Selfless team of volunteers in epic effort
A VOLUNTEER helping to lead flood-recovery efforts in northern NSW has spoken of the tearful moment rescuers stumbled upon stranded residents in areas cut off by landslides.
Byron resident Chai West, 31, is among the selfless members of the public putting their lives on hold to help others since the natural disaster devastated the region.
She was part of the first civilian-led mission to reach isolated Upper Wilsons Creek in the Byron Shire, where one house collapsed on a hill after the deluge and landslides tore through the area.
Still, the group refuses to be classed as heroes. It says it is simply doing its duty to help the community, fuelled by a lack of government response.
“The rivers basically crossing the creek were impossible, you could not get across as it was way too dangerous,” Ms West of that first treacherous journey.
“We were able to cross one creek and get some information, so the next day we put together our whole plan of what they needed and what supplies we were going to take up.”
Fifty litres of water, more than 200 litres of fuel, food, medical supplies and flashlights were delivered. Back at Mullumbimby Civic Centre, a “military-like” community-led operation was unfolding.
“We walked those things from the second creek at Wilsons Creek all the way up past this roughly 500sq m landslide over to the twelfth creek,” the business development manager said.
“We had a few people that just cried when they saw us … we were the first people that they had seen in days.
“It feels like we were right where we were supposed to be. The welcoming that we received, I will never forget it.”
The days and now weeks that followed involved the leadership team co-ordinating groups of volunteers to doorknock properties and help out in any way possible.
“It’s where this really amazing story continues to unfold. We came together and just put together something that couldn’t even be written.
“We split the volunteers into groups, we sent them into every street to go and door knock every house and ask them three questions: A) do you have water?, B) do you have food? and C) what can we do for you?”
Hundreds of jobs filled a whiteboard each morning. By day’s end the tasks would be wiped clean – most of them completed or assigned.
The community felt a sense relief thanks to the volunteers but a sense of abandonment by the government was evident too, Ms West says.
Volunteers are calling for a chance to speak with government leaders to share their knowledge and experience.
“We’ve all never done this before,” she said. “We have no training or expertise whatsoever but somehow we just organically and cohesively worked as a team to kind of lead this whole thing.
“We need to work with some other resilience team where we can share our knowledge and suggestions on how we can avoid this situation in the future.”