Record-breaking spring temperatures helped spark and fan bushfires across the country on Thursday.
In Victoria, 100km/h winds fanned more than 60 fires as an unprecedented heatwave moved north to south, drawing comparisons with the “worst conditions you’d see in February or March” from the state’s emergency services minister, Lisa Neville.
“This shows us what the risks will be in summer around Victoria, so we still have a long way to go to be ready,” she said.
Emergency services crews were equipped and trained for the difficult forecast summer but she was concerned about residents in bushfire-prone areas being properly prepared.
“One of the things we felt earlier this year out of the fires that happened over the summer was that there was a level of complacency,” she said.
One of 11 properties destroyed when an electrical fault caused the Yorketown fire. This is all that’s left of Mark Hewton’s farmhouse #SAfires #Yorketown pic.twitter.com/8aeMmC01I0
— Richard Davies (@DaviesRich) November 21, 2019
A fire near Yorketown on South Australia’s Yorke peninsula on Thursday was sparked by a network power fault, local authorities said.
The blaze forced the towns to be evacuated, destroyed homes and crops, and injured more than 30 people.
At least 11 properties were affected but the full extent of the losses was not yet determined.
The Yorke peninsula’s mayor, Darren Braund, said many residents had taken shelter overnight in the Edithburgh town hall but had been told to leave.
“People are very worried, a lot of anxious people, hoping their properties are OK,” Braund told the Adelaide Advertiser.
“There were warnings throughout the night from Country Fire Service. All of a sudden the wind changed. From what I understand, the fire jumped containment lines. That’s when it got very dangerous.”
Victoria’s most extreme bushfire warning – code red – was issued for the central and northwestern regions, and a fire ban was imposed across the state.
Melbourne’s maximum temperature of 40.9C matched the 1894 record for the hottest November day. Laverton was the hottest place in Victoria at 44.3C.
In Mildura, a thick haze of red-earth dust blanketed the city – the regular duststorms a consequence of drought – and in the west of Victoria more than 80,000 homes were left without power after a network failure which also sparked a fire.
A storm which moved across the state caused widespread damage. The state emergency services received more than 1,600 calls for assistance, 1,300 because of fallen trees.
Fires continue to burn across New South Wa;es. Already this season, six people have died and 612 homes have been destroyed.
The Rural Fire Service said there were 59 bush and grass fires across the state at 5pm, and 29 still had to be contained. Only one, at Bora Ridge in the north of the state, is at emergency warning level.
There are no total fire bans in place in NSW for Friday, but there is a high fire danger forecast and warm weather is set to continue.
The smoke haze which blanketed Sydney is expected to remain, but will clear overnight and tomorrow morning with a wind change. Forecasters are expecting the smoke to return at the weekend.
The Bureau of Meteorology said a number of areas in South Australia broke November heat records, including Lameroo at 44C, Murray Bridge at 45.3C and Nullarbor at 46.6C.
In Tasmania, Hobart equalled its hottest November day, and the statewide top temperature of 38.3C at Campania was just 0.2C lower than the November record for any place in the state. Two fires continue to burn.
Cooler conditions heading into Thursday evening were expected to help contain all bushfires still being patrolled by firefighters in Victoria. However, Emergency Victoria encouraged people to stay alert.
A fire near Ballarat that was at emergency level was also downgraded to a “watch and act” warning.
The fire was heading towards Dunac, but water-bombing from helicopters and aircraft helped contain it.
“It was horrific … There was branches coming down all over the place, the wind was blowing, it was hot,” a farmer from Dunac, Tom Davies, said.
“For a fire day you wouldn’t have got much worse.”
Davies has lived and worked in the Dunac area all his life, but cannot remember another day like this ever happening so early in the summer.
“No, I don’t think so. For a serious fire like we’ve just had, I think this would be about the earliest I’ve seen it,” he said.
“Generally you don’t get a day like we’ve just had until after Christmas.”