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Gippsland Region Fires

Latest Community Update - January 16 2003

By DSE / CFA - 16th January 2003 - Back to News

Fire crews from the Departments of Sustainability and Environment, Primary Industries, Parks Victoria and the Country Fire Authority spent a busy night working on containing the Razorback fire last night.

This fire has now burned over 9000 hectares in Victoria’s remote high country. Some problem edges and spotfires caused concern overnight, with at least one spotover onto the western side of the fire in the north west sector. In the south west sector, bulldozers are continuing to construct containment lines.

Incident Controller at Swifts Creek, Ben Rankin said that crews are backburning north of the fire, with plans to backburn to the Dartmouth Dam containment line.

"Even though the temperature overnight was 12 degrees, with high relative humidity and no wind, the fire still behaved erratically and unpredictably, due to the nature of the fuel load," Mr Rankin said.

"Firefighter safety is our paramount concern and this is a warning for everyone to watch out and not be complacent about this fire."

"We will be bringing in an extra 50 personnel to fight this fire tonight, plus additional resources. There are currently 217 personnel from the Departments, Parks Victoria and the CFA working on the fire."

A base camp has been established at Dartmouth to enable quicker access to the fire by crews, increasing safety and efficiency of operations. These crews will cover the northern sector of the fire.

Communities in the Omeo area should be prepared for an increase in smoke in the area as crews continue backburning operations both at the Razorback fire and other fires in the north east.

For further information on parks and forests, contact Parks Victoria 131 963.For information about public road closures and threats to private property please call the Victoria Police Information Line on 1 800 444 343.

This information is provided by the Department of Sustainability and Environment (incorporating the Department of Primary Industries and Parks Victoria) in partnership with the Country Fire Authority to protect our rural land in Victoria. More information is available on the DSE website: www.nre.vic.gov.au and on the CFA website: www.cfa.vic.gov.au .

Source: http://gippsland.com/

Published by: news@gippsland.com

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