No one had higher stakes in the findings of the Queensland Floods Commission of Inquiry than Grantham father Matthew Keep, whose mother, mother-in-law and baby daughter, Jessica, died at Grantham that terrible day in January.

For seven months he has read every statement, submission, running log, disaster management plan and media article available. As he has comforted his grieving wife, Stacy, helped care for his two young children Madison, 5, and Jacob, 4, who amazingly survived the flood, and welcomed a new baby into the family, Matthew has searched for answers for himself and his community.

Why were authorities not able to warn people in seven towns in Toowoomba and the Lockyer Valley that the worst flash flooding in at least a century was about to strike, killing 22 people? How could such a sudden and catastrophic flood claim three members of his family within minutes?

He realises now that assurances his house was above the record 1974 flood gave him a false sense of security. He told Crikey: “I was complacent and thought we were safe. I thought there would never be a bigger flood.”

That is why Matthew Keep has broken his media silence today, hoping that the wake-up call he got that day will echo across the country: “Don’t be complacent about the risk of natural disasters which strike suddenly. Don’t expect warning. Don’t rely on anyone to save you. Be prepared to protect your own family.”

Having read the inquiry’s interim report on flood preparedness, Keep now has to come to terms with the lack of warning of the unfolding catastrophe. The first he knew of the impending disaster was when the flood water inundated a farm near his house.

“As the water came over the paddock and across the highway to our house, the water began to pool around our house. I went into our home. My wife and mother were starting to place towels around the doorways,” he said.

“The water soon reached the second brick on the side of the house allowing water to enter into the frames of the house. I told my wife not to worry about the house. We got the children together and went into the lounge room.”

Looking back, Keep can now see that their only options for survival at that point were to run to the railway line and get to higher ground or to climb on the roof.

“My mother’s car floated away. It had been parked on the road at the front of the property. My mother then suggested we call the SES to be rescued,” he said.

“We all went into the kitchen and I called the SES and told them that water was all around the house and still rising and that we would need to be rescued. Then the back glass sliding doors broke.”

By then the option of running to the railway line was gone. Floodwater was gushing extremely quickly along a deep gutter between the road and the railway line. Their mothers Dawn Radke and Pauline Magner, his six-month pregnant wife, Stacy, and their young children would not be able to get across.

And the option of climbing to the roof was also gone. The current around the house was running very fast. They had no ladder. Their new brick house had no verandas or anything outside to stand on to climb up.

“A fixed ladder on the outside of the building allowing for easy access to the roof would have saved our family but it would not have helped people whose houses were washed away,”  Keep said.

Relying on modern communications to be able to receive warnings from authorities was another easy mistake to make. On January 10, flooding upstream had cut power supplies. With no access to computers or television, the only communication available was via a mobile phone or a hand-delivered message.

SES volunteers at Gatton were activated at 2.30pm to drive five minutes along the highway to door-knock at Grantham. They did not set out until 2.50pm. By the time they reached the town they could not get through due to rising water.

It took until 4.07pm for the Grantham Rural Fire Brigade already in Grantham to be activated to knock on doors, the inquiry has found. By then the doors were under water and 12 people were in peril or already dead.

Another major problem, Keep says, was the lack of situational awareness by key members of the disaster management team. The chair of the LDMG, mayor Steve Jones, was trapped in flood water himself at Withcott more than one and a half hours before the main flood water destroyed 138 houses in Grantham.

“He described the damage caused by the biggest flood in Withcott as a ‘war zone’ but he was unconcerned for the remainder of the Lockyer Valley as he thought the storm was a cloudburst,” Keep said. Many people made the same mistake.

It appears no one told the mayor that the disaster was more widespread, and affected more than one of the six creeks that flow down the escarpment into the Lockyer Valley.

The inquiry has found that the local disaster a management group failed to meet the legislated requirements of the Disaster Management Act. However, even if the DMG had met the requirements, it would not have changed the outcome on the day.

This finding means the Keeps will never know whether better planning would have saved his family and the others who died in the town or not.

Evacuation plans might have helped, he believes. Severe bushfires in 2002 and 2004 in the Lockyer Valley did not prompt local officials to make any evacuation plans.

Keep is now focusing on future risks. He believes the Lockyer Valley towns affected in this disaster are more at risk now than they were before January 10 because the creeks are now so wide and deep that floodwater will travel faster than it did during this disaster, leaving people less time to scramble to safety and emergency services less time to respond.

“People might get complacent about sirens. Any signals need to indicate the severity of what is going to happen. They could use one siren for ‘prepare’, two for ‘move’, three for ‘get the f-ck out’,” he said.

Keep also believes the lower side of Grantham, now known as ground zero, is more vulnerable to a similar disaster because the railway line, which channelled floodwater towards the town and that prevented it from spreading across the floodplain, has been rebuilt higher.

“The difference between 1.8 metres in a house and two metres in a house is the difference between having space to breathe and not having space to breathe,” he said. “No culverts have been installed under the railway line to allow floodwater to pass under the railway line and dissipate across the floodplain.”

Keep fears for the families who will remain living in the ground zero area. His own house has been demolished and he and his wife will be among 70 families who draw a new block of land tomorrow (Saturday) on the high side of the town in Australia’s first land swap. While there is comfort in knowing his new family home will be well above record flood height, he is concerned that under the new master plan for the town, the small businesses will remain in the most flood-prone area.

“To construct a business district in the heart of Grantham is ludicrous as many buildings were totally washed away in this area and lives were lost,” he said. “The business district needs to shift to a safer area as well.”

Living through the grief he has already borne, he is compelled to spare other people the risk of the same fate. Complacency that “it will never happen” is no longer an option.