caravan park would need to be evacuated we had the relief centre reopened."

While the Kingston-on-Murray site is under threat, another caravan park downstream at Morgan is currently providing shelter for local resident David Wallent.

He has shifted to the site after he and his wife were forced to evacuate the dream house he finished building about 12 months ago because of rising water levels.

"It hasn't gone in the upper storey yet, but we expect it to. The lower storey is three quarters of the way up," he said.

"It took us 45 years to be able to get that block and put a new home on it.

"[But] I do have a caravan to stay in at the moment, and there's some people that can't even afford to buy a caravan."

Mr Wallent said he was preparing to move closer to Adelaide should the adjacent water level continue to rise.

Fellow resident David Hornby is also getting ready to leave.

"We're just packing up — we've been the longest tenants here at Morgan, we've been here for 30 years," he said.

"We're just not sure what the river's going to do, whether the levee bank's going to hold up."

Meanwhile, SA Police said the Purnong ferry will close from 7pm tonight and the Walker Flat ferry will close from 7pm tomorrow due to the rising waters.

They join the existing ferry closures at Lyrup, Morgan, Swan Reach, and Mannum.

'No happy ever after' for vineyard

A Riverland grower has had 13 years of hard work and his life's savings washed away by floodwater.

Peter Singh said he could only watch on when his 30-acre vineyard was washed away in three hours as a result of a levee breaking in Renmark.

Mr Singh said he may never financially recover from the damage caused.

"That was my and my wife's super," he said.

"We bought a nice vineyard and we thought we'd put a house on it and live happily.

"But no happily ever after."

Back in Kingston-on-Murray, general store owner Robyn Onn is confronting the likelihood of having to temporarily abandon the site.

But she said that, despite the inundation, water was not her biggest concern.

"The water I can cope with — when it starts coming in my door I'll put my bathers on and swim on out," she quipped.

"It's the power going off possibly for two months, anything up to two months. That's a worry.

"It's nature, what can we do? We've got to live in it. And perhaps if we hadn't done so many bad things with our country, we might not be in this position, who knows?"

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