Survivors shelter in dams as bushfire death toll hits 131

Published on Sunday 8 February 2009 21:02

WITH the death toll from the deadliest bushfires in Australia's history expected to keep climbing today, police have revealed some of the blazes are almost certain to have been started deliberately.

Suspected arsonists were yesterday warned the authorities will "throw the book" at anyone found responsible.

At least 131 people have been killed in the inferno that swept across a huge swath of south-east Australia on Saturday, many perishing in their cars as they tried to escape, or as they huddled in their homes. Police fear the death toll will rise once they have carried out searches of burnt-out properties.

Another 20 people are being treated for serious burns in hospital. Entire towns were almost completely destroyed as searing temperatures and strong winds sent sheets of flame racing through the landscape.

Eye witnesses described walls of flame up to four storeys high, trees exploding and ash raining down as the fires tore across forests, farmland and towns. Some people abandoned their homes to shelter in swimming pools and dams as the flames closed in.

Australia's previous worst bushfire tragedy was 1983's "Ash Wednesday" blazes in Victoria and South Australia, in which 75 people died.

AMONG the confirmed dead was Brian Naylor, 78, the veteran Australian broadcaster, who died with his wife, Moiree, at their home at Kinglake, just north of Melbourne. In 1983 Mr Naylor reported on the Ash Wednesday bushfires from Kinglake.

Kieran Walshe, the deputy police chief commissioner in Victoria, the state worst affected, said: "Some of these fires have started in localities that could only be by hand; it could not be natural causes.

"We do need to get to the position where we can get our investigators and our forensic scientists into the fire scenes to do a full, thorough investigation, see what evidence can be uncovered that will confirm or deny how these fires have originated."

Police say anyone found to have started the fires will be charged with murder or manslaughter. They revealed that a 31-year-old man had been charged in New South Wales.

Viewed from the air, the landscape was blackened as far as the eye could see. Entire forests were reduced to leafless, charred trunks; farmland to ashes.

Most of those killed were besieged in fires which burned in several small towns about 50 miles north of Melbourne.

The worst affected were the former goldrush town of Marysville and several hamlets in the Kinglake district. In Kinglake, 12 people were killed and more than 500 homes were destroyed. Street after street was lined by smouldering wrecks of homes, roofs collapsed inwards, iron sheeting twisted from the heat.

CATHY Barber managed to escape her now burnt-down home and huddled in Kinglake School, which was also later destroyed, before finally arriving at an evacuation centre in nearby Whittlesea.

"There were a lot of families that couldn't get out," she said.

Ms Barber said the blazing trees surrounding her home had looked like Christmas trees and that on the way out of the town she had seen blackened carcases of kangaroos and other animals littering the road.

Jim Scott, who has lived in Kinglake for 22 years, said: "This horrific wind came through and just took the roof off our house, our shed.

"I've never seen anything like it, it was horrific. This is devastating, the loss of life."

Sue Aldred, another resident of the Kinglake area, said: "All of a sudden we were in a raging inferno. There was coloured smoke and the noise was indescribable. It was terrifying."

UP TO 90 per cent of Marysville, which has a population of about 800, is thought to have been destroyed, including several hotels. Television footage showed houses ruined, metal twisted from the heat, and the skeletons of smoking cars in the deserted streets.

Pastor Ivor Jones, who lost his own house, said: "Marysville, one of the loveliest townships in Victoria, if not Australia, has just about been wiped out."

A Kinglake resident, Gemima Richards, told reporters that her husband, his brother and their parents dived into a reservoir on their property to escape the inferno.

"They drove through the fire to get down to the dam and take refuge with their parents," she said. "A fireball fell from the sky and hit their car, but luckily it bounced off."

Australia's prime minister, Kevin Rudd, speaking on a tour of the fire zone yesterday, announced an emergency aid package of A$10 million (about 4.5 million). "Hell in all its fury has visited the good people of Victoria," he said. "It's an appalling tragedy for the nation."

The Queen last night expressed her shock and sadness at the "terrible" death toll.

In a statement issued by Buckingham Palace, she said: "I was shocked and saddened to learn of the terrible toll being exacted by the fires this weekend.

"I send my heartfelt condolences to the families of all those who have died and my deep sympathy to the many who have lost their homes in this disaster on so dreadful an occasion as this for Australia.

"The firefighters and other emergency services have been making extraordinary efforts to contain the situation and tend to those injured," the Queen went on. "Please also convey to them my renewed admiration for all that they are doing."

Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, yesterday pledged Britain's support for Australia's attempts to deal with the aftermath of the bushfires.