Tamborine Mountain woman grateful to be alive after huge tree traps her inside her home

A Mount Tamborine woman says she’s lucky to be alive after a tree came crashing down on her home, smashing her in the head and back - trapping her inside. See the video

Returning home for the first time to find nothing left, Susan and David Hanmore have every reason to feel despair when faced with what has become their Mount Tamborine home.

It’s the damp and earthy smell that hits you first as you duck under the piece of wood chip board that has replaced the front door to the property. Once inside, you’re confronted with more than a decade of family memories smashed, shattered and strewn across the hard wood floor.

There’s not much that mother nature hasn’t destroyed. The lounge room TV and cabinet have been thrown across the room, shunted by the enormous tree that crashed through their roof during the cyclonic Christmas Day storm.

The rains that followed on New Year’s Eve brought down nearly every roof panel, flooding what was left behind.

Damage from the storms that brought tornados and flooding rains to Mt Tamborine. Susan and David Hanmore, with dog Gracie, marvel at how lucky they were to escape with minor injuries after a tree went through their home on Kinabalu Drive. Picture Glenn Hampson

Most of us would breakdown and cry, pack-up and never come back. That’s far from the case with owners Susan and David. In fact, you won’t even hear a world of complaint.

“We are both just grateful that we’re alive and we have each other. There is nothing that can replace us,” Mrs Hanmore said.

“Certainly people are frustrated about the time for the power to get back on but look at what they have to deal with. There is no angst from us, we just feel great regard and gratitude to all the people helping to put this back together.”

Hearing Susan’s story, it’s easy to see why she is filled with humility in the face of utter devastation. It’s a miracle she can even be here to tell it today, how she escaped serious lifelong injury, is just as remarkable.

When the furious and intense storm belted down on Christmas Day, Susan was sitting on her lounge in the living room watching TV. There was no warning when the huge tree outside her Kinabulu Drive home split in two, smashing through the roof and pinning Susan underneath it.

“It knocked my glasses from my head. I had a big shiner on my head, my shoulder was huge. I really was a mess,” she said.

“I tried to get up but every time I did I would slip on the debris and broken glass”.

Damage from the storms that brought tornados and flooding rains to Mt Tamborine. David Hanmore marvels at how lucky they were to escape with minor injuries after a tree went through their home on Kinabalu Drive. Picture Glenn Hampson

One of the branches from the tree stabbed Mrs Hanmore in the back, narrowly avoiding her spinal cord and a catastrophic lifelong injury.

The hard hit to her head was also another miracle. Scans in hospital later revealing no internal injuries or concussion.

“The feeling we had in the hours after it happened when we were trapped in there and couldn’t get out, when these guys (emergency services) had to hack their way in. We heard their foot steps and heard them call out, that feeling, I would never feel anything but gratitude,” Mrs Hanmore said.

The downed live powerlines, falling trees, strong winds and lightning didn’t deter paramedics, SES and firefighters from coming to the couple’s rescue.

Trekking more than a kilometre on foot in pitch black to reach the badly damaged home, they then carried Susan on a stretcher all the way back to the waiting ambulance.

“They were so kind, patient and caring. We have nothing but gratitude towards them.”

The couple have months, possibly, even a year of rebuilding ahead of them but most importantly, they’re here to do it together.