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Scifleet Hino completes flood rebuild

Scifleet Hino is reopening its offices after virtually rebuilding the entire operation in the wake of the Queensland floods

By Gary Worrall | October 18, 2011

More than eight months after it was swamped in the devastating Brisbane floods, truck dealer Scifleet Hino is reopening its offices after virtually rebuilding the entire operation.

With the repair bill topping $7 million, dealer principal Craig Andersson says the site at Coopers Plains was inundated by more than one metre of water after the creek running across the back of the dealership overflowed.

Andersson says Scifleet Hino opened the Beaudesert Road site in 2004, an offshoot of the Kedron truck dealership run by the Scifleet family since 1989 which sprang from its highly successful Toyota operation.

“We had no previous indication there was any sort of flood risk, it did go under in 1974 (Brisbane floods), but like most people we assumed Wivenhoe (Dam) would protect the location,” Andersson says.

“But we now have an action plan for the future, if we are given a warning.”

In the case of the 2011 deluge, Andersson says the first warning came on the Monday when staff understood the site was at risk of inundation.
“We began moving the trucks to the north side, over to Kedron, but a combination of factors including ongoing heavy rain and road closures made it slow going.”

Andersson says the dealership had more than 80 brand new trucks on site, from the light duty 300 Series through to the 700 Series prime mover models.

“We were doing it legally, we were using trade plates plus licenced truck drivers only. We had two sites we could move them to but the other car division was also moving vehicles to the same site.”

Worst of all for Andeson was that he was not even in Brisbane, having taken his family on an overseas holiday before the drama began unfolding.

“We had insurance concerns as well, because no trade plate means no third party insurance, so we were worried about parking the trucks on the roadside.”

Andersson says about 15 trucks were saved but a further 75 were left to their fate at the dealership.

Knowing the dealership would go under water, staff had been working in the service and repair workshops at the rear of the site attempting to reduce the damage before it happened.

“We had saved the electrical equipment, things like telephones, computers and so on, plus spare parts and tools because we took them up to the mezzanine level,” Andersson says.
“We also had a customer truck in for a repair – a tipper – so the guys filled up the back with toolboxes and other heavy equipment and then lifted it up on a hoist, hopefully out of reach of the water.”

With water starting to creep into the site on January 13, Andersson says staff could only “lock up and leave” and then return after the floods had receded.

The water levels were beginning to drop by January 15, having peaked at 1.2 metres in the front office but reaching higher levels where the ground sloped away at the back of the block.

“The water sat for approximately 36 hours, it seeped up into the walls and roof of the offices. When we removed all the wet panels we were left with the shell only, everything else was soaked.”

By the afternoon of January 15 the water had gone completely and the clean-up began in earnest. Andersson says the whole site was cleaned by the end of the weekend.

“We had the workshop pressure cleaned and prepped, ready to resume operations by the start of February but the sales staff had already re-opened one week after the floods.”

Andersson then oversaw what was effectively the construction of a new dealership, with just the shells of two buildings on the site.

“We had to get electricians to rewire the whole workshop before it could reopen. The customer truck full of tools and parts was actually stranded up on the hoist for two weeks before we could bring it back down.”

When the final tally was complete, Andersson was sitting on a $7.3 million insurance claim, including the 75 trucks worth $5.3 million as well as an extra $2 million to rebuild the offices and replace equipment that could not be moved.

“An example of that was we had to cut the top off the bulk oil tank and flush it out. There were lots of similar issues around the site.”

Andersson nominates insurer Suncorp as the saviour of the piece, saying without its quick response it would have been harder to reopen the business as quickly as he did.

He says his broker and Suncorp gave Scifleet Hino open permission to replace and refurbish what was needed, with paperwork to be completed later.

For Andersson and his team, this meant being able to go out and buy what was needed knowing they would be reimbursed. It also meant there were no problems with getting the correct equipment.

While the approval was not a blank cheque, Andersson says staff who knew what was lost and what was needed were able to negotiate with suppliers direct.
“We also need to thank our electrician, Platinum Electrical. It was their quick response that was critical to us being able to get back to work, and the builders National Build Plan Group who have done a great job getting us back to rights.”

Although Andersson says he is happy with how things went after the flood, he says the business now has a contingency plan for the future, including moving trucks off-site and being able to park them safely.

“We have had discussions with police and our insurers. They have given us a clear picture of what we can do if a state of emergency is declared, to rescue as much stock as possible.”

Although he was overseas as much of the emergency developed, Andersson is under no illusions about how bad things could have been.

“It is the power of nature, you can’t appreciate it until you have seen it. There was no water flow in this site, it was rising water only.”

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