Lady, 9, escapes car as mother and two siblings are swept to their deaths in Australian floods

A nine-year-old damsel escaped from a car just moments before it was submerged in floodwaters in Australia, screaming that her family was still inwards and had “gone into the river”.

In an unfolding tragedy that goes after a devastating cyclone and flooding across eastern Australia, police divers have launched an operation to attempt to recover the bods of the girl’s mother and older brother and junior sister. They are believed to be trapped in a car in the Tweed Sea, near the town of Tumbulgum in the state of Fresh South Wales.

The car evidently veered off a muddy road and crashed into the sea at 1.40pm, local time.

Thomas Grinham, a bystander, said he arrived on the scene soon after the car became submerged and spotted “a little dame running along the road”.

“She was screaming that her mum, little sister and older brother had gone into the sea in the car,” he told Seven News.

P olice said the road was dangerous and had previously been shut because of mud and rubble. Authorities have located the vehicle using sonar equipment but are unlikely to recover any figures until Tuesday.

“This is a tragic event and we’re very worried a tragic event will unfold over the evening,” said police assistant commissioner Jeff Loy.

“This is about heeding the warnings of the road closures.”

T he incident followed almost a week of torrid weather across eastern Australia which is believed to have killed at least eight people and caused some of the worst flooding in the nation’s history.

H omes, businesses, crops and vehicles have been bruised or lost in a disaster whose cost has been estimated in the billions of dollars.

“This was a one-in-40-year event, if not longer,” said Gladys Berejiklian, the Fresh South Wales premier.

T he natural disaster began with a tropical cyclone – named Debbie – which struck the state of Queensland on Tuesday, causing strenuous harm to resort islands and coastal towns.

The cyclone then moved south, causing flooding and strong winds in southern Queensland and northern Fresh South Wales.

Across Queensland, almost six hundred homes have been deemed uninhabitable, three hundred schools were bruised and 22,600 houses were still without power.

“This has had a hefty influence right across this state,” said Annastacia Palaszczuk, Queensland’s premier. “We’ve got roads down, we’ve got bridges down, we’ve got families that have lost everything,”

A n emergency services worker described rescuing a family from the roof of their house on the Gold Coast before the home was washed away.

“The house cracks free, smashing into another house and then just totally self-destructs on trees all the way down the sea,” said Chris Holloway, from the state emergency services.

Further flooding is expected in the coastal city of Rockhampton in Queensland on Wednesday or Thursday.

The Insurance Council of Australia said almost 20,000 claims had been made, with an initial loss figure of about £140 million, but the figure is expected to rise.

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