NSW floods: Insurance Council of Australia heads to Lismore
Insurance Council of Australia representatives say they are on their way to the Northern Rivers to see damage first hand and help get the claims process started.
Lismore
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Insurance company representatives will be in Lismore on Monday along with Insurance Council of Australia staff to assist policyholders impacted by the devastating floods.
They will inspect damage caused when the Wilsons River breached its levee as the city experienced devastating flooding.
Insurance Council of Australia CEO Andrew Hall said the impacts on Lismore were distressing.
“We understand the timely nature of getting personnel on the ground as soon as possible to assist policyholders in the claims process,” Mr Hall said.
He said the council and its members were given clearance from State Emergency Services on Sunday to enter the city.
He said eligible customers in urgent need could receive an advance cash payment of up to $5000 and could also be able to access temporary accommodation under their policy.
“We want to make this process as simple as possible for the people of Lismore, who are already suffering tremendous losses as a result of these devastating floods.
“As we have heard once again today, this time from Lismore mayor, Steve Krieg, we need to do better at protecting homes, business and communities from the impacts of extreme weather.”
He called on the federal government to increase its resilience investment to $200m a year and asked the states and territories to match it.
Firefighters return to find their homes destroyed by flood
Emergency service crews have had a major breakthrough, reaching the isolated Northern Rivers town of Coraki which had been cut off by road for four days.
A convoy of Fire and Rescue NSW vehicles, including “in-water” rescue teams assigned to the NSW State Emergency Service-led flood response, were tasked to try and reach the town by boat.
Instead, about 10.30am Saturday, Strike Team ‘Charlie’ found the waters blocking Coraki Rd had subsided enough to drive into the town.
Floodwaters had cut the town in two early last week.
Of the 11 FRNSW firefighters in Coraki, four lost their homes and the houses of five others were badly damaged.
However the crew, instead, has focused on the plight of its community by doorknocking residents and guiding them towards the safety of the fire station on high ground.
The fire station quickly became the community hub over the last few days, providing food, medical supplies and shelter.
Those supplies were running out when the FRNSW convoy arrived today, soon followed by Resilience NSW, the Australian Defence Force and other emergency services.
The dangerous floodwaters will need to subside further before public access to Coraki is permitted.
More storms loom over Northern Rivers
More storms could get to the Northern Rivers as a weather system hovered south of Grafton on Sunday morning.
Weather bureau meteorologist Grace Legge said the storm could disappear before it hit the North Coast – but even if it did there was chance another could form in its place.
Ms Legge said storms caused by an upper low moving through northern parts of NSW would bring thunderstorms throughout most of the day.
She said many of those storms had started in the south on Saturday night and had travelled north.
“We could see it moving more into the north east or it could decay,” Ms Legge said.
“Unfortunately it could impact the Northern Rivers today.”
She said the storms were more intense, isolated falls, as opposed the widespread falls seen earlier in the week.
However she said there was potential it could once again raise river levels in the region.
Ms Leggee said there was a chance the showers and thunderstorms would continue into the beginning of next week.
Miraculous rescue of dog trapped in tree for three days
A bull mastiff cross trapped in a tree for three in Lismore during the floods has been rescued by firefighters
Fire and Rescue NSW crews in the flood zone at Lismore were dealing with a major fuel leak emergency in Union Street, South Lismore about midday on Wednesday, when one of the firefighters heard a whimper nearby.
He borrowed a kayak and went to investigate, discovering Sadie, entangled in vines, up to five-metres off the ground.
The firefighter and a colleague fashioned a hook and eventually freed the dog.
She was taken to a vet and has been reunited with her owners.
Sadie is believed to have been swept away by floodwaters and into the tree before water levels subsided, trapping her.
Fifth death reported
A man believed to be in his 40s has been found dead on Byrrill Creek Road near Terragon south of Murwillumbah.
This is the fifth death from the Northern NSW floods.
Police found the body of the man south of Murwillumbah shortly after 2pm on Friday.
The man is yet to be formally identified.
Officers from Tweed-Byron Police District have attended and established a crime scene.
A report will be prepared for the information of the Coroner.
Teen in a tinnie’s ingenious life saving efforts
A young cabinet maker, Allan O’Sullivan, living in the tiny country village of Brushgrove found incredible ways to assist his 200 strong community, saving lives during the process.
Keeping with his routine Mr O’Sullivan went to work in South Grafton on Monday morning but soon realised it wasn’t going to be an ordinary day.
He collected fuel and supplies and quickly returned home to Brushgrove.
The community there received evacuation orders on Monday but Allan said the notifications were too late.
“Last year the flood took seven hours, but this year it rose in just a couple of hours and came roaring up,” he said.
The power cut off, the local phone box flooded and he knew people were desperate to let family and friends know they were OK.
So on Tuesday he got in his tinnie and visited neighbours collecting mobile phones.
Back at home he and his father charged them with jumper leads hooked up to a car battery. After returning the phones he hooked up a fridge to a two-stroke generator so people could store food.
He then collected jerry cans and fuel money for people who needed fuel and gave them to the SES.
He finished Tuesday off by delivering the full jerry cans back to their owners.
On Wednesday, having seen people desperate for their medication, including an elderly woman taking half her meds, he set off in the tinnie to collect scripts.
Again he worked with the SES members, who then took the scripts to Grafton and returned the medication to him to deliver. But his good deeds didn’t stop there as he continued to help those most in need.
“I helped a young pregnant lady with milk for her children and there were some old people with oxygen bottles which were running low so we used the generator to hook them up.”
Brushgrove doesn’t have its own SES so was supported by six South Grafton members.
Unfortunately as the clean up began Mr O’Sullivan senior had a fall and is having his leg X-rayed. Mr O’Sullivan junior will continue the clean up.
“The smell is like sewerage and a completely rotten smell,” he said.
The O’Sullivans aren’t insured for floods as they couldn’t afford the extra cost added onto their house insurance.
23 horses led out of floodwaters near Ballina
More than 20 horses have been saved from flooding in northern NSW after a daring rescue involving the Gold Coast’s Australian Outback Spectacular stockman’s show.
The elaborate operation, which also included a helicopter from Sea World, took place in fading light on Thursday afternoon.
Volunteers led 23 horses from a farm outside Ballina through chest-deep floodwaters before finally emerging on dry land where the animals were given a feed of hay and checked for injuries by a vet.
Video footage of the rescue shows the horses’ emotional owner thanking the team for their brave efforts.
“I thought they were all going to die,” she said.
“I can’t thank you enough.”
Aerial photos of northern NSW’s flooding devastation laid bare
Aerial views of Northern Rivers hubs smashed by swollen Wilsons and Clarence rivers have revealed the scale of flood devastation and the effort that will be required to recover.
Lismore, Southgate and Ulmarra are among the communities deep in clean-up mode as residents from within and outside the impact zone band together to get their lives back on track.
Nearmap captured the following before and after images via the Nearmap proprietary aerial camera system attached to planes.
They show the inundation of the Ballina Street Bridge which connects Lismore with South Lismore.
It was a truly unexpected scene for long time residents who had not before witnessed water over the top of the landmark.
Ballina waits for clearance to see homes
Ballina residents are waiting for permission to return to their houses after thousands of evacuations during a devastating flood.
Many parts of West Ballina remained flooded on Friday morning while the CBD waters were slowly receding.
Ballina State Emergency Service unit commander Gerry Burnage said a lack of phone and internet reception had been hampering the organisation’s efforts to get updates out.
He said emergency volunteers and community members had evacuated “many hundreds of people” from across the Ballina Shire over the past few days.
“We’ve evacuated close to 2000 people,” he said on late Thursday.
“We now need to work hard to recover from such an event.”
34 hours on the road to help those in need
Members of a Sikh volunteer organisation have driven 34 hours from Melbourne to bring two truckloads of home cooked meals to Lismore flood victims.
Sikh Volunteers Australia secretary Jaswinder Singh said he had found Lismore people to be friendly, strong and resilient since arriving to help those in need.
“We have seen people who have lost everything except the clothes they are in, but their mental health, understanding and strength is amazing,” he said.
“They are coping so well, even when they don’t know where their belongings are.”
He said Lismore residents were “taking an educational and analytical mindset” to the devastating damage.
Journalist’s incredible first-hand account of floods
Thirsty, shivering and cold, I stood waist-high in floodwater, numb.
By this time I was standing on my front balcony on a chair – it was the only place I wouldn’t be engulfed in rapidly rising flood waters. I’d been there for about six hours.
Before my brother Jeremy and I made it to the balcony, the water had risen so fast in three hours it was above my head on the second-storey of our home.
The pace at which the floodwaters gushed into our house was terrifying, but the thing that will probably draw flashbacks long term is the bitter cold of the rapids.
We were raised in Lismore. We’ve seen floods come and go, so we thought we were prepared for waters to rise early Monday morning. But like so many in the town we know and love, nothing could have prepared us, or Lismore, for this. It was nine hours of agony as the floodwaters slowly rose.
We were unable to escape and had to hope that a good Samaritan would come to our rescue.
Earlier, we had taken all our usual precautions around our raised Queenslander home.
We spent eight hours moving valuables from the bottom floor to the top.
As night fell on Sunday we moved our car and motorbike to higher ground at a nearby Bunnings and we stayed awake watching the flood updates until about 1.30am. The last update said the river was going to get to 12.1m, so it shouldn’t have been a problem, with our home standing at 12.47 metres.
Exhausted, we went to bed, thinking the water levels would come nowhere near us. As a precaution we set an alarm for 3.30am. It probably saved our lives. READ MORE
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