Not a meal missed – our flood heroes
Date published: 03 May 2021
Author: Elizabeth Williams
Milk delivered by helicopter, staff leaving family and flooded homes for days so they could get to work, and HealthShare NSW (HSNSW) logistics teams working overtime to get linen, stores and food delivered before towns became isolated.
These were the very real scenes for HealthShare NSW teams battling the rising flood waters in northern NSW this March.
“I’ve been in health a long time, 37 years, and I’ve never seen disaster after disaster like this,” said Anne Buckley, Food and Patient Support Services Sector Manager for Northern NSW/MNC and New England.
“Off the back of COVID-19 and bushfires I think we can deal with anything now.”
“A big call out needs to go to our support teams and managers. Without the logistics and knowledge they provided in their patches we wouldn’t have had food to serve.”
Fleet and Logistics Assistant Manager David Small said they were lucky this time to get advanced warning that the water was about to come down from Queensland to northern NSW.
“We had about a week to get supplies in and get out. We managed to get about three weeks’ worth of linen and OneLink products to our hospitals that would soon become isolated,” David said.
“We always try to forward plan when disasters happen. All Linen staff have a reputation to ‘team’ together to ensure staff and patients are not compromised.”
It was Friday, 19 March, when flood waters from the Macleay River began to creep into the backyard of Maria Tyne’s Smithtown home, just 20 minutes from her work at Kempsey Hospital.
“We thought on the Friday that it had peaked but on the Sunday we got a fresh rise and I knew I had a window of opportunity to get out,” said Maria, Food Services Manager at Kempsey Hospital.
“I had to make a really quick decision. I left my partner Mark that day (Sunday) to man the forte so I could get into town and support my team before we became completely cut off.”
“It was frightening how quickly things were changing and I felt I was abandoning Mark at a very crucial time. I was heartbroken that I was leaving him there by himself but I had to make a choice.”
Mark drove Maria on the only road out and returned to protect their property as best he could. They were cut off from each other for four days before the flood waters subsided.
“We were very lucky. There’s a lot more people that lost more than we did,” Maria said.
Maria and Mark’s house survived with minimal damage, but water inundated the basement and surrounded the house, leaving the pair with a massive clean-up.
“Mark was very supported by our neighbours, our little community looked out for each other, so we did have minimal damage,” Maria said.
“The Army, our local and out of district fire brigades have already started the clean-up of flood affected areas.”
There were dozens of other HealthShare NSW staff who were impacted and unable to get to work but teams managed to keep patients fed.
“It goes back to managers knowing their business. They put their patients and staff first,” Anne said.
“It was pretty impressive. Everyone pushed through and got the job done. The resilience to just keep going after working a 12–14 hour day – I’m so proud of our teams.”
If you are a HSNSW employee and you or someone you know was affected by the floods and needs support, please contact our free Employee Assistance Program by calling the WHS Assist Line (02) 8644 2323 (select option 4).
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