Emergency services in New South Wales and the Australian Capital Territory have predicted a worse than usual bushfire season, as this week’s heatwave breaks December records in south-eastern Australia.
The NSW Rural Fire Service warned that drier than average conditions made NSW “extremely vulnerable” to bushfires this summer, while fire bans were declared in parts of NSW, Victoria and South Australia for Tuesday and Wednesday.
On Tuesday afternoon residents in Neath and Abermain, near Cessnock in the NSW Hunter Valley, were warned to take shelter as 80 firefighters assisted by water-dropping aircraft fought two fires in the area.
Residents in several streets were told it was too late to leave their homes. Others were advised it might not be safe to return home.
“The trend of warmer and drier than average weather conditions mean both NSW and the ACT are extremely vulnerable to bushfires this summer,” it said.
“We had one of the wettest springs on record and then one of the driest Octobers on record, so we’ve got a lot of grass there that is very, very dry. That provides a very dangerous level of fuel,” Prof Lesley Hughes said.
No comments:
Post a Comment