Unpredictable Hazards, Predictable Consequences: Why Adaptation Can’t Wait

The photos coming out of the Otways have a way of reminding us who’s really in charge.

Even from a distance, you can see the force of the recent flash floods — banks ripped open, channels widened or shifted, whole patches of vegetation flattened. Reaches that looked settled for years suddenly look raw and unfamiliar.

And the first reaction many people have is completely understandable:
 “How do we get it back to how it was?”

But here’s the thing we don’t talk about enough: Sometimes the goal shouldn’t be to reinstate a pre‑flood channel form.

These intense storms and flash floods aren’t random outliers. They’re part of a climate pattern we’re seeing across southern Australia — hotter, drier catchments followed by short, intense bursts of rainfall that hit with enormous energy. Under those conditions, rivers behave differently. They don’t break - they reset.

And when a system resets, trying to force it back to its old form can:

• lock in future instability

• create future failure points

• waste resources on forms the river can no longer sustain

• remove the ecological opportunities that disturbance creates.

Because disturbance isn’t just damage. It’s a natural - and often necessary - part of river evolution.

So instead of asking “How do we restore what was lost?”, a more useful question might be: “What trajectory is this river now on, and how do we support it under today’s climate, not yesterday’s?”

That shift opens up a completely different conversation:

• Where is the system naturally trying to move?

• What new habitats are emerging?

• What risks genuinely need intervention, and what can be left to settle?

• How do we support recovery without fighting the new reality?

River disturbances are confronting, but they’re also a chance to rethink our assumptions about stability, recovery, and adaptation in a rapidly changing climate.

Sometimes resilience isn’t about bouncing back. Sometimes it’s about bouncing forward.

Photo: Flooding along the Great Ocean Road (source: ABC News 2026)