Flooding continues across Riverstone, Shanes Park

Some residents in northwestern Sydney had to bolt from their homes after the SES issued immediate evacuation orders. Another household was rescued after being trapped. Read the latest.

Disaster was averted when Blacktown SES volunteers rescued four adults and a dog while floodwaters trapped them in their Riverstone house on Tuesday.

The SES managed to safely pull the Riverstone Pde occupants — including an elderly person — to safety in what the Blacktown unit described as the most critical and life-threatening jobs of the day.

On Tuesday morning, some residents across the Blacktown region had just over an hour to evacuate their homes when the SES issued the orders as rain continued to plague Sydney.

At Shanes Park, residents and businesses in parts of the suburb were alerted at 6.45am and had to flee their properties by 8am.

They were advised to use Castle Hill RSL Club as an evacuation centre, where temporary accommodation is available in the auditorium or where they can be relocated into apartments and hotels after being processed by Communities and Justice Department staff.

Riverstone resident Donna Morris evacuated her Delaware Rd house that she shares with her brother, 50, her 80-year-old father and five dogs, on Monday night.

On Monday, the SES sent text messages for Riverstone residents to evacuate if they lived on Richards Ave and streets near Garfield Rd East and Riverstone train station.

Despite Miss Morris’ property falling outside the boundary, she and her family were not taking any chances and they left, along with most of her neighbours.

The assistant pharmacist is seeking refuge at a pavilion at Castle Hill Showground where her dogs can seek shelter too.

She is still recovering from $10,000 worth of goods damaged from the March floods. That includes two hot water systems, a fridge, freezer and ride-on lawnmower.

Long time Riverstone resident Donna Morris says this week’s floods have been the worst.

“We have been in Riverstone 30 years and we’ve been in that address for 20 years and the last two years is the only time we’ve had flooding,’’ she said.

“And this one is the worst. It came up quickly and when I left there, it was lapping at my door.

“My acre block is under and it was lapping at my doors when I left. I’m assuming the house is going to have water (inside). I have insurance but it doesn’t cover floods.’’

On Tuesday afternoon, Miss Morris left the club’s evacuation centre with a box full of essentials including food and toiletries.

Showing resilience, she said while emotionally and mentally she was stressed, “we’ll get through it”.

“We always do,’’ she said.

Since Monday, more than 100 evacuees sought shelter at Castle Hill RSL Club.

In the past 24 hours, Blacktown SES has had 39 requests for assistance and Parramatta volunteers responded to 18 requests, with most jobs including toppling trees, leaking roofs and sandbagging.

Blacktown had 130mm of rainfall in the past 24 hours while Parramatta experienced 58mm.

On Monday night, the extreme weather interrupted power to over 10,800 homes and businesses across the Endeavour Energy network.

Blacktown is one of 23 local government areas where disaster assistance is available.

“We have seen some of these impacted communities being hit by floods for a third and fourth time in 18 months, which is extremely distressing to the residents of these communities,” Emergency Management Minister Murray Watt said.

“The Australian and NSW governments have worked very co-operatively through this latest flood emergency, to ensure defence and other resources were deployed early and fast.’’

Assistance available under the Disaster Recovery Funding Arrangements include: Help for eligible people whose homes or belongings have been damaged; support for affected councils to help with the costs of cleaning and restoring damaged road and essential public assets; concessional interest rate loans for small businesses, primary producers and non-profit organisations; and freight subsidies for primary producers.

For information on personal hardship and distress assistance, contact Service NSW on 13 77 88.

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