Six Additional NSW Areas Declared Natural Disaster After ‘Extraordinary’ Rainfall

The NSW emergency services minister, Steph Cooke, told ABC’s Afternoon Briefing on Thursday that six additional local government areas have been added to the state’s natural disaster list.

In addition to the 23 declared earlier in the week, Cooke named the new areas as:

• Bayside
• Dungog
• Lake Macquarie
• Maitland
• Singleton
• Upper Lachlan

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"So that’s very good news for those areas because we are working very closely with the federal government at the moment to put together support packages,” Cooke said.

“Further support for those communities that have been so devastatingly impacted by this latest flooding event and that means that support will flow to those communities as soon as we make the announcements around those support packages.”

- Ms Cooke

Although the immediate emergency response phase is starting to relax, Cooke said a close eye is being kept on the Hunter River at Maitland, which is currently at 9.7 metres and expected to peak later today at 10.7 metres.

It comes as 250 Defence personnel were deployed on Thursday to help flood-affected communities in the Hunter Region and Mid North Coast, where the SES conducted 56 rescues on Wednesday night.

NSW SES tweeted it had executed over 370 flood rescues and 7,600 requests for assistance from flood impact across the state this week.

“During the severe weather event starting last Tues 28 June, over 2,600 members have been deployed operationally.”

“Today, we’re really going to focus on the isolated communities and what supplies and assistance they need,” NSW SES Hunter Region Tammy Garrett said.

“The community has reacted so well to the warnings and advice messages and enacted their own plans. It’s been fantastic to see the response of the community. The majority of the community have already done what they need to do.”

- Ms Garrett

Join Tom Tilley with regular rotating co-hosts Jan Fran, Annika Smethurst and Jamila Rizvi on The Briefing, Monday - Saturday, for the day's headlines and breaking news as well as hot topics and interviews. Available on Listnr.