Six months on, Coffs Harbour’s forgotten hailstorm victims

The hailstorm which smashed Coffs Harbour is long gone – but the memories and the wait for a remedy linger painfully on. We talk to those impacted about their frustrations with insurers and repair delays.

They are the people nature took to task and all but forgotten by the ever moving news cycle – the scores of Coffs Harbour residents still living in patched up homes after last year’s ferocious hailstorm.

Six months on from the ice rampage which shredded Toormina, Boambee and Sawtell, many still wait for repairs to houses and vehicles.

While public sentiment has rightly been with the flood victims up north, dozens of Coffs residents suffer quietly – tormented by insurance red tape and tested by trying to find a tradesman who can put things right.

A carpet of ice whited out the nature strip and road outside Kri Pierce’s Toormina home.

They understand that local builders and smash repairers simply can’t manage a quick fix for all in need – the demand is too great.

As it is, panel beaters as far away as Nambucca have steady lists to repair vehicles peppered by the Coffs hailstorm which hit on October 20.

It’s not just domestic properties that were in the line of fire – the Toormina Gardens shopping centre was also torn asunder, and while work there has been underway for months, it’s far from finished, with many stores having never reopened.

Case study: Mark Little

Mark Little is waiting for repairs to his investment property at Newport Crescent, Boambee East, which was extensively damaged. Picture: Chris Knight

Mr Little has an investment property at Boambee East which got “annihilated” by the supercell storm.

His own home too was damaged, but nothing like the devastation wrought on the Newport Crescent property.

The roof and skylights were wrecked, the gyprock walls and downstairs kitchen need to be replaced, and there was a “waterfall” alongside the internal stairs.

Damage to the roof of the Newport Crescent, Boambee East, home was extensive. After the ice melted, it was cloaked in shredded vegetation.

“I still don’t even have a scope of works,” Mr Little said, who puts the damage bill at around $140,000.

Soon after the storm hit, mould became an issue – and the tenants had to move out.

In February – near four months after the event – his insurers arranged for powered dryers at the site.

“The old wet carpet had already been ripped up – and that revealed that half the sub-floor had gone to god,” Mr Little said.

He said insurance had come good on new flooring, $45,000 worth.

Makeshift timber supports a water damaged ceiling.

“But now the roof’s leaking again,” he said.

In a bid to cover the mortgage repayments on the rental, he has new tenants in place – at a $300-a-week discount as repairs still need to be made.

The roof was tarped, but the plastic coverall had been in place for so long it has perished in the sun.

Mr Little said he understands many are in the same boat given the widespread nature of the storm.

He has an “email trail” on the to and fro with his insurer, “and I spent two hours on the phone to them yesterday”.

Mark Little: “I’d just like to know when the work is going to start.”

“I’ve had four different claim managers since this started,” Mr Little said.

“I just wish they’d give me something – but nothing, crickets.”

He has now lodged a claim with the Australian Financial Complaints Authority.

“I’d just like to know when the work is going to start,” said the volunteer firefighter who manages Avan at South Coffs.

Case study: Kris Pierce

There’s light at the end of the tunnel for Kris Pierce after the repair works to his home have been approved. Picture: Chris Knight

Mr Pierce’s single-storey brick veneer home was ‘ground zero’ in Linden Ave, as the supercell cut a corridor of pain tracing Lyons Road.

The roof, flooring, air vents, pergola and garage were damaged, and there was water in the kitchen.

“Basically the whole house, really,” the landscape garden business owner said.

Kris Pierce's Linden Ave home at Toormina was under an ice blanket.

The repair works have just been approved by Mr Pierce’s insurer, though he doesn’t have a start date from the builder.

“They (the insurer) were going to cash settle the floor because they said they can’t match it – but I said, ‘what do you mean, there is no floor’,” he said.

Mr Pierce said he was also taken aback to find the cash settlement offer was $10,000 shy of the builder’s estimate.

The force of the hail was “epic”, Kris Pierce said.

While the roof and solar hot water system were quickly fixed, he is sweating on the remainder getting sorted.

“It’s all the internals – the floor and the painting,” he said.

Mr Pierce was home when the heavens erupted.

“It was full on. Crazy to watch,” he said.

“It was epic – like a different bloody world.”