Shirley Martin required assistance from Marine Rescue to evacuate from her Phylands Rd home on Monday.
Their home has been surrounded by lakes of floodwater for a number of weeks, but when an evacuation order was issued for Davidson St in north Deniliquin at the weekend Elizabeth Martin knew she had to do something more.
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She and husband Keith Brimstone chose to stay, but plans were made to have Elizabeth’s mother Shirley - who turns 94 on Christmas Day - evacuated from their property to a safe place in town.
It took a few days to arrange the transfer, and then the Marine Rescue team and other volunteers spent a few hours on Monday escorting Shirley to her temporary home.
Images of the rescue, which show a smiley Shirley waving to her family from the rescue boat, have gone viral on local social media channels since then.
Shirley Martin waves to her family as she is escorted off the Phylands Rd property.
“It was not an emergency evacuation, we just wanted to make sure mum was safe and was close to health services if required,” Elizabeth said.
“Based on the predicted heights, we knew that if she became unwell we might not have the time to get her out.
“We live on Phylands Lade off Dahwilly, and water from the creek has been over the roads out here for a number of weeks and getting higher all the time.
“Our neighbours evacuated last week, but we did not have any friends or family to stay with and our home is raised a little higher than the others.
“Our home is like a little island in the middle of the lake, and water has this week started to come up into the house yard.
“We have left our car at the neighbour’s property though, and we row over to it if we need to get into town.”
When river height predictions of 9.6m were discussed on Friday and Saturday last week, Elizabeth starting making calls to have her mother evacuated.
Shirley Martin required assistance from Marine Rescue to evacuate from her Phylands Rd home on Monday.
The emergency services were teed up, and then a respite bed became available at Navorina Nursing Home on Monday.
“Initially mum was very grumpy at having to go, but once she got outside and saw the water along the road she understood. There are gullies either side of our driveway, so we virtually have a moat around us.
“We drove the car out as much as we could to meet the Marine Rescue team, and mum slid out of the car into their boat.
“It took a few hours to get her out,
“Initially they thought they might get a truck in, but then they had to call for the boat.”
Shirley Martin required assistance from Marine Rescue to evacuate from her Phylands Rd home on Monday.
Elizabeth said her mother will remain at Navorina until the water around their home had receded to an appropriate level.
That drop of the river heights has already started.
“We are so relieved the peak has been revised down, because the water was getting quite close to the house.
“We did not sandbag anything, as because of our elevation there was nowhere to divert the water to.
“The water did get high enough that it started to compromise our water quality. If it had hit the sceptic it would have been quite bad.”
Floodwater started to enter the house yard of the property before the surge peak was revised down.
