Hot news on Aust. TV

Press, 6 December 1979, Page 6

Hot news on Aust. TV

NZPA Sydney Police and television helicopters combined to rescue 50 schoolgirls trapped by raging bushfires in the Royal National Park, south of Sydnev. yesterday afternoon. the police helicopter and machines from Channels Seven, Nine, and Ten ran a shuttle service from the gully where the girls were trapped. The girls, aged from 14 to

16. were tramping in the park when they were trapped by flames. The fire was still burning late yesterday over a huge area of the park, one of many areas ablaze on the ■ outskirts of Sydney. New South Wales enter-1 gency officials said that the

i fire risk this summer was \ the worst for a decade. ; -: Sydney’s bushfire brigades' s! found the going tough as ~the temperature soared to I 1!40.4deg. Extra brigades were! - called in to fight several; fires south-west and north of ij Sydney. si Fires continued to burn at! lithe Lucas Heights Atomic! J Reactor site and the Hols-j s worthy Army range to the! 'south of Sydney, where! )

troops have battled them’ since last Friday. Other blazes have been re-! ported at Gosford, Cessnock, I .and Port Stephens, north of I :! Sydney; Colo, Orange, and 'Mudgee in the west; Gunda-' gai in the south-west; and Helensburgh, Shoalhaven, and the Royal National Park lon the south coast. Two men have died so far 'this week fighting the New: I South Wales fires.