Australian flood crisis: southeast states on emergency alert

Reuters:

SYDNEY, Oct 15 – Emergency warnings remained in place on Saturday for parts of Australia’s southeast as floods, sparked by days of heavy rain, impacted three states, with hundreds of people having to be rescued from floodwaters.

Flood warnings were current for large parts of Victoria state, southern New South Wales and the northern regions of the island state of Tasmania, as an intense weather system earlier this week brought more than a month’s worth of rain to the southeast of the country.

Large parts of Australia’s eastern states have been hit by severe flooding since early 2022, with the country now enduring a third consecutive La Nina weather event bringing heavy rains.

While floodwaters receded in some areas on Saturday, in others such as the Victorian rural city of Shepparton, northeast of Melbourne, weather forecast suggested the worst was still to come.

The nation’s weather forecaster, the Bureau of Meteorology, said major flooding was likely at Shepparton overnight Saturday. Bureau of Meteorology forecaster Jonathan How said while heavy rain had cleared, flooding was still widespread.