Three teenage girls gather on the street carrying skateboards, the epitome of youthful independence.
But far from carefree, the friends stand frozen and shell-shocked at the centre of a historic climate catastrophe.
Photographer Natalie Grono came across the girls when a second flood hit the NSW Northern Rivers region just one month after parts of Lismore were razed by a wall of water in early 2022.
One of the girls told Grono her family's house was destroyed, while another was stranded as floodwaters cut off the road to her home.
The poignant photograph is among 16 of Grono's images that make up the Inundated exhibition at the Australian National Maritime Museum in Sydney, launched on August 1.
"That image speaks the loudest," Grono told AAP.
"We have a group of teenagers, they're dressed like they should be, with their skateboards like it's a normal day but they're standing on the edge of a cityscape just looking completely lost."
"If environmental catastrophes continue it's the youth that are going to be affected the most."
Another image included in the exhibition, called Peter Takes a Moment, shows a flood survivor amid the muddied detritus that was once his life.
When he sat down on a ruined chair, water lapping at his knees in the village of Wardell, Grono immediately knew the scene was a powerful depiction of despair.
"The top half of the image could be tropical Queensland, but the bottom half really paints the story," she said.
"It's these opposing worlds in one shot with Peter, this stoic character who needs to take a break."
The image won the Nikon-Walkley Photo of the Year in 2022.
Curator Roland Leikauf wanted to install an exhibition on the disaster after being moved by a visit to the Lismore Museum soon after the floods.
Volunteers had taken artefacts to shipping containers on high ground, where they used brushes and vacuum cleaners to preserve local history.
Their work showed the breadth of the disaster, which destroyed human lives, homes, business and culture, Leikauf said.
"I hope in the future we develop more understanding of what we lose in floods and how many things we never regain.
"Even though a city is rebuilt and it might look like before, it never is."
Though people have ready access to news photography online, collections of images still carry great weight, he said.
"They have a gravitas if they are displayed in a large room; you have time to look at them and reflect on them."
Grono, a Northern Rivers local, hopes the exhibition captures the enormity of the disaster and is a reminder of the ongoing recovery effort
"I want it to raise conversations and awareness of what the future holds," she said.
"But also compassion for what people went through, especially for those who weren't there to witness it."
