Residents of an Anzac Avenue, Cessnock property had to be rescued by fire truck after storm water banked up in front of their home.
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Tyson Johnson, who lives in a granny flat out the back of the home, said it was Tuesday morning when they realised the water started to rise very quickly.
Mr. Johnson said as soon as he and the other residents of the household saw the water reach their gate, they started to put things into garbage bags and their valuables up high, but the water rose at a fast pace.
“I just can’t believe how quickly it happened,” he said.
“It was honestly like a river.”
Fellow resident Chris Herbert called 000 as the residents were left stranded in their home by a flood of water on the road in front.
“Within half an hour it became a raging torrent,” he said.
A fire truck soon arrived and managed to transport the residents into safe territory around the corner, and then an ambulance took them and their dogs up to the hospital, where another resident Tracy Dargan was working.
The water did not make it into the house, but flooded the backyard to waist-deep level, and filled the sheds and the granny flat, damaging everything inside.
The belongings they lost included clothes, computers, a washing machine, power tools, fridges, a dryer, and even a car.
In the clean-up, 1600 kilograms of belongings had to be thrown away, which filled two truckloads and would have normally cost $1100 if council’s waste facility didn’t offer free waste disposal to flood-affected residents.
And that wasn’t even the entirety of what needed to be thrown away.
However, the family have looked on the bright side of things, and consider themselves lucky to be safe, considering there was a six-month-old baby, a pregnant woman, dogs, a cat and horses to worry about evacuating.
“It’s not that bad, we are alive,” Mr. Johnson said.
“It could have been a lot worse.”
“You can buy new houses, you can’t buy lives,” Mr. Herbert added.