When the flood strikes...

He had gone down to the ground early that day to help his personnel evacuate people affected by the floods.

He was also scheduled to be in an evacuation operation, along with Azman Alias, head of Zone 2 of the Terengganu Fire & Rescue Department, from 10 pm to 4 am the following day, with this Bernama Terengganu bureau chief and photographer Wan Zuratikah Iffah Wan Zulkifli in a fire & rescue service truck.

However, at 7.30 pm Mohd Zailani was informed that floodwaters were rising at his house in Bandar Baru Bukit Mentok, in another part of Chukai.

Calmly, he called his wife and advised her to take their three children and evacuate to a safe place and continued with the immediate job at hand of helping someone else flee the rising floodwaters.

“My wife and children know what to do. They understand the nature of my job,” said Mohd Zailani who has 10 years of service behind him. Families of fire & rescue personnel usually put up with relatives or stay in budget hotels near the station.

Unusual times call for unusual measures.

Mohd Zailani said he had not been home for several days now and that he has kept a spare set of clothes in the office.

“I cannot remember when was the last time that I clocked in to work. Most of the time we had to be in the field, even at odd hours,” he told Bernama.

The 10 pm-to-4 am flood evacuation operation was an adventure of sorts, if I can call it that. Mohd Zailani and Azman took the Bernama team on “a guided tour” of the worst-affected Bukit Mentok area.

The operation was conducted with a truck that can accommodate over 20 people. There were four other fire & rescue personnel, all of whom were calm, patient and ever ready to get down to evacuating people, plus the Bernama team of two.

The “tour” began at 10 pm in this town. The truck navigated through thigh-high floodwaters, with the road seemingly a river.

At 1.20 am, upon getting a telephone call, the personnel rushed to Kampung Pengkalan Pandan not far away but the dark of the night and stagnant floodwaters slowed the journey to 20 minutes.

Mohd Zailani, Azman and the other personnel rescued a woman and five children standing in waist-deep floodwaters that were seeping into their house. They were sent to the relief centre at Sekolah Kebangsaan Chukai.

Then the truck rushed to Kampung Tempurung after the personnel were informed that an elderly person had to be evacuated to the relief centre. However, 10 minutes into the journey, a telephone call came informing that Civil Defence Force personnel had reached there earlier and completed the task.

Just as I thought that the time had come to end the operation, the personnel decided to continue scouring the Bukit Mentok area to ascertain whether everyone requiring evacuation had been attended to.

At 3 am, Mohd Zailani received a telephone call to return to Kampung Tempurung to rescue six members of a family, including a 34-day-old baby and a vision-impaired elderly person who is unable to walk.

At that village, Mohd Zailani, Azman and the other personnel had to wade in waist-deep floodwaters for several minutes to get to the house and help move out the family and some important stuff, leading some of them by hand and carrying others.

All of them were taken to the relief centre at Dewan Berlian of the Kemaman Municipality by 3.45 am.

This episode of moving back and forth the whole night ended 20 minutes later with the truck returning to the Chukai Fire & Rescue Station.

The trip on the truck, which struggled over humps and potholes hidden by the floodwaters, was too exhausting for this writer and photographer. Stepping into the floodwaters now and then also caused the legs to itch as well.

The fire & rescue personnel seemed unperturbed as they have gotten used to wading in floodwaters filled with attacking leeches and, sometimes, mixed with excrement.

However, Mohd Zailani and the others always had a cheerful disposition, smiling and chatting and always eager to help people in distress, even those who are most difficult to please.

For them, it is duty first.

Mohd Zailani said families of the fire & rescue personnel usually stay with relatives when their houses get flooded.

“Some of us are not eligible for the government aid given to flood evacuees at the relief centres as we don’t register with the centres. We have our own departmental welfare aid,” he said.

Azman said most of the fire & rescue personnel put up at the stations and many will offer to work rather than take leave during disasters.

“The welfare of others is the priority of the fire & rescue personnel. This nature has become embedded in them. And, they seek no reward or gratitude in return,” he said, adding that this resolve is what sees them through the tough times.

Azman said the chairs in the office and benches in trucks serve as their bed during the floods for them to catch some much-need sleep as they patrol the flooded areas and report periodically to the State Disaster Management Committee Secretariat.

“Even five minutes of sleep is considered a great blessing. It feels like one has slept the whole night. The tiredness is forgotten once there is an emergency to attend to,” he said cheerfully.