There are about 250 people stranded at the highest point of Coraki and illness is beginning to spread as essential supplies run low. Others have spent the week living in their cars with their families and animals, and desperation is rising.
In the isolated northern NSW community of Coraki the stench from the dead animals hanging from trees is palpable.Some residents feel they have not been made a priority by emergency servicesThey were caught there when local flooding combined with torrents from the Richmond and Wilsons Rivers earlier this week, totally isolating the Northern Rivers town.
In the meantime many of the town's 1,200 residents have been living in their cars or at the evacuation centre established at Coraki's highest point, where illness is starting to spread and drinking water is running out. Little did she know the small town was destined for a similar fate as Lismore about 12 hours after the floods caused"We were stranded on a roof for 16 hours in the rain with a two-year-old child and seven adults," Stacey said.Coraki is about 28 kilometres from Evans head, to the east, and about 50km from Lismore, to the north.
"The water came up to the roof of our two-storey house and it has never flooded in past events," she said."Right now we're limiting water, we're limiting food," she said.Hannah Gordon has been living in her car with her son for more than four days.Hannah Gordon said living in her small car with her son and partner for more than four days was "a bit rough".