Torrential overnight rain has flooded homes and shut roads at Moe in the Latrobe Valley through to Wilsons Promontory in Victoria’s east.
More than 120 millimetres fell late yesterday causing a landslide that closed the Princes Highway at Moe.
About 300 people are stranded at the Tidal River camp ground at Wilsons Promontory and it is believed outlying camping grounds have been isolated by flooding.
Acting Inspector Dave Watson from Wonthaggi Police says a number of roads are blocked.
“At the moment, the road is still blocked due to rising flood waters from the Darby River and also Tidal River,” he said.
“We’ve also got a reportof a road slip near Whisky Bay.”
SES spokesman Stewart Beale says about 10 people had to be rescued from cars when they tried to drive through floodwaters.
He says crews answered hundreds of calls for help from householders.
“Last night we did have some initial assessments which indicated that a lot of them did have water lapping up at their doorway, but we are starting to get reports in as day breaks of homes that have been flooded out particularly around the Fish Creek area and in the southern area of South Gippsland,” he said.
Weather bureau senior forecaster Richard Carlyon says around 100mm of rain fell on the town in only four hours last night.
“It was around about 6:00pm to 10:00pm that we saw the heaviest rain. It started to ease off around midnight and then it moved southward,” he said.
“It’s only just cleared the Prom over the last hour or two and it looks like the heaviest rain has moved southward away from Victoria.”
All trains to Gippsland have been cancelled this morning because of the flooding.
V/Line’s Daniel Maloney says the tracks have been damaged at Yarragon, Trafalgar and Moe.
He says inspection crews are assessing the damage.
“In the meantime we’ll be running buses along the whole Gippsland line through to Pakenham,” he said.
“From Pakenham, people will then transfer to suburban trains the rest of the way through the city.”
