Queensland’s chief coroner is about to hand down his findings on the deaths of 22 people when floods swept through the state’s southeast.
The inquest looked at fatalities from flash flooding in Grantham and Toowoomba, west of Brisbane, in January last year.
The inquest was held to formally determine the identity of the victims, and the circumstances surrounding their deaths.
Coroner Michael Barnes is also expected to make findings about whether three people who remain missing are deceased.
His broader findings are expected to explore whether there has been a significant increase in the number of suicides in southeast Queensland since January last year, and whether any increase is linked to the floods.
About 70 per cent of the state was flooded last summer, killing a total of 35 people.
The scope of the inquest was reduced so it did not intrude on the terms of reference of the Floods Commission of Inquiry, which handed down its findings in March.
That inquiry focused on the wider aspects of flood mitigation, and found the dam operator, the government-owned SEQwater, breached the dam’s operating manual during the floods, which also swamped Brisbane and Ipswich.
It also found three dam engineers had colluded to write a misleading report about how they managed water releases from Wivenhoe dam before the two cities flooded.
The Crime and Misconduct Commission (CMC) is currently assessing whether the actions of engineers John Tibaldi, Robert Ayre and Terry Malone warrant criminal or official misconduct charges.
More than 3000 Queenslanders have signed up as class-action law firms pursue possible compensation over the deadly floods.
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