The NSW Rural Fire Service has expressed its gratitude for the massive delivery of food, drinks and health products collected at a Newcastle community appeal at the weekend.
Novocastrians had flocked to a collection point near Gibbs Oval in Merewether on Sunday and donated a plethora of items sought by the RFS for volunteer firefighters and their work in impacted communities.
Organiser Gillian Summers told the Newcastle Herald on Monday the appeal had netted an estimated $50,000 worth of goods.
She said volunteers spent most of Sunday loading five seven-tonne trucks and a one-tonne ute, before a few people made delivery runs.
Two trucks went straight to the Shoalhaven Emergency Management Centre, where inundated authorities were forced to cancel any more deliveries due to the staggering amount of donations received over the past week.
Another two trucks went to the Hunter Valley Fire Control Centre at Bulga, while the fifth truck and ute went to the Lower Hunter centre at East Maitland.
"We were shocked and surprised at the generosity of the people of Newcastle," the NSW Rural Fire Service's Hunter Valley district manager Superintendent Paul Best said.
"It's going to be a very long and drawn out season.
"All the food and drinks will be used locally to support the firefighting effort."
Reflecting on the "incredible" response to what was initially a small collection among friends, Ms Summers said she had been blown away by how people went to work without prompting.
"You couldn't repeat it because it was just so spontaneous," she said.
"They organised it, everybody who had never met each other before.
"Nobody was wanting to be the boss, nobody was wanting to order people around, they just seemed to intuitively know what to do."
She said it was perhaps no surprise to see the community react the way it did given the devastation being felt in other parts of the state.
"It's our community, it's our state and it's our country," Ms Summers said.
"You're sitting their watching all this devastation, and all these volunteers putting their lives on the line, you just want to do something."
Ms Summers wanted to thank every volunteer, particularly those who loaned or drove trucks, including: Allan Woodham, Oliver Coakes, Mark Trenter, Luke Orton, James Ferguson, Ian Bamford, Greg Kerr, Mitchell Vajda and Samantha Phillips.
