Victorian Floods 2022: Murchison, Echuca, Rochester rebuild

Victims, volunteers and businesses tell their story of the Victorian floods as they attempt to rebuild their lives one month on from the tragic event.

Heartless looters, unbreakable community spirit and tireless volunteers are the stories behind the floods that rocked Victoria a month ago.

The state was hit by unrelenting rain that saw many regional parts of central and northern Victoria battling floods and needing assistance. According to the SES, it has received 13,526 Requests for Assistance (RFAs) and conducted more than 5900 impact assessments since the floods began.

While inundated roads and major weather warnings remain in parts of the state, tales of community spirit and the unyielding dedication of volunteers to protect their towns have emerged in the rebuild.

“I think the town itself has bounced back pretty good,” CFA Murchison’s Brandan Reilly said.

“It’s been an incredible effort by the town and the community.

“It’s amazing to see the community spirit and resilience from one community to the next and what’s happening in each community depending on the rising or falling water … it’s been a big month.”

After Mr Reilly finished his shift last Saturday, the usual 45-minute journey to Katandra took more than three hours due to the closed roads and difficult terrain to navigate.

CFA volunteers like Mr Reilly put in an estimated 200 to 250 hours volunteering during the floods while other members of the Murchison CFA, like Thaniel Meyer, worked with similar dedication.

Water flooded houses in Murchison including Adam McLarty’s home one month ago. Picture: David Crosling

The CFA partnered with the council and SES in the aftermath to assist with pumping the flood waters out of homes and businesses.

“It’s just been a really good community effort, all the agencies, SES and everybody, worked really well together,” Mr Meyer said.

“Even the local copper, his house was threatened the whole time yet he was out there helping everyone.

“A lot of our members like farmers have lost everything and they’ve been out there trying to save people’s houses and yet they’re losing their whole property, some farms and millions of dollars in the process.”

For many members of the Murchison brigade, they were saving others from the floods while the waters lapped at their own homes and farms.

“Our guys were having their own homes threatened yet they were still out their doing their bit for a very large amount of time,” Mr Meyer said.

“It was a very anxious situation a lot of people were not able to sleep and rest because it was such a dynamic situation and their homes were being threatened.”

It has been a similar story for the Echuca SES as the town piled in to lay 195,000 sandbags to support the levee.

Murchison is piled high with sandbags four weeks after the floods hit the town. Picture: Adam Daunt

The impact on residents and the town is clear in the numbers: Echuca SES had 439 RFAs this year but 395 have come in the month since the floods first hit.

““I’ve been around floods before, and they go up and they go down in a few days, but this has been extraordinary,” VICSES Echuca unit controller Judi Cantwell said.

“Seeing people being flooded, and the impact of that, has been confronting to see. Losing your home and asking yourself, ‘where do I go? Where do I live? How do I get to an evacuation centre?’ Your whole life is turned upside down.

“The resilience of the people of Echuca has been humbling.”

As much as it brings out the best in communities, it has also brought out some of the worst.

While Victorian Police confirmed it had not received any reports of looting in Murchison, residents have described people stealing from their piles of flood-damaged items.

It compounds an already traumatic experience for residents who are still trying to rebuild their lives after flood waters damaged their homes.

Adam McLarty near his camper at the front of his house in Murchison where he has been living since the flood. Picture: Adam Daunt

From Rochester to Echuca and Murchison and many places in between, the floods were unrelenting on residents.

“Some people have been really, really good and some people are being shit,” Murchison resident Adam McLarty said.

“This sort of stuff brings out the best and worst in people.”

From small businesses in Rochester to award-winning wineries like Mitchelton, locals have been left working around the clock to open back up to customers.

It took an army of volunteers and local tradesmen to restore Mitchelton with work still ongoing to their Indigenous art gallery and underground cellar.

“When we first came in and were able to reassess the site, I thought there was no way we’d be able to open in two weeks,” Mitchelton’s head of hospitality Martin Garrett said.

“When the community and tradies came in, we started to think we could pull it off but it didn’t seem achievable.

“It’s just a massive thanks to the community I think, it’s been a huge effort from a wide range of different people coming together.”