Numurkah was perhaps the hardest hit in Victoria, with 40 homes and businesses damaged and much of the hospital inundated, as Broken Creek rose and flooded the town over the weekend.

Chief executive of Numurkah district health Jacqui Phillips said the town’s hospital — built in 1956 and having survived two previous floods — was now being assessed to see whether it could be recovered.

The floods on Sunday resulted in the evacuation of several patients to other hospitals in nearby towns, but a further 34 patients are still being cared for in Numurkah Pioneer Lodge.

“It (the floods) came as a surprise in the time they rose and how quickly they rose,” Ms Phillips said.

“It was beyond any flood that has ever been experienced here.”

At the El Toro Motel on Numurkah’s main street, owners Rod and Debbie Seen are looking at a $100,000 recovery bill after all the rooms were filled with about 20 centimetres of water.

But a recent change of insurance policy by their broker appears to have left them without coverage for flood damage.

Across the road from the hospital Neville Sutton’s house suffered minor inundation, meaning a six-month wait for his slab floor to dry out before he can put new carpet down.

The Numurkah floods are slowly receding, with a State Emergency Service spokeswoman saying it is likely to take a week for the water to drop away completely.

To Numurkah’s west, Nathalia is still waiting for floods to peak late today or early tomorrow, with a massive temporary levee being completed and thousands of sandbags put in place.

Authorities believe the levee will hold.