TWEED Shire Council has defended its preparations ahead of the March 30 flood that damaged more than 80% of its truck and plant fleet.

The council has come under fire from ratepayers angry at the expensive loss of equipment from its Murwillumbah depot.

Murwillumbah resident, Maris Bruzgulis, questioned how this could have happened.

"Will there be an investigation of the circumstances leading to this situation and the cost of repair and replacement where necessary?” Mr Bruzgulis said in a letter to the TDN.

But council General Manager Troy Green said like every other business in Murwillumbah that Thursday, the council had heeded warnings from the NSW SES which predicted a minor to moderate flood.

"We did what we ordinarily would do in a minor to moderate flood warning and that was to move all of our trucks from our bottom pad in Buchanan St... to the Buchanan St depot, which is on higher ground,” Mr Green said.

"We acted in accordance with the warnings and predictions of the flood. We moved all of our trucks to higher ground.

"If it had have been a major flood warning, we probably would have taken them somewhere else, but it wasn't - it was a minor to moderate warning.

"It caught us and Mills Transport, ETS have lost all of their trucks. It caught Shoobridge (Transport), it caught O'Connor's, we all lost our trucks, we are all in a similar area, all us truck companies.”

The council lost 35 trucks in the floodwaters which inundated the depot by up to 1.6m.

However, all of the equipment was covered by insurance and will be replaced. Mr Green said the incident was a warning for the future.

"This is a bit of a wake-up call for people who think climate change is not a reality,” he said.

He said a new depot on higher ground may have to be built in the future, but this would cost in excess of $5 million.

"But long-term that is probably the appropriate thing to do,” he said.

"If people ask what was council doing, what they are really saying is we should have had some crystal ball that can see things that no-one else in the town could see,” he said.

"What they are really saying is what was every business in Tweed doing; what was every resident that got flooded doing?”