Residents from a northern Victorian town have been given the all-clear to return after the flood threat eased, but the damage to houses, livestock and crops won’t be known until the water recedes.
There is one road open to Kerang near the Victorian-NSW border after the town was isolated for the second time in as many weeks by floods that have battered the eastern states.
Kerang mayor Charlie Gillingham said probably 10 to 15 houses had been inundated, while losses to crops and livestock were so far unknown and some stock remained stranded.
“If they’re on a bump somewhere in water, they (owners) are going to have to get feed to them somehow,” Mr Gillingham told AAP.
The mayor said the town needed to report its losses in order to shore up government assistance.
“That will be happening in the coming days where we need people to register their losses,” he said.
“So we can start to talk to politicians and the like to get some funding through to get us back on track again.”
Western Victoria is forecast to be pummelled by heavy rain on Sunday afternoon while an evacuation order remains in place at Echuca.
The Murray River at Torrumbarry Weir is expected to peak over the weekend and potentially cause major flooding, with a number of watch-and-act alerts in place for other towns in the north and northeast of the state.
Across the border in NSW more than 1000 homes and businesses have been damaged, with the government appointing Mel Gore, Ken Harrison and Donna Argus as recovery and clean up co-ordinators.
Flood Recovery Minister Steph Cooke said the co-ordinators would ensure a timely and effective transition to recovery.
“As the waters slowly recede our first priority is to undertake rapid damage assessments of flooded homes and businesses so that they can begin the mammoth task of cleaning up,” she said in a statement on Saturday.
As at 28 October, 1008 homes and businesses in NSW have been recorded as damaged and 163 deemed uninhabitable from 2389 assessments.
Rain and storms are expected to hit various parts of NSW on Sunday through Monday after a mostly sunny Saturday.
There are more than 60 flood warnings across NSW, including emergency warnings in Murray Valley Regional Park, Mathoura East, Cummeragunja and parts of Moama.
Storms and damaging winds are expected in South Australia on Sunday from the west coast all the way down to Mount Gambier, including Adelaide.
