It is with a sad heart that I record my thoughts today. Today is Monday. Two days ago, Victoria had the hottest day on record, with fierce northerly winds. The temperature soared to just under 50c - it was 49.8 at our back door at midday.
Unfortunately, due to a previous week of 44c temperatures, the state was extremely dry and all the vegetation had all it's moisture sucked out of it. Perfect conditions for a Bushfire.
And a Bushfire we had.
I say we. About half the state of Victoria was ablaze by 5pm. I am fortunate that although being within 15km of the nearest fire, the wind was blowing away from us and we could see the smoke, but we did not have any embers land on us.
Sunday morning, the horror of the previous day became apparent. Marysville and Kinglake - two communities in the leafy hills were no more. Without warning, these communities were ablaze and many, many people lost their lives. Bunyip State Forest is still ablaze. It will take weeks for the full impact is felt. Loss of lives are measured in 100's - not in dozens. Thousands of families are now homeless. Our firefighters and volunteers are heros.
There are other blogs with far more eloquent words. Here is a photo of the fireclouds as seen from the front of my house looking east at 1:30pm Saturday.
And again at 4pm: Looking east 
and looking north.
and looking north.
The fire threat is not over. Fires are still burning through the state.
6 comments:
I have been thinking of everyone with the fires. The UK news has been full of them and they look bad enough from that. I will be keeping you in my thoughts!
I am so sorry for the people of your state and you all are in my thoughts and prayers. I pray to God to give lots of strength to the firefighters and volunteers to be able to contain and defeat this raging beast.
Scary pics Bronny. I am glad that you are safe!
Yes the fires are terrible, and still not over for alot of unfortunate people. We are safe, but we had very thick acrid smoke on Saturday night and ash on our cars. Glad that you are also safe.
I am so sorry for the loss of life and homes, my prayers are with you all!! It's so hard to imagine such things unless you have been involved. I'm glad you are safe!
Glad to read that you are OK. I wish I could send the rain we had today your way. Stay safe.
Glad to read that you are safe and in a fire free area of Vic, I am over in WA and yesterday our community did a huge fundraising for the families affected by the fires over there. My thoughts are with the families over there and a huge thank you to our wonderful, brave firefighters. All the best.LISA V.
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