AN Ararat SES volunteer has spoken of the devastation he faced when deployed to flood impacted areas of northern New South Wales last week.<\/p>\n
Jordan Bush, the Acting Controller of Ararat SES, spent four days helping around Casino and Coraki, describing the damage as \u201cincomprehensible\u201d<\/p>\n
He said coverage of the floods on television could not prepare him for what he saw.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s way worse than what it is being presented as on the television,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cI was the division commander of a crew that went to Casino and we flew in by helicopter and the devastation was just incomprehensible.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cWe kind of shadowed the local (SES) unit on the first day we were there, get to know the ropes, how they do things and the next day we were out on our own.<\/p>\n
\u201cThe (local) unit was so exhausted, they\u2019ve been going for two weeks straight, most of them were sleeping at the unit as well, they had lost their houses and belongings and some had lost family members and they were still going,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe were able to provide them, finally, with that much needed break. It was devastating for them, we certainly wore some of the emotion for a few days, but we provided them with a break.\u201d<\/p>\n
Mr Bush said his crew were also involved in several rescues during their deployment.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe got sent there as flood boat operators and we ended up doing a few rescues, both planned and unplanned. We came across another boater who had become inundated with water because his boat had broken down so we managed to save him.\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cThe rest of the recues were people off of houses or off little islands. The thing we spend the majority of our time on was medical drops and food supply drops to people who couldn\u2019t or didn\u2019t want to evacuate,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Mr Bush said the flooding was different to the type of floods experienced in Victoria.<\/p>\n
\u201cIn Victoria we experience flash flooding, it comes and then disappears as quickly as it comes, it leaves a path of destruction but it doesn\u2019t hang around whereas in Coraki and Casino, the water just sat there for days,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Mr Bush said four days on the ground left him and his team exhausted.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe slept on the plane on the way home and I think it\u2019s safe to say we all slept well that night. It was exhausting, not just from a physical point of view, the emotional exhaustion was the toughest because we were wearing the communities emotions as well,\u201d he said.<\/p>\n
Ararat SES is a volunteer based unit where members are on call to help out in emergencies.<\/p>\n
New members are always needed to respond to calls for help, both locally and across Australia.<\/p>\n