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As South Australian firefighters continue to battle blazes that broke out during yesterday's catastrophic conditions, a grassfire has come close to a popular camping area south of Adelaide.
Key points:
- Temperatures reached the mid-40s in some parts of the state yesterday
- A bushfire at Keilira has burned through about 25,000 hectares
- The CFS says it believes a number of properties have been lost at Keilira
The fire, at Second Valley on the Fleurieu Peninsula, is near the Rapid Bay campground, and a watch and act message has been issued.
Witnesses said the flames were moving quickly and that water bombers had been called in to assist firefighters on the ground.
The Country Fire Service (CFS) said the fire was burning uncontrolled and was posing a threat to people in the area.
"If you are not prepared, leave now, and if the path is clear go to a safer place. Do not enter this area as conditions are dangerous," the CFS said.
Nearly 40,000 hectares have burned across the state over the past 24 hours, with several bushfires yet to be controlled.
At least three properties were damaged and thousands of livestock killed in a bushfire in the state's south-east.
Authorities have begun to assess the full damage of yesterday's catastrophic conditions.
A blaze at Ravine on Kangaroo Island, remains at watch and act level, while fires at Keilira, near Kingston in the state's south-east, and at Miltalie, near Kimba have been downgraded to advice.
Authorities are today beginning to assess the damage following a number of bushfires across the state amid the catastrophic weather conditions yesterday.
The CFS this morning said the Keilira fire had burned through almost 25,000 hectares.
Incident controller at the Keilira bushfire, Richard De Groot, said the fire had a perimeter of a little more than 80 kilometres.
"I can say that we understand there are three structures that have been impacted, but we don't know the makeup of that structure," he said.
"We're not sure whether it's a home or sheds or outbuildings."
He said while some properties were damaged, firefighters should be applauded for their work to save many more.
"What I can say is yesterday the firefighters made some excellent saves, I understand over 20 properties were being impacted on and as a result of our firefighters they were protected or saved," he said.
'We're hearing severe stock losses'
South Australian MP Nick McBride, who is the local member for Mackillop in the south-east, said he also heard of three properties damaged, and countless livestock had been killed.
He said the fire had devastated prime cropping land, with farmers beginning the grim task of euthanising injured animals.
"Infrastructure-wise, I'm hearing two or three haysheds which were full, I'm hearing at least three houses have been lost, no lives and look this is very early days," he told ABC Radio Adelaide.
"We're hearing severe stock losses … we're talking thousands.
"A lot of that is the euthanising of stock and destroying and cleaning up."
He said many producers were caught out by the wind change that came through yesterday, which changed the direction of the fire.
"Some large grazing properties have been really, severely affected," he said.
"It burned out, I'm hearing nearly 95 per cent of property on the northern side of Keilira because of the wind change from a northerly direction to a westerly and blew the fire to the east.
"People had put their stock up out of the way of the fire coming in a southerly direction and it's basically cooked a lot of stock and caused a lot of misfortune for a lot of farmers up in this area."
Fires fanned by strong winds yesterday also caused power outages for thousands of customers on the Eyre Peninsula, with power restored just before midnight.
CFS chief officer Mark Jones yesterday said the south-east fire had run through a large area of grassland.
"It is believed to have been caused by a dry lightning strike and is running through scrub and grassland," he said.
CFS duty commander Sam Quigley said the Keilira fire was "significant", but CFS was also monitoring other potential breakouts as well, including the Cudlee Creek fire in the Adelaide Hills.
The Cudlee Creek fire also remains at advice level, after starting on December 20.
"We have a number of fires that did pop up and we're continuing to crew and resource those fires overnight and into today," he told ABC Radio Adelaide.
He said he expected the CFS to contain the Adelaide Hills fire at some stage today.
'Pretty challenging weather conditions'
CFS communications officer Brett Williamson this morning said firefighters were challenged by the extreme conditions yesterday, all across the state.
"Yesterday presented some pretty challenging weather conditions for us with the heat and wind that changed direction throughout the day," he said.
"At around 6:30pm last night we had attended 154 different incidents across the state, we had 135 fire trucks active on firegrounds with about 540 CFS personnel."
Cooler weather is expected to help firefighters control bushfires burning across the state over the next two days, with forecast temperatures in the mid-20s.
However, the CFS is concerned ahead of another day of hot and windy conditions on Friday, which is forecast to rise above 40 degrees Celsius.
"Conditions are better for us today, so now will be the time where we really do try and make some headway and be able to get some better ground covered on some of these fires before the heat returns on Friday," he said.
"It's been a really tough couple of weeks for our volunteer crews and they've done a fantastic job over, particularly the last 24 hours, to make sure that all their work is paid off and none of these fires that were already existing jumped out."
Topics: disasters-and-accidents, fires, weather, bushfire, community-and-society, adelaide-5000, sa, kingston-se-5275, lobethal-5241, cudlee-creek-5232, australia, renmark-5341, port-pirie-5540, port-lincoln-5606, mount-gambier-5290, broken-hill-2880
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