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As flood waters drown the New South Wales mid-north coast, residents are hurriedly taking whatever is still undamaged and preparing for the rising tide.

Horses and livestock were seen floating along rivers and washing up on beaches on Sunday, as the region faced a once in a lifetime flood.

Greg Cox, who lives in Raymond Terrace north of Newcastle, was watching the water slowly rise around his property on Sunday morning. “I think it could get a whole lot worse before it gets any better,” he said. “It’s pouring rain here now, and it’s predicted to keep that up in the next 48 hours. “It’s devastating. Our whole backyard is underwater, I’ve never ever seen anything like this, and I was speaking to my landlord today and he also said he’d never seen anything like this before.”

Alistair Flower, a businessman and hotel owner told Guardian Australia he and his staff had been working hard to protect one of his places.

“We’ve seen that the water is rising, and unfortunately the flooding has gotten into the basement and the bottle shop,” he said. “We’ve been able to pump some water out, but it felt like a bit of a losing battle at times. Talking to a lot of regulars, they tell us this has surpassed the last great flood in the 60s. I think this has surpassed everything. I went out to our jetty£¨ÂëÍ·£©, and looked back on our neighbor, and it looked like a cow had floated down the river. Thankfully, they had a pool, which doesn’t have a fence line in front of it, allowing the cow to come in.”

The loss of livestock has been so great that a Facebook group has been established to help people find their lost animals.

1. What can you know from the first two paragraphs?

A. Many people drowned in it.                        B. The whole country is affected.

C. It killed many farm animals.                       D. The tide has been falling.

2. What’s Cox’s opinion about the flood?

A. It’s getting better and better.                      B. It won’t stop rising in two days.

C. Luckily it’s not the worst.                         D. It also brings some benefits.

3. What does the underlined word mean?

A. Mild.                B. Decreasing.          C. Dull.                  D. Disastrous.

4. What can you infer about Alistair Flower’s fight against the flood?

A. There is more water than they can manage.

B. He stopped the water getting into the basement.

C. He fought with the help of a Facebook group.

D. He was desperate and gave up at times.