Fire Update 11.30am & Some Pics
I've been trying to embed some videos of the fires but LJ is being obstinant and won't let me embed or even post links properly, so if you want, here's a couple of links to news pages you can copy and paste into your browser:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/hundreds-left-homeless-as-the-gravest-bushfire-emergency-in-a-decade-strikes-nsw-this-is-as-bad-as-it-gets-says-barry-o8217farrell/story-fni0cx12-1226741636446
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/nsw-bushfires-rage-live-updates-20131017-2vo14.html
I hope you can get them if you live outside of Australia.
The wind is still mild, the helicopters are able to do their jobs dumping water and we're now graded as 'Watch and Act' rather than Emergency, so even though the fires are still going strong, I'm a lot less stressed and more hopeful. The bad news is that I just heard the first death reported - a 63year old man died while trying to protect his house at Lake Munmorah on the coast just north of Sydney. I have a feeling that there will end up being more as people are allowed back into some of the worst affected areas - people who were trapped in their homes or cut off while trying to escape.
Some kids that were stuck at their schools overnight are finally able to see their parents and some kids didn't get away from their schools last nght til after 11pm. At Yellow Rock, further down the mountains from me (I'm right at the top), most of the houses were wiped out and 60 residents who were cut off from escape had to go to the local lookout that had burnt earlier and are still stranded there - a miserable, worrying, cold night for them. Springwood, another regional city further down the mountains has been hit very badly too, as has Dargan a couple of km from me, and, well, a lot of communities. They think it may take weeks or even months to get the fire to the north of me under control.
The central coast north of Sydney has been hit very badly too and one of my cousins is cut off and has his boat packed ready to choof via sea if he has to. My sister, who's up there too, is ok where she is for the moment. A lot of smaller communities have been hit hard there, too.
Here's a Rural Fire Service pic of the fires near me from yesterday morning - X marks where I am:
Here's approximately where the fire's spread as it is now with my position still marked:
All the fires now go well off the map with the south and southeastern area having spread into communities in the lower Blue Mountains and into the edges of the outer Sydney area. As you can see, I'm pretty much surrounded on three sides and if I wasn't in a valley with sandstone ridges, my place would be well gone by now. To the west is only road out now and as you can see, some of the town I'll be evacuating either into or through has lost houses and businesses on the north side. The fire to the north now covers over 100 square miles and the firefront that they're working on is over 140km or 86 miles long.
The sun's up now and so far the wind is much calmer than yesterday and although there's lots of smoke in the air, it's looking hopeful.
Here's some pics taken from right outside my house yesterday:
Looking north up my street:
to the north and east - the fire was just behind the ridges to the east at this time:
and to the south when the fire broke over one of the southern ridges and was speeding towards the houses on the other side of the street. Luckily, the wind died at that time and between a few water dumps and the steepness of the ridge slowing it down, it got under control before it hit any of the houses - they're a bit blurry but will give you an idea of how fast this one was travelling until the wind died down. They were taken less than 10 seconds apart:
We were very relieved when the wind died down and the helicopters could start dumping water:
But even with all of this going on, we had a beautiful early evening moonrise, sunset and some visitors that were escaping the fires:
This doesn't do it justice but bushfire sunsets really are beautiful:
One of the literally hundreds of golden cicadas that invaded us:
I much preferred these to the snakes and spiders that came stampeding in as well.
Well, that's my update for now - I think the worst is over for my hamlet unless the winds pick up again, but many places are still in immediate danger - I'm wishing them well and hoping there's no more loss of life. There are a couple of thousand wonderful Fire Service volunteers coming in from other states to help us today - I really can't praise our volunteer firefighters enough.
I'm off in a bit to volunteer for some support work now my son is up and about - not sure where I'll end up, but every little bit helps.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/hundreds-left-homeless-as-the-gravest-bushfire-emergency-in-a-decade-strikes-nsw-this-is-as-bad-as-it-gets-says-barry-o8217farrell/story-fni0cx12-1226741636446
http://www.smh.com.au/nsw/nsw-bushfires-rage-live-updates-20131017-2vo14.html
I hope you can get them if you live outside of Australia.
The wind is still mild, the helicopters are able to do their jobs dumping water and we're now graded as 'Watch and Act' rather than Emergency, so even though the fires are still going strong, I'm a lot less stressed and more hopeful. The bad news is that I just heard the first death reported - a 63year old man died while trying to protect his house at Lake Munmorah on the coast just north of Sydney. I have a feeling that there will end up being more as people are allowed back into some of the worst affected areas - people who were trapped in their homes or cut off while trying to escape.
Some kids that were stuck at their schools overnight are finally able to see their parents and some kids didn't get away from their schools last nght til after 11pm. At Yellow Rock, further down the mountains from me (I'm right at the top), most of the houses were wiped out and 60 residents who were cut off from escape had to go to the local lookout that had burnt earlier and are still stranded there - a miserable, worrying, cold night for them. Springwood, another regional city further down the mountains has been hit very badly too, as has Dargan a couple of km from me, and, well, a lot of communities. They think it may take weeks or even months to get the fire to the north of me under control.
The central coast north of Sydney has been hit very badly too and one of my cousins is cut off and has his boat packed ready to choof via sea if he has to. My sister, who's up there too, is ok where she is for the moment. A lot of smaller communities have been hit hard there, too.
Here's a Rural Fire Service pic of the fires near me from yesterday morning - X marks where I am:
Here's approximately where the fire's spread as it is now with my position still marked:
All the fires now go well off the map with the south and southeastern area having spread into communities in the lower Blue Mountains and into the edges of the outer Sydney area. As you can see, I'm pretty much surrounded on three sides and if I wasn't in a valley with sandstone ridges, my place would be well gone by now. To the west is only road out now and as you can see, some of the town I'll be evacuating either into or through has lost houses and businesses on the north side. The fire to the north now covers over 100 square miles and the firefront that they're working on is over 140km or 86 miles long.
The sun's up now and so far the wind is much calmer than yesterday and although there's lots of smoke in the air, it's looking hopeful.
Here's some pics taken from right outside my house yesterday:
Looking north up my street:
to the north and east - the fire was just behind the ridges to the east at this time:
and to the south when the fire broke over one of the southern ridges and was speeding towards the houses on the other side of the street. Luckily, the wind died at that time and between a few water dumps and the steepness of the ridge slowing it down, it got under control before it hit any of the houses - they're a bit blurry but will give you an idea of how fast this one was travelling until the wind died down. They were taken less than 10 seconds apart:
We were very relieved when the wind died down and the helicopters could start dumping water:
But even with all of this going on, we had a beautiful early evening moonrise, sunset and some visitors that were escaping the fires:
This doesn't do it justice but bushfire sunsets really are beautiful:
One of the literally hundreds of golden cicadas that invaded us:
I much preferred these to the snakes and spiders that came stampeding in as well.
Well, that's my update for now - I think the worst is over for my hamlet unless the winds pick up again, but many places are still in immediate danger - I'm wishing them well and hoping there's no more loss of life. There are a couple of thousand wonderful Fire Service volunteers coming in from other states to help us today - I really can't praise our volunteer firefighters enough.
I'm off in a bit to volunteer for some support work now my son is up and about - not sure where I'll end up, but every little bit helps.