AUSTRALIA: Bush fires in New South Wales threatened homes for a fifteenth day yesterday when more than a thousand residents were evacuated on the state's south coast as strong winds fanned fire fronts.
The towns of Cudmirrah, Berrara, Fisherman's Paradise and Conjola, close to Sussex Inlet where flames claimed 20 homes last week, were all evacuated after fire fronts closed in on residents late yesterday.
With further strong winds and soaring temperatures expected tomorrow the south coast looks set to remain on high alert in coming days. However, heavy rain in the early hours of yesterday morning in northern and central NSW effectively ended the bush fires crisis in those parts of the state.
In the worst hit area of the Blue Mountains, north west of Sydney, the rains extinguished fire fronts that had survived the best efforts of hundreds of fire crews as well as water-bombing aircraft for most of last week. But with the situation on the south coast still critical, the authorities were warning last night that the longest Australian bush fire crisis in history is still far from over. "The 1994 bush fire crisis was over in 10 days, the state operations centre closed after 10 days," the Emergency Services Minister, Mr Bob Debus, said yesterday. "We are now in the fifteenth day of this crisis and there are clearly many days to go before the state operations centre could even contemplate closing."
The fires of 1994 devastated much of south Australia and Victoria and claimed 76 lives. The current crisis however has yet to claim any lives and less than 20 homes have been lost but around 900,000 acres of bush, much of it national park land, has been destroyed in the last two weeks.
More than 15,000 firefighters and other public workers have fought over 100fires since the crisis began on Christmas Eve but following the rains of early yesterday many crews from outside NSW and from New Zealand began to return home.
However, the Rural Fire Service Commissioner, Mr Phil Koperberg, said the situation in some areas is still far from stable.
"The rain hasn't meant that just anyone can now pack up tools and go home," he said. "Having said that, we are demobilising our colleagues from Victoria and south Australia. They will be progressively making their way home depending upon the transport logistics being able to be arranged today. The other states are remaining for at least another 48 hours and we'll assess the position over that 48 hours."
The blazes have wreaked a heavy toll on Australia's unique wildlife, with thousands of koalas, kangaroos, possums, birds and rare reptiles unable to escape the infernos. "Koalas and other wildlife are suffering greatly and the cumulative damage of habitat destruction is making the impact of these fires much worse than they should be," said Australian Koala Foundation executive director Deborah Tabart.