I was going to call this ‘Does bad luck come in threes and if so, what’s next?’ but then i thought that was a glass half full approach.

Australian content follows.

A week ago at 3am after around 700mm of rain over the previous week a microburst storm uprooted a huge tree which smashed through our bedroom roof and wall.
Winds were estimated at 150km/h and the hail sandblasted our iron roof. I’ve honestly never experienced anything like it.

It’s been a massive week organising an evacuation from the property, making it safe, moving into temporary accommodation and firstly having to clear a 350m driveway strewn with multiple huge trees, including a 40m tree hanging over our bridge (access to the road) and the main powerline to three houses.

Then, a week to the hour after the storm my eldest son wakes up with an ‘orrible fever and has now tested COVID+

But we’re all alive. We’re in good shape. We haven’t been flooded like so many other people in the region and we have (hopefully) good insurance (don’t know when we’ll get an assessor out!)
I’m focussing on the good luck… if such a thing exists.

Anyway, in the spirit of sharing experiences as we seem to do here – what are your stories of storm damage and reconstruction?

And here’s some photos/vids (language and 2-stroke warning on the vids) of the damage and TV news coverage.

Ouch. That could have been really catastrophic.

Glad you and your family are all ok. I’m sure your lad will be over Covid real fast too, it’s gone through the schools over here like a dose of salts. It’s a huge relief that it doesn’t lead to anything serious in the vast majority of children.

I’m not sure about bad luck coming in threes but it might be worth getting a nuclear bunker installed during the renovations!lol

Ah, this is the reason for emergency relocation from the WiFi casting thread! Blimey, that’s a story. This has barely made the news in the UK what with all the Ukraine coverage. Good luck reeksy.

Jeez your house is more tree than house! 😳 Amazing no one was hurt. Good luck with the insurance/repairs etc.

Literally everything in Oz is trying to kill you. Glad you’re all safe.

RIP swingset and trampoline.

Lucky escape. Thankfully. I’d count that as lucky. Maybe good luck comes in threes! And the pool survived. So that’s 2. Number 3 may be a new roof 😉

True, although most of the time life is grand.
The Covid issue is mainly a frustration added to the load. It means we have to delay an insurance inspection and the younger son will have to miss his annual school camp which was going to be incredible 😞

might be worth getting a nuclear bunker installed during the renovations

That’s not too far off what we have in mind 😀

Ah, this is the reason for emergency relocation from the WiFi casting thread!

Yep. Huddling around an iPad tonight to watch Killing Eve without waking the kids wasn’t great tbh

Yes, good luck in 3s seems appropriate

And the pool survived.

Depends. We don’t know how long until we get power and a new oxidation / UV system so that might be a premature assumption.

Shit the bed.

I love how laid back everyone is about it. Standing in front of utter devastation, “yeah, the swingset’s gone…” The fire service describing it as a “weather event…”

Glad you’re all OK dude.

Thanks. We have ‘storm season’ here, there’s so many storms they don’t get named… apart from “here’s comes another bastard.”

Funny how the fire service said they responded. I called emergency services immediately and they didn’t ever turn up. If it’s taught me one thing it’s that if you live in these kinds of communities you need to have the means to get yourself out. I’ve bought a second chainsaw, more headtorches and we’ll look at off-grid options for the rebuild too.

I’ve heard that a guy down the road that lived alone died of a heart attack shortly after the storm and a horse was killed by a falling tree 🙁

Calm as you like! Impressive demonstration of keeping things in perspective, “it’s not Ukraine”.

Was watching some of the flooding footage earlier, very scary stuff.

It was all over in a few minutes. The flooding on the other hand is another level.

Trust me, i was literally (in the traditional not millenial sense) screaming and running madly in a circle when it happened. I think that scared the kids more than anything. The interview was several hours later.

Well a mere one year and 24 days on and we have signed a contract with a builder to repair our house…

… yet to finalise the payout from the insurance company. It’s been a lesson in resilience.

missed this first time – and glad it’s coming good.

Watching your interview made me think slightly of this

Classic.

Funnily enough we’ve been talking snake stories in the office this morning. Best one: One of my colleagues’ Dad’s once killed a snake near the house while the rest of the family were out. As a prank he waited for the family to come home and lay down next to the snake to make it look like the snake had killed him.

His wife and three young girls apparently didn’t find it very funny!

Wow, glad you are at least all unheard.

I briefly attended Oxfird Polytechnic in 1987, dropped out straight away, and started a job with an I surance company on 2nd November, 2 weeks after the Great Storm of 16/10/87. Straight into the claims department,overtime from day 1, just authorising claim payments and writing that date.

MrsMC was in 6th form down in Sussex at the time, their village was cut off and without electricity for 7 days.

Doh, just realised this is an old thread.

Not enough coffee…..

After 13 months, we finally started a rebuild and renovation… still don’t have money from the insurance company.

Progress is being made…

Slab out the front for new bedrooms

All the internals gutted (framing’s pretty much all gone now too)

New treatment plant fitted to replace old septic system

By heck, that’s a year since?

What’s the hold up with insurance? Apart from the usual insurance crappiness.

They tried to settle with contrary terms to their own structural engineer because their builder didn’t agree! Insurer’s builder also omitted to follow the legal requirements of a Bushfire Assessment that we already had. Flipping cowboys … and also probably one of Australia’s largest insurers.

We ended up taking them to the Ombudsman which meant lots of delays, and having to explain things like ‘inflation’ to a an inept staff. We’ll be seeing what we can do to complain about the industry and the industry funded complaints process. If we weren’t financially literate we’d have been screwed over – so that probably means thousands of people are screwed over.

Lots of lovely new trusses going up. Some new walls due this week… hoping it stays dry!

Glad progress is finally happening, I had a heating pipe burst in our kitchen a few years ago, that as it had not been lagged when house was built, the concrete had corroded it, the insurance companies plumbers took 7 visits and 2 months to finally sort, by which time it had spread through half the house and soaked carpets and wood flooring and even tiles had lifted off walls with damp.

They assured us that when we went away for a week, their industrial heaters and dehumidifiers would be fine running 24 hours a day, got back to house so hot, all the food had gone off, even tins were hot to touch, and two doors had warped!

First builder they sent to do remedial work was supposed to level floor, you could roll a marble down it by the time he’d finished.

So i lost my rag, reported to ombudsman, and took a lump sum and compensation, and 2 years later, a new bathroom and kitchen and i can only see end in sight now finally…

<p>Blimey, that sounds like a pain. Hopefully we’re back in by Christmas… depends on how all the trades come together.</p>

19 months down and the end is in sight… kinda.

Tiling to be completed, internal painting, electrics and plumbing, pool fence repairs, new path etc.

Architect reckons it’s going to be 8 star… will be interesting to see how it goes in the summer heat.

That looks lovely. The big tree on the left is scaring me a bit.

Missed this first time around. Jebus what an experience! And what resilience dealing with the aftermath! The new place looks ace 👍

The big tree on the left is scaring me a bit.

Same. I’m normally a commited tree hugger, but in your situation I think you’d be justified in getting a bit chainsaw happy to avoid a repeat.

That tree is a bit further back than the one that landed on us. Up close you can see they the slope and the root structure make it extra unlikely for it to fall on us.

We’re surrounded by trees though. This is the view from the deck at twilight – looking down.

I didn’t spot the date stamp, my first thought when I opened this thread was “jesus, how can it have happened to the poor bastard again?!” I genuinely breathed a sigh of relief when I realised it was the original thread.

Glad you’re finally getting sorted mate, that’s looking mint.

Haha. Thanks. I’m a bit apprehensive about the whole palaver of moving back in and having to maintain the property as well as a nice house. I’m sure it will all be worth it.

And the pool survived.

Did the pool survive, or did the storm secretly fill it with crocodiles and sea snakes?

Just frogs I think… and leaves, lots of leaves. This is what it looked like straight after.

Job done.

I hate unpacking though.

Before and after photos:

I missed this thread first time around, but catching up with it now means I’ve been able to follow the whole story through in one go. It’s the supercells that get you every time, there were some here during the last few storms, they have so much concentrated energy in them, there’s little anyone can do. Nice job on the house, too!

Just frogs I think… and leaves, lots of leaves. This is what it looked like straight after.

Honestly, knowing what the flora and fauna are like in your neck of the woods, I’d be approaching that with several sticks of dynamite, a speargun and extreme caution! 🧨🐊🦈

Good luck in your new home! 👍🏼

Mate that looks fantastic – congratulations.  100% finished, or are you leaving some things incomplete so you can procrastinate over getting them finished over the next decade?  That’s how I roll.

@countzero – firepump got all the water out. Hands got the vegetation out. Washed it down with chlorine and pressure washed…a little bit of damage from the pressure washer but cosmetic only.

List of jobs… starting at the road:

• Replace three bridge joists (rotted out after 25 years)*
• Grade driveway
• Landscape, gabion wall, drainage around house*
• Refit fireplace
• Window screens on sliding doors
• New roofs for garage and shed (doing that after the builder had finished to save the markup)
• Finish treehouse repairs*
• Repair pool filter shed (using leftovers)*
• Pay for all the furniture being made out of the downed trees – see other thread (made and fitted an island bench top from a packing case yesterday to tide us over)
• New steps to the pool (I did a very bad job last time)

So, really not too far off. Might make it before the kids leave home.

*jobs i can do myself