Clean up begins as Grantham residents return to homes wrecked by floodwater

Slowly Grantham residents return to their homes and take measure of the destruction brought by Friday’s deluge. For some there is no going back.

Within on day Grantham resident Yvonne Darlington lost a garden she spent 10 years building.

One by one Grantham residents returned to their home yesterday to survey the damage and start clearing away the mud and debris washed down the Sandy Creek by Friday’s flood.

Yvonne and Mick Darlington knew the place was going to be a mess but seeing the full extent of the damage left them wondering if it was worth replacing what was lost.

“It is devastating,” Mrs Darlington said.

“I want to cry but crying is not going to help me, it is not going to fix anything.”

The couple’s home sits in the middle of Grantham’s low-lying area, surrounded by a park that was built after the Lockyer Valley Regional Council’s land swap deal with residents whipped out by the 2011 floods.

Grantham residents Yvonne Darlington has a big job ahead.

The Darlington’s were offered a block up on the hill but declined because they would not have been able to run their water carting business from the new property.

Instead Mrs Darling set about building an oasis in the heart of the hamlet.

She had more than 70 rose bushes along with grape vine, citrus and mango trees, an extensive veggie garden and hundreds of cute and quirky sculptures, many of which she made herself.

“That is what you do when you retire,” she said

“You want to have everything nice but now it is all gone.”

Sandy Creek peaked on Friday and inundated dozens of Grantham homes.

The water cut across the parkland and washed under the Darlington’s home forcing them to flee, with the help of a swift water rescue team at about 4pm on Friday.

The torrent undermined their plumbing and destroyed an expensive solar system that made the home self-sufficient.

It wrecked Mrs Darlington’s newly renovated caravan, destroyed their outdoor dining areas and eroded large sections of lawn.

The couple did not get a full measure of the damage done to the solar system and Mick’s business but they know it was bad.

Aerial footage of flooding in the Lockyer Valley on Sunday. Photo: Joe Kluck.

The Darlingtons were one of the dozens of families who left their homes in the face of rising flood water on Friday.

The downpours filled the both Cooby and Perseverance Dams as hundreds of millimetres of rain fell across the region.

Grantham was cut off from the neighbouring towns through the weekend and many homes were submerged for more than 24 hours.

Yvonne and Michael Darlington's garden was hit hard by the Grantham flood, February 28, 2022.

It stopped people like the Darlingtons from returning to the home to start the clean up.

Most of that water has moved to Brisbane where about 1200 homes are expected to go under water.

But the one silver lining was that, unlike in 2011, looters didn’t get access to their home, though some tried.

“We found fresh food prints in the mud,” Mr Darlington said.

“They looked like they were two adults and a few kids.”

The fact that someone came close to their home after it had been evacuated angered the couple. “Just because our home was flooded does not give them a right to walk around and look for anything they want,” he said.