Three homes destroyed in major bushfire in Australia
Sydney, Dec 28 (IANS/GURPUNEET SIDHU) Three homes and nearly a dozen outbuildings have been destroyed in a major bushfire burning in a national park in Australia’s southeastern state of Victoria, local media reported on Saturday.
Cooler, settled conditions in and around the Grampians National Park, 230 km west of Melbourne, have allowed emergency crews to start initial impact assessments, Xinhua news agency reported quoting The Age daily newspaper.
Three homes have been lost in the town of Moyston, while 11 outbuildings have been destroyed by the fire across Moyston and Pomonal, the report said.
“These numbers will continue to evolve over the next couple of days,” State Control Center spokesman Luke Heagerty was quoted as saying.
Fire crews are expecting conditions for fighting the out-of-control 75,000-hectare fire across the Grampians National Park to remain favorable for the next seven days, according to the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Xinhua news agency reported.
Warnings have been downgraded to watch and act with residents advised to monitor conditions.
Earlier on December 25, authorities in Australia’s state of Victoria issued an emergency warning to residents in the Grampians mountain range, urging them to evacuate as bushfire conditions worsened.
VicEmergency issued a fire warning on Wednesday afternoon, urging residents in Moyston and Pomonal, two towns in western Victoria, to leave immediately as the bushfire in Grampians National Park continued to burn.
“There was a bushfire at Grampians National Park, Yarram Gap Road, that was not yet under control,” said VicEmergency, adding that leaving immediately was the safest option before conditions became too dangerous.
VicEmergency also warned in a statement that bushfires burning across Victoria would create Extreme Fire conditions, which it described as the worst across the state since Black Summer in 2019-2020.
If the fire was rated as Extreme Fire Danger, it would spread quickly and be extremely dangerous.
The fire, which was sparked by lightning on December 16, had burnt through approximately 41,000 hectares of land as of Monday due to high temperatures and strong winds.
Communities and fire crews in Australia had been preparing for several days of extreme bushfire danger.
Several out-of-control fires continued to burn in the southeastern state of Victoria that week despite more favorable conditions for firefighters.
With temperatures forecast to exceed 40 degrees Celsius on December 26, Victorians were advised to brace for catastrophic fire conditions.
Residents of communities evacuated due to the threat posed by a major fire in the Grampians National Park, about 230 km west of Melbourne, were allowed to return to their homes for two hours to collect their belongings.
Four interstate firefighting task forces and two emergency management teams were expected to arrive in Victoria to aid the hundreds of local firefighters working to contain the Grampians blaze.
The Country Fire Authority had advised anyone who could avoid traveling through affected areas over the Christmas period to do so.
Elsewhere in Australia, several small bush and grass fires in the state of New South Wales continued to burn but were under control.
In South Australia, residents of the outer-southern Adelaide suburb of Onkaparinga Hills were urged to leave as firefighters battled an out-of-control bushfire.
