Blood Curdling Screams from Panicked Stallions

Left:  Phoebe Colomina with her stallion Genereux at Minden Lodge. Photo: Sydney Morning Herald/ Jacky Ghossein)

More and more stories of miracles and horror are emerging as a result of last week's floods.

Josephine Tovey of The Sydney Morning Herald has reported on the terror experienced by Minden residents, Phoebe and Christophe Colomina, as they rescued their terrified stallions at the height of the flooding in the Lockyer area.

Phoebe Colomina could hear screams of fear issuring from the stables where her valuable stallions were fast disappearing under water last Tuesday. ''They're usually gentle creatures,'' she said. ''It was bloodcurdling.''

It had been raining non-stop but few in the picturesque town of Minden, at the bottom of the Lockyer Valley, were prepared for the soggy puddles to turn into a raging torrent as it did that day. It would claim the life of one of their neighbours, a four-year-old boy, Jesse.

The mares roaming free on their property, Minden Lodge, quickly found their way to higher ground. But Ms Colomina and her husband Christophe heard the screams of panic from the stallions, trapped in their stable on low ground. Rushing into the waist-deep water, which was fast forming a small ocean, they waded past snakes and floating spiders. The horses brayed and screamed as they were being led.

It was a daring act that might puzzle some in the city, but in this horse-breeding area, it was a no-brainer. ''Our horses are our kids,'' she said. ''We would die before they did.''

But it was not only their ''kids'' the Colominas helped that day. At the bottom of their property Amber Hartley and her five children, aged four to 17, and one of their friends, were watching from the upper floor of their house as the waters crept higher and higher.

Ms Hartley, who had moved to the town only six weeks earlier, became increasingly fearful the second storey would be inundated too. Though she had not had time to get to know her neighbours, Mr Colomina and another man were soon at her door, carrying her younger children on their backs up the hill to safety.

As the waist-deep water swirled around them, Ms Hartley's daughter Chloe, 17, became paralysed by fear.

Without hesitation, her brother Jamie, 13, scooped her up and over his shoulders and carried her up the hill. ''The waters were so strong, if you stopped you could feel yourself losing your balance,'' she said. The family now refers to its neighbours as guardian angels.

Later, when Ms Hartley saw the rescue helicopters searching for the missing Jesse, she felt in even greater debt to her neighbours. ''In my couple of moments I kept thinking that could have been my four-year-old,'' she said.