Tweed residents say the community is still "raw" a year on from devastating floods, with the anniversary reminding them of the region's vulnerability to sudden natural disasters.
Residents in the Chinderah, Murwillumbah and Kingscliff areas were forced to evacuate their homes early on February 28 last year.
The flood level reached 6.5 metres at Murwillumbah, 200mm above the 2017 floods.
About 2,100 properties were damaged across the shire, with more than 1,500 people being forced out of their homes.
Electricity and telecommunications were cut off for days.
Much of the initial rescue and recovery efforts were led by the community.
At the time, there was widespread community anger at the official response.
Former Murwillumbah resident Brett Bugg said things would probably never be the same.
"It's not over and not everyone got the help," he said.
"It's hard to say it’s a failure, it's hard to say it's a success.
"People seem to forget — that's the key moment, six months in the promises stopped coming, the action moved elsewhere."
'Things were getting hairy'
Mr Bugg's family was rescued by two strangers in a tinnie as floodwater completely inundated his house on the Tweed River.
He said his family had registered with the state government's buyback scheme, but decided to leave Murwillumbah.
"It's almost impossible to get flood insurance again," Mr Bugg said.
"We weren't going to put ourselves in the position of spending a lot of money on doing the renovations that was required and possibly having another flood.
"We're in the process of still trying to receive a payout from our insurance company."
Tania Phillips was running the Tweed SES Facebook page during the floods.
"Suddenly roads were cutting everywhere and the rains were still coming down," she said.
"I couldn't get a hold of SES in Lismore and I wasn't get a lot of reports through.
"Things were starting to get a bit hairy."
Ms Phillips said an evacuation centre was established at the Kingscliff TAFE as caravan parks "started going under".
She said people used their tinnies to rescue the stranded residents.
"There was just this flotilla of locals who were pulling them out," she said.
"People who could least afford to be affected are the worst affected."
Kingscliff resident Sheree Merryfull said she was in shock when her house was flooded last year.
Her house has been stripped and checked for mould, with repairs starting just three weeks ago.
"Everyone is in the same boat needing repairs," she said.
"Our little community has come together and we support one another."
Fragility exposed
About 180 residents gathered at a community breakfast in Kingscliff today to commemorate the flood anniversary.
Tweed Shire Council mayor Chris Cherry said the day was about acknowledging everything the community had been through but also "everything we're still going through".
"People are still trying to find safe housing," she said.
"It's very raw out there still."
She said "there's no right way to do this", with some residents preferring not to publicly mark the flood anniversary.
"Recovery is an intensely personal thing," Cr Cherry said.
Mr Bugg said there was a lasting impact, with subsequent wet weather "setting off alarm bells" for some.
"There's a lot of people that are dead anxious when the weather forecast comes in and there's a cyclone moving down the coast, the social media pages, the chatter starts," he said.
But Ms Phillip said the community continued to rally together.
"Tweed is a great place to live but I think this reminded everybody about how fragile that is."
