From fires straight to floods, Salvos now busy serving stranded Victorians

kirranicolle
32 minutes ago
2 min read

Some volunteers have travelled straight from bushfire response into flood response centres, with Victoria facing a battering from extreme weather over the past week. Image: Supplied

BY KIRRALEE NICOLLE

With flash flooding submerging campsites on the Great Ocean Road in Victoria yesterday, Salvation Army Emergency Services (SAES) teams have rushed to offer assistance to those left stranded.

Following a week of bushfire response efforts across Victoria, some teams who were assisting those impacted by fire have now been relocated to Lorne and Apollo Bay in the Surf Coast region to offer meals, snacks, drinks and bedding to those displaced by floods.

The sudden deluge hit on Thursday night, and while only one person so far has been injured, many holidaymakers have lost cars, caravans, tents and possessions, many of which were cast out to sea in a matter of minutes.

The Salvation Army’s General Manager for Emergency, Aid and Development, Daryl Crowden, said the team, occupying three trucks and a support vehicle, was anticipating up to 800 people needing bedding and food, but many of those stranded had managed to find accommodation elsewhere or catch emergency relief buses out of the region.

While some of the team arrived onsite at mid-afternoon yesterday, a group including Daryl arrived at 1.30am this morning.

“Two of the vehicles came straight from the fires,” Daryl said.

One of the material aid trucks and our support vehicle left Yea and went to Seymour and picked up as many of the beds that they could get, packed up their vehicles and then travelled straight down here to get people onto beds.

“We had about 40 people in the Apollo Bay relief rentre and about 60 to 70 people in the Lorne centre. Some of the people that were displaced and stayed in [private accommodation nearby] came back to the relief centre in Lorne during the day to be fed.”

Daryl said he spoke to one man and his wife this morning who had been at the Yea River Caravan Park with their daughter and grandchildren, staying in a campervan with an annexe. Within half an hour of the downpour, they noticed the previously low creek was overflowing, so they escaped and got to higher ground. From their vantage point, they watched the water take their caravan and supplies out to sea.

“We’re hearing a number of stories like that, including at least three cars that disappeared out into the water as well from that same area,” Daryl said.

Daryl said his team has been amazing and also applauded SAES teams in Western Australia who have done “almost six weeks of back-to-back bushfires”. He said over the past week in Victoria, he had seen many people approach members of the team and thank them directly for their assistance.

“I’m just really proud of the team,” Daryl said. “They’ve done amazing work. They have got a lot of comments and compliments from the people that we're serving, and that’s encouraging.

“So yeah, just very proud of them and very pleased to be able to work with them.”