Thousands flee Sydney floods as Australia's east coast
Thousands of people on Australia's east coast fled their homes Wednesday after torrential rains swept north after a torrential flood in Sydney that submerged communities, roads and bridges under mud-brown water.
New South Wales authorities issued fresh flood alerts north of Australia's largest city and warned that rising, rain-swollen rivers still posed a danger in parts of Sydney despite easing rainfall in the city.
The event is not over, according to the state's premier Dominic Perrottet.
Emergency services have issued more than 100 evacuation orders since the floods began over the weekend.
A total of 85,000 people have been told to leave their homes immediately or be prepared to depart imminently so that they won't be stranded by rising floodwaters.
Across Sydney's western fringe, rivers broke their banks and large areas have been transformed into inland lakes, with mud-brown waters invading homes and cutting off roads and bridges.
Prime Minister Anthony Albanese visited the affected area Wednesday, promising to look for long-term solutions after multiple flooding disasters across Australia's east coast in the past 18 months.
Albanese said that while Australia has always been the subject of floods, bushfires scientists have warned that climate change will make such events more frequent and intense.
He said that the play out we are seeing is something we are seeing.
More than 1,000 emergency service workers were in the field on Wednesday, and 21 flood rescues were made across New South Wales overnight.
The federal government has been declared a natural disaster in 23 flooded parts of the state, unlocking relief payments to stricken residents.
Many people affected have been affected by successive east coast floods that hit in 2021 and then again in March this year when more than 20 people were killed.
Australia's Bureau of Meteorology said the weather system was expected to move off coast later this week.
Andrew Hall, the chief executive of the Insurance Council of Australia, said he expected the Sydney floods to be declared a catastrophe by the insurance industry.
He said there were 2,700 insurance claims from Sydney alone and more were anticipated as people were able to return to their homes.
Hall said that there had been $5 billion $3.4 billion in catastrophe claims made in Australia this year.
Hall said it was unavoidable for homes that had flooded four times in the past 18 months to remain in the insurance pool, because they needed to stand back and ask the question, ''Have we built homes in the wrong spot?