A?swollen river submerged bridges and inundated homes and stores yesterday in another town in Australia's Queensland state, where more heavy rain meant little respite from the country's worst flooding in decades.

Maryborough became the latest of 40 towns to be swamped as the river running through it burst its banks and entered parts of the town of 22,000, which has been protected behind sandbags and levies.

Two houses, a mobile home park and about seven businesses near the river were inundated, and two bridges in the town were underwater, police Superintendent Stephen Wardrope said.

Heavy rain fell yesterday across southeastern Queensland, which officials say has almost no capacity to absorb more water after weeks of downpours submerged an area the size of Germany and France combined.

Ten people have died since late November and about 200,000 have been affected by the floods. Roads and rail lines have been cut, Queensland's big-exporting coal mine industry has virtually shut down, and cattle ranching and farming across a large part of the state are at a standstill.

Towns in the path of floodwaters have had time to prepare with sandbags and levies, and officials say the rain falling now is not expected to make the crisis significantly worse. A massive relief operation has moved from emergency operations to recovery.

Queensland officials have said the price of rebuilding homes, businesses and infrastructure, coupled with economic losses, could be as high as US$5 billion.