Flood

The rain keeps falling, the rivers keep rising. There is disbelief that we are flooding again, one month on from the worst floods people in the region had ever seen. Sandra Aarts at the Woodburn Bakery has had to move the shop equipment again. The bakery had only been open for a week and a half.

Houses identified as being at risk in the Kyogle Flood Study are purchased at market value in a voluntary House Buy Back Scheme. Kyogle Council contacts all identified property owners each year and asks them if they would be interested in selling their properties. Only identified properties are eligible for the grant.

Empty shells of houses. Rubbish piled up outside homes. Waterlogged Woodburn is drying out. In week three since the floods, the sound of dozers and trucks echoes though the empty streets removing the rubbish piles, one at a time. There was one place where there were a lot of people – a queue of them. The Woodburn Wurlitzer Bakery opened today, March 21.

Brigadier Robert Lording, Commander of ‘ADF Operation Flood Assist 22’ for the NSW Northern Rivers Region said the first request for assistance came from the NSW State Emergency Services. “By Saturday February 26, the SES were aware there was going to be a flood emergency develop and they were quickly onto it, requesting ADF assistance to doorknock residents and provide other logistical aid”, said the Brigadier.

Cattle farmers like Rachel Bell at Coraki need help. Having just experienced their worst flood ever, they need to rebuild and the flood recovery grants are supposed to make that rebuilding easier. Unfortunately, Rachel has found herself in the position where she doesn’t qualify for the flood recovery grants because she doesn’t fit the eligibility criteria for a farmer or as a small business owner.

One thousand army personnel are based in Casino helping with the flood recovery ... This group isn’t only for Casino, residents in surrounding areas can put in a request for assistance ... The army have been in Woodburn and Coraki and helped out at the Rappville Pub.

Geoff Helisma. The Northern Region Planning Panel (NRPP) has deferred its decision to approve (or not) a 136 multi-dwelling proposal in Yamba, pending the development of a draft flood evacuation plan ... As well as calling for an evacuation plan, councillors Tiley and Clancy were concerned that managing stormwater during an extreme weather event, such as the recent Yamba flooding, would be more than the design could handle.

A rescued orphaned koala joey is one of countless native animals rescuers expect will need urgent care amid the flooding catastrophe in New South Wales and Queensland. The 14-month-old male koala, named Gulliver, was rescued amid the torrential downpours in Tregeagle in the NSW Northern Rivers region on February 28.

“They refused to vote down dodgy National Party law changes that allowed for excessive water take in the Northern Basin. These law changes really disadvantaged Lower Darling communities and Murray River irrigators” : Helen Dalton ... “This disallowance motion is a political game from a green Independent looking for relevance that undermines years of hard work by the SFF to see floodplain harvesting regulated”: Mark Banasiak, SFF MLC and Deputy Chair of the Select Committee on Floodplain Harvesting.

At the start of the floods, private company Rotorwing Helicopters was using two helicopters. Now they have 12 here. Over five days they made 20 drops to Coraki. They have coordinated 250 drops so far across the region. At least 100 people have been moved to safety by their helicopter crews. More than 1000 calls for assistance have come in.

In the aftermath of the flood, bread and milk have become important commodities. With delivery trucks from Brisbane delayed, dairy farmers Shane Hickey and Julia Curtis have stepped up to get milk to as many places as they can ... In the past few days, they have widened their delivery service ... Dave’s Bakehouse in Kyogle is flat out making bread ...

While the focus in Evans Head is on getting food and fuel into the town and cleaning-up, the harrowing flood experiences the community went through remain. And will for a long time ... Like many residents in Coraki, Woodburn and Broadwater, Kerri-Anne is unhappy about how the flood crisis was managed.

Lynne Mowbray. A contingent of Rural Fire Service (RFS) volunteers from around NSW arrived in Maclean on Monday morning to assist with clean-up operations on Woodford Island ... Over the last week here in Maclean, the town has had an influx of assistance from around the State from not only RFS members, but SES, NSW Police Rescue, Army Reserves, NSWF+R Technical Support and NSWF+R Bulk Water Transfer System ...

Emma Pritchard. Several local businesses have united to host fundraising events to assist Clarence Valley residents affected by the adverse wet weather which unleashed havoc upon the region last week. TNT Towing and grooming salon You Love ‘m, We Scrub ‘m have held flood fundraising barbeques. Anytime Fitness will host a third fundraising event.

Please DO NOT handle or place any asbestos in rubbish piles for collection. Asbestos can only be removed by a licenced contractor. Hazardous wastes will eventually be included in the overall disaster clean-up work.

Storms which hit Narrandera in January remain vivid in the minds of locals, with flooding still the hot topic of conversation among many who had a first hand experience of the storm disaster ... residents talked about the same things happening back in 2012 and said nothing had changed.

The costs in human and animal suffering, infrastructure, farmland, wildlife, the list goes on, is immense. What makes it so appalling is that, with good planning, both in terms of infrastructure, such as dams, and planning laws restricting development on floodplains, much of this horrendous waste and loss could have been at least mitigated, and, I suspect, in many cases, avoided altogether.

The current flooding in Lismore and Nimbin, and associated power outages, have affected Council’s water supply and sewage systems. Residents are asked to conserve water as much as possible as we are currently unable to replenish water reservoirs. Nimbin has approx. 24 hours of water supply left based on normal usage rates and residents are asked to conserve water.

Elizabeth and Hayden Steele made sure they built their Colorbond home on Casino's Coraki Rd above the one-in-100 flood height. That was two years ago, and like many people in the area they were surprised when floodwaters lapped at their doorstep.