SYDNEY—Floodwaters had inundated or were threatening the homes of 85,000 people around Sydney on Wednesday as rivers started to recede and the heavy rains tracked north of Australia’s largest city.
While rain was easing across Sydney, several waterways including the Hawkesbury-Nepean rivers system on Sydney’s northern and western fringes remained at major flood levels, Emergency Services Minister Steph Cooke said.
Emergency responders knocked on doors overnight in the towns of Singleton and Muswellbrook, in the Hunter Valley north of Sydney, to order residents to evacuate, she said.
“For many, it has been a sleepless night,” Cooke said.
Evacuation orders and official warnings to prepare to abandon homes were given to 85,000 people by Wednesday, up from 50,000 on Tuesday, New South Wales state Premier Dominic Perrottet said.
On the fifth day of the flood emergency, Perrottet warned that homes that remained dry during previous floods could be inundated this week.
“This event is far from over. Please don’t have that past experience inform your current behavior,” Perrottet said.
Federal funding would be available to flood victims from Thursday, less than two days after a disaster was declared in 23 local government areas, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said.
“This is, I believe, the quickest that these payments have ever been approved,” Albanese said.
When Parliament resumes on July 26 for the first time since the election, the government will propose spending 4.8 billion Australian dollars ($3.3 billion) on disaster mitigation measures such as building higher river levees, Albanese said.
