‘We’ve done what we can’: Echuca bands together as Victorian town braces for record flood

Bobby, whose house is just outside the levee bank being built around Echuca in northern Victoria, has sandbagged his house to 1.5 metres high to help protect it from flooding. Photograph: Mike Bowers/The Guardian

Echuca man Peter Green says floods are a bit like a horserace, “you can never predict what’s going to happen”.

“Who knows? It depends on the rainfall,” Green says. “If we get 50mm of rain, it’ll soak in. If we get 100mm of rain, it’ll run off … we don’t know.”