Deepwater residents urged to flee bush fire as crews prepare for possible "fire"

Update

November 28, 2018 08:50:49

Firefighters fighting "awful" fires in central Queensland are preparing for potential fire storm conditions while residents of the Deepwater area are urged to evacuate their homes immediately.

Residents of the Deepwater, Baffle Creek, Rules Beach and Oyster Creek areas are warned that "an extremely large and intense fire" is expected to impact these areas in the coming hours.

A fire around nearby Round Hill burns inside containment lines, but a watch and act alert remains in place.

"This is not an ordinary fire … it's a dangerous fire that could cause a fire storm," Ms. Palaszczuk said late in the afternoon.

The "storm" conditions expected today occur when strong winds push burning materials beyond containment lines.

Andrew Sturgess, of the Queensland Fire Department, said the crews were alarming.

"We are not talking about a very hot day or a very bad fire, today we are talking about recordings, so these are conditions that we have never had before. previously seen.We will see fire behavior that we have never seen before, "he said.

Some crews who returned to Round Hill Base this morning had not slept for a day after fighting the deep-sea bush fire for 12 hours in a row.

The Bureau of Meteorology's chief forecaster, Gabriel Branescu, said a "dry storm" forecast this morning for central Queensland could make fires even more unpredictable.

"In some places, the rains are not very abundant, but the storms are very hot, they are very high, they move quite quickly and can let out a little gust," he said.

Chief Superintendent of Fire and Emergency Services Paul Smeath said conditions would be volatile and extremely dangerous.

"There is a very good chance that they will break the containment lines – the activity of the fires will be unprecedented, so there will be a lot of fire energy," he said. declared.

"Everything is black"

A community meeting was held last night to inform the residents of Agnes Water.

Marcus Webber, a neighborhood man, said he feared the worst after being forced to evacuate his home.

"My property is burned, the images that I got from a firefighter show all the fire at 3 or 4 meters from my house.All is black, there is wind, smoke everywhere", said Webber.

"But my house [was] still standing there, so I fell and almost cried – the joy was overwhelming. "

Red Cross volunteers arrived at evacuation centers in the area to help those who fled their homes

Inspector Darren Sommerville of the Gladstone Disaster Management Group said that residents of Deepwater who refuse to leave underestimate the magnitude of the current fire danger.

"We are trying to tell them that the current fire conditions will look nothing like what they have seen before," he said.

"Many of them say that they have experienced fires in the past and that they know how to handle them, but we explain to them that it will not be a problem." 39, a normal fire nor a normal day. "

"There are a lot of people who have decided to stay in the area … we are worried about them and we continue to make doorknobs and we tell them to leave."

Separate monitoring and action is in place for Dalrymple Heights, west of Mackay, where residents have been warned that firefighters may not be able to protect all properties.

Topics:

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emergency planning,

deep water-4674,

qld,

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rules-beach-4674,

Australia,

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Agnes-water-4677,

Gladstone 4680,

rockhampton-4700

dalrymple-heights-4757,

Mackay-4740

First posted

November 28, 2018 07:41:37