Sydney, Europe Brief News – Thousands of people in southeastern Australia have been told to leave their homes due to the heavy rains.
Two days of incessant rain caused dams to overflow and rivers to burst their banks.
Large parts of Victoria state, southern New South Wales and the northern regions of the island state of Tasmania have been pounded by an intense weather system with some seeing more than a month’s worth of rain since late on Wednesday, according to officials.
“[This] has led to widespread, major flooding … with some rivers experiencing record flooding and this is only going to continue to move downstream and get worse,” Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Dean Narramore told Australian public broadcaster ABC television.
Victoria, Australia’s second-most populous state, was the worst hit with the western Melbourne suburb of Maribyrnong swamped by the rising waters.
Footage on social media showed thousands of people wading through knee-deep water with their pets and some being rescued in boats.
“It’s far from over, we’ll see waters rise,” Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews told the ABC. “We’ll see more and more waters continuing to rise, more and more houses being inundated, more and more communities being closed off.”
Meanwhile, the Victorian government was preparing to reopen a COVID-19 quarantine centre to shelter those whose homes were uninhabitable, he added.
