CANBERRA, Australia — Homes were flooded in Melbourne and other cities in Australia’s southeast on Friday with rivers forecast to remain dangerously high for days.
About 70 residents were told to leave the suburb of Maribyrnong in Melbourne’s northwest, along with hundreds in the Victoria state cities of Benalla and Wedderburn, authorities said. Melbourne is Australia’s second-most populous city with 5 million people.
About 500 homes in Victoria were flooded and another 500 had been isolated by floodwater, Victoria Premier Daniel Andrews said. Those numbers would increase, he said.
Most of the state was experiencing a “very, very, significant rainfall event and it comes, of course, with the ground completely sodden,” Andrews said.
“The real challenge now is we’ve got another rain event next week and the Bureau (of Meteorology) forecasting more rain throughout the next six-to-eight week period and it won’t take a lot of additional water for there to be further flood events,” Andrews added. “So this has only just started and it’s going to be with us for a while.”
Andrews said 4,700 homes were without power, more than the 3,500 that Victoria State Emergency Service had reported earlier on Friday.
The Bureau of Meteorology said major-to-record flooding was occurring or was forecast to occur on many rivers in Victoria and the island state of Tasmania to the south.
North of Victoria, moderate-to-major flooding was occurring along several rivers in inland New South Wales state, the bureau said.
A 63-year-old man was reported missing in floodwater in New South Wales on Tuesday and a person was reported missing in central Victoria on Friday, officials said. No details of the person missing from the Victorian town of Newbridge have been released.
Police on Tuesday found the body of a 46-year-old man in his submerged car in floodwater near the New South Wales city of Bathurst, west of Sydney, a day after he died.
The State Emergency Service said it had carried out 108 flood rescues in Victoria in the past 48 hours.
State Emergency Service commander Josh Gamble said complacency was the main reason for people getting into trouble.
“That is quite significant and we haven’t had that many flood rescues for quite some time, for some years in fact,” Gamble said.
“Many of these people are putting their own lives at risk, their own children in some circumstances, but more importantly, other community members and responders and that’s in all parts of…
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