As a category two tropical cyclone headed towards the east coast, Tweed couple Amber Butler and Ben Chan found themselves preparing for both a storm and a baby.
Around the house, Chan was sandbagging and tying their outdoor furniture down, at the same time as learning how to put in a car seat. Butler’s 38-week doctor’s appointment on Wednesday involved discussions around how to get to the hospital in the event of flooding.
But the couple were confident they would be able to weather Tropical Cyclone Alfred without incident – after all, Alfred was expected to make landfall on Thursday – 10 days before their baby’s expected due date on 17 March.
Butler told herself “she’s not going to come in those two days, you’ll be fine”.
On Thursday night the couple went to bed as the weather intensified with strong winds and rain. At 2am on Friday, Butler woke Chan up because the air conditioning had gone when their home lost power.
At 4am, when Butler woke Chan up again, he expected she might tell him the plumbing was also gone, but instead she said: “You’re not going to believe this, but my waters have broken.”
Chan said the drive to the hospital – whose main entrance is in a floodway – amid the “apocalyptic” scenes of 100km/h winds, torrential rain and fallen trees “was probably the scariest drive I’ve ever had in my life”.
The couple arrived at Tweed Valley hospital at 5am. Butler said while hospitals are often thought to be sterile environments, the minute she walked in, she felt safe and glad to be there.
Despite the ever-worsening conditions outside, Butler said, “I was in the midst of labour, so I really had no idea what was going on outside. It felt like a cyclone inside.”
It was only after their daughter was born at 5.03pm, weighing 3.665kg, that the couple looked out the window again to notice the rain lashing against the window. They named their new baby Florence, “but we definitely threw around Alfie as a joke”, Butler said.
“She’s born to do great things. She’s just been born in a cyclone, and she’s just going be amazing, I can already tell,” the new mum continued.
Butler only had praise for the hospital and its staff – every single person who helped them was “fantastic”.
Tracey Maisey, the chief executive of the northern New South Wales local health district, said to date, more than 370 staff were away from their own homes – some for up to four days – to ensure emergency and urgent care services were available for patients across the district’s eight hospitals and four multi-purpose services.
“Most of these staff slept on-site in the hospitals to ensure they were able to report for duty the next day, lending a hand to unpack and deliver supplies and assisting in evacuation centres,” Maisey said.
“While the emergency is not yet over, we are indebted to all our staff … for their incredible efforts to provide the best possible care for our community over the duration of this weather event.”
Ex-Tropical Cyclone Alfred finally made landfall on Saturday night just north of Brisbane, but has battered south-east Queensland and northern NSW with heavy wind and rain.
Maisey extended her gratitude to the NSW Health staff, including registered nurses, mental health and allied health workers, who travelled from across the state to provide back-up support in the district’s hospitals.
Normal operations, including planned surgery and outpatient care services, will resume where possible on Tuesday, she said.
While patients delivered to emergency departments by NSW Ambulance were higher than normal, with 118 presentations on Friday and 130 on Saturday, walk-in emergency department presentations were slightly lower than usual as people chose to stay home during the adverse weather, Maisey said.
A Queensland Health spokesperson said more than 2,000 of the state’s healthcare workers camped out in south-east Queensland hospitals over the weekend to care for those in need.
Read more of Guardian Australia’s Tropical Cyclone Alfred coverage:
