Climate stories

Hi! My name is Patrick, and I was affected by the recent floods which occurred throughout Victoria. I am currently working full time at an accounting firm and therefore spend majority of my time in Melbourne CBD. I live in Maribyrnong, Victoria, which is a suburb only around 15 minutes from the city.

Living in such proximity to a major city, I did not have much experience with climate change and its effects. It was not until last month when I felt the seriousness of climate change because myself, my family and my friends were impacted by the floods. We were warned to prepare for flooding throughout Victoria, but my family and I did not expect it to become as serious as it did. We went to sleep feeling anxious about how the heavy rain would affect us, and we were woken by the sound of water seeping into our home. It was the first time that this has happened and we felt extremely nervous about how it was going to ruin our house and our possessions inside it. As water started coming in, our furniture began soaking it up and essentially our bottom floor was covered in water. We were able to clear a lot of the floor to protect our belongings, however the next morning when we looked further into it, we realized some of our furniture was damaged and irreparable. It was clear that we were not the only family to face this issue as there was a section in our street filled with piles of furniture and damaged goods from the overnight flooding. It was sad to see that so many of us were affected by something that could have been avoided altogether.

Since that week, my family and I have considered moving elsewhere to avoid a situation like this from happening again. We are well within Spring and it continues to rain heavily. For most of my life the effects of climate harm was not clear to me but after the flooding I strongly feel that change needs to happen as soon as possible.