Warning for bushfire in Victoria’s west downgraded to ‘Advice’

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Victorian firefighters have spent the night battling a blaze in the state's west, one of several which broke out across Victoria yesterday, on the hottest December day since the black summer bushfires.

Transcript

00:00The advice message remains in place for the fire ground after that bushfire started up

00:06yesterday at about 5pm at the Creswick State Forest on Melbourne Road.

00:11Today residents are being urged to stay informed and those are for the areas surrounding Creswick,

00:17that's Dean, Wattle Park, Clarks Hill and the Newland areas.

00:21Now that fire at this stage is not yet under control, it's actually burned through about

00:25200 hectares of the State Forest over the past sort of 12 hours.

00:31We have learned that that fire started at about 5pm last night and it spread quite rapidly

00:36over the next just two hours and within that time it was declared as an emergency and it

00:42was required that residents were told to evacuate that area.

00:46So the wind changed from a south easterly direction at about 6.30pm and was heading

00:51towards those towns which was causing some serious concerns for those authorities.

00:57About 250 firefighters and 58 trucks spent some time in the afternoon and evening trying

01:03to work to control the blaze.

01:05We spoke this morning to Chief Fire Officer Chris Hardman from the Forest Fire Management

01:10who thanked the communities for their hard work and here's what he had to say.

01:15I'd just like to acknowledge and thank the community for taking heed of our warnings

01:19last night and those people in the path of that fire evacuating but really terrific work

01:25by our firefighters making sure that no assets have been lost.

01:32We're not certain if there are any minor assets but certainly no reports of any house losses

01:38at the moment.

01:41So here in Creswick about a dozen residents in total that we know of ended up being evacuated

01:47from those areas.

01:49It was a difficult day right across the state and further into the night with those soaring

01:54temperatures up near Mildura in Walpia.

01:57It got to 47.1 degrees which is actually the fifth highest temperature recorded anywhere

02:04in Victoria.

02:05It's only 17 to 18 degrees there now this morning.

02:08It's definitely more favourable conditions here in Ballarat region as well where it's

02:14just hitting sort of the mid-teens and we even saw a little bit of rain this morning

02:19making for sort of more favourable conditions for those fireys to continue their work out

02:24at the Creswick State Forest.

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