Australian firefighters on high alert as extreme heat creates ‘catastrophic conditions’
Temperatures climb to mid-40s, producing conditions worse than those on Black Saturday in 2009, which claimed 173 lives
New South Wales firefighters are bracing for catastrophic fire conditions across large parts of the state on Sunday as 21 fires remained uncontained.
A statewide fire ban is in place for the entire weekend, with temperatures in some regional areas, including Scone in the upper Hunter region, north of Sydney, and Walgett in northern NSW, tipped to reach 46 and 47 degrees respectively.
At 5am on Sunday, the NSW rural fire service advised there were 76 bush or grass fires burning across the state and 21 of those were not contained. The Bureau of Meteorology said a trough was moving northeast from the central region, producing very hot, dry and gusty northwesterly winds.
“This will produce widespread severe to catastrophic fire conditions in central and northern districts,” the bureau said.
Extreme fire danger ratings were in place for five areas in the state including the north coast, northern slopes, upper central west plains and lower central west plains regions.
“To put it simply, they’re simply off the old conventional scale,” RFS commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said on Saturday.
Fitzsimmons said the severity of the conditions on Sunday could not be understated. He said conditions were worse than those on Black Saturday in 2009, which claimed 173 lives and has been described as one of Australia’s worst peacetime disasters.
