Dartmouth Dam's imminent spill is pouring thousands into town's economy

Some businesses were salivating at the thought of a dam spill, saying commerce in the town had stagnated since the COVID doldrums.

General Store and Post Office manager Lorrae Smyth, who had helped with a "pop-up" community fundraising food store to feed the visitors, said hopes of the dam spilling had injected much-needed funds into community groups' coffers.

Dartmouth Pub manager Aaron Scales, who had 180 lunch bookings on Sunday, said a lot more "sneaked in".

"I've done more than 220 meals today," he said.

Dartmouth Motor Inn owner Debbie Ormrod said her phone had been running hot with people asking, "Has it spilled yet?"

"We've had more bookings than usual but, at this stage, before it spills over, most of the hundreds I've been seeing in town are day-trippers," Ms Ormrod said.

The dam didn't spill over yesterday, retaining a 99.2 per cent capacity but that might change on Thursday when the Bureau of Meteorology tipping rainfall of 20mm.

Ms Smyth said there was excitement on Saturday when the wind started howling.

"We're going to continue with the food store because when people are so keen to see it happen they'll keep coming," she said.

"The wind was heavy and pushing the water over to lap over the walls on Saturday - but not cascading over."

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"Since the word got out, the pub's been flat out - people are coming from a long way to see this.

"I counted 100 cars before 12 o'clock today - and it's going to keep going.

"In 1996, when it spilled, it kept spilling for about nine weeks - so it's not something that just going to go away quickly."

At the weekend, capacity of the Hume Dam was 96 per cent and Dartmouth Dam at 99 per cent.

While there is little chance of major flooding on the Border and North East in the next few days farmers downstream of the Hume and Dartmouth dams have been warned by agencies to prepare for minor inundation.

Spills from the Hume Dam combined with flood waters from the Kiewa River have caused flooding along the Murray River at Corowa, the NSW SES said yesterday.

On Sunday morning, the Murray at Albury peaked at 3.89 metres with the SES warning reserves and forests around Corowa are likely to remain inundated.

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