It seems as if the firefighters are fighting a losing battle to contain the flames.The brushfires have killed more people than the Ash Wednesday fires of 1983, when 75 people died, officials said. Close to 200,000 hectares of land have burned.
The death toll seemed to rise every hour Sunday as rescue workers discovered more bodies -- of those who perished inside cars while trying to flee the flames, and those who stayed put inside houses that had been burned to their shells.
Hospital officials treating burn victims said the wounds were the worst they have seen since the terrorist bombings in the Indonesian island of Bali in 2002. "Hell and all its fury has visited the good people of Victoria in the last 24 hours," Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd told reporters while touring the fire-ravaged areas. "Many good people now lie dead. Many others lie injured."
All day Sunday, winds fanned fire into local towns, where the blaze spread with frightening speed, devouring homes. Residents - with handkerchiefs covering their faces - pointed garden hoses at the flames or tried to stamp out hotspots with towels and clothes, but to no avail. "All I got left is what I stand in and a bag," a woman told the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, before breaking down. "My house. My house of 25 years is gone. I worked so hard for that house. Her son patted her shoulder. "Mom, it's going to be all right," he said. No one was unaffected.
John Brumby, the premier of Victoria, said the fire stopped just outside his parents' house in the western part of the state. "There was an intense few hours for me," he told ABC. "I was too far away to get there, four hours away. Dad's in his early 80s, mom a bit younger. But we couldn't get them on the mobile (phone), we couldn't get them at home. No one knew where they were." As darkness descended, the flames continued to lick the night sky. Aerial views showed rivers of orange trickling in all directions amid the dense vegetation.
By Sunday, the death toll had climbed to 84 and more than 640 houses had been destroyed, said Sharon Merritt of the country's Fire Protection Association. Officials were hoping for some help from milder weather moving in. Drops of rain had started to fall in some areas. Meanwhile, Victoria police are investigating the possibility that at least two of the fires were set deliberately, adding that the pattern of the fires does not suggest natural ignition.
The largest blaze was centered in the Kinglake area, about 50 miles (80 km) northeast of Melbourne, the Australia's second most populated city and the capital of Victoria.
One silver lining amid the devastation: the fires have not posed a significant threat to more populous areas, including Melbourne, as they sweep across rural outskirts of southeastern Australia, Walshe said.
Wildfires are an annual event in Australia. But this year, a combination of factors have made them especially intense: a drought, dry bush and one of the most powerful heat waves in memory.
Temperatures in parts of Melbourne reached 118 degrees Fahrenheit (48 degrees Celsius) in the last few weeks. Dozens of heat-related deaths have been reported.By Sunday, the temperatures had dropped to the mid-20s in the area.Northern Australia, on the other hand, is grappling with a different problem. Sixty percent of the state of Queensland was flooded, officials reported, and residents were warned to be on the lookout for crocodiles in urban areas.
Source : CNN.com
Bookmark us!
| Comments |
|