A tavern inundated by water during flooding in the Melbourne suburb of Maribyrnong, yesterday. Photo: AFP/ William West
Residents in Victoria's north are being told to prepare to evacuate as floodwaters begin to move downstream to already swollen rivers and creeks, as dozens of emergency warnings remain in place across New South Wales, Victoria and Tasmania.
More than 350 water rescues across Victoria
Communities in the state's north are bracing for floods expected to exceed levels seen in 1974.
That could mean thousands of properties affected by flooding.
Volunteer rescue service SES said widespread major flooding in Victoria was likely to extend downstream to Shepparton by this afternoon.
Widespread major flooding was occurring along the Goulburn River and has already peaked at Seymour and developed at Murchison.
Crews had already been called to 355 water rescues, including 160 in Rochester, where the Campaspe River is at major flood level.
Victoria's Emergency Management Commissioner Andrew Crisp urged people in the state to keep updated on the latest emergency warnings throughout the day.
"Conditions are changing relatively quickly, so you've got to stay across local information so you can make good decisions," Crisp said.
"Don't go back to properties, this [is a] 'blue flood' scenario where you've actually got blue sky and sunshine but we've got significant risk in relation to the water that is moving down these river systems at the moment so stay out of these areas."
SES was out assisting those who needed help: "We ...just encourage people to stay away from flood waters - a reminder that it can just take 15cm of water to float a small car," said SES state duty officer Erin Mason.
From suburban Melbourne to regional Victoria - floods this week have caught residents off-guard as waters inundated homes and properties.
Many scrambled to salvage what they could and face an anxious wait to see what will remain when they are allowed to eventually return home.
The ABC news agency said the state was already facing a housing crisis - and for some, this natural disaster would feel like the last straw.
In Wangaratta in Victoria's north-east, a new emergency warning was issued for residents in properties within the Parfitt Road Levee System told to leave immediately.
The Ovens River at Wangaratta has peaked at 12.8 metres.
Meanwhile in Shepparton and Mooroopna in northern Victoria, residents had been told to prepare to evacuate as floodwaters move downstream.
In Melbourne, the levels of the Maribyrnong River have dropped significantly overnight, but emergency services said they want to assess the damage before allowing residents to return home.
In Melbourne's west, authorities believed about 100 homes were inundated yesterday.
Resident Matthew Iozzi was woken by a text from emergency services at 4am advising him to consider leaving.
Within an hour, police knocked on his door and another text arrived telling him to evacuate.
"It's been pretty shocking because no one in the area has ever considered that something like this would happen," Iozzi said.
Iozzi said by the time he had checked on his elderly neighbours, the river was at his doorstep.
"After the last couple of years, we've had fires, we'd had Covid and now there's a flood and the flood has hit so close to a city," he said.
"I'm so proud to be a Melburnian but at the same time I'm now kind of getting over it."
As residents along Melbourne's Maribyrnong River prepare for a gruelling clean-up, concerns were being raised about whether a controversial flood wall in the area helped or hindered residents.
Aerial footage shows Melbourne's Flemington Racecourse, home to next month's Melbourne Cup, escaped severe flooding but outside the wall the waters flooded the homes around it .
Local resident and historian Liz Crash said the area around the racecourse had always been a floodplain.
She said when the flood wall was first planned nearly 20 years ago, three local councils objected over concerns it would exacerbate flood risk in the area.
"This has always been a huge concern for the community,'' Crash said.
Victorian man dies in floodwaters at Rochester
Victorian authorities have reported the state's first flood fatality, after a man died at Rochester in the state's north.
Police say the man was found dead in floodwaters in the backyard of his High Street home around 9:30am today (local time).
SES crews are on the scene and police are trying to get into the property, which is blocked by floodwaters.
The exact circumstances of his death are still being investigated.
Other states also reeling
Flood warnings also remained in place across northern Tasmania and parts of southern New South Wales on Saturday morning.
There were 63 flood warnings still in place for New South Wales on Saturday morning, with nine at emergency level.
SES NSW received 213 calls for help and rescued seven people trapped in cars in floodwater in the past 24 hours.
And some residents in Gunnedah, Wee Waa and Warren were still isolated by the floodwaters.
Despite fine weather in some areas, the SES said there was still water moving downstream so the flood threat remained.
In Tasmania's north floodwaters were slowly receding, but emergency warnings remained in place in the region on Saturday morning, leaving residents waiting anxiously until they could feel safe.
The Meander River remained at an Emergency Warning level, but an emergency flood warning for the Mersey River in Tasmania had been downgraded to Watch and Act.
-ABC