TERRIBLE BUSH FIRES

New Zealand Mail, Issue 1511, 14 February 1901, Page 21

TERRIBLE BUSH FIRES

♦ —- MELBOURNE, February 8

A heat wave, accompanied by disastrous bush fires, is passing over many districts. At Banxholme, besides great destruction to stock and other property, a number of residences have been burned, a man named Mclntosh was burned to death, and several others were injured. At Condah the Roman Catholic Church, and several houses were destroyed, and railway bridges and culverts burned. At Warrnambool five houses were burned on the outskirts of the town.

Wangaratta reports that the Sydney express had run through a large area of burning oountry,, the passengers being treated to a magnificent spectacle. At Searsdale several houses were destroyed. In the Buninyong district a vast area of grass has been burned, and much stock lost, and it is feared some lives were lost. In the Ballarat district some mining plants were threatened, and in other districts many outlying settlers were burned out.

The thermometer yesterday registered 109 degrees in the shade in the city. Showers at night cooled the atmosphere. ADELAIDE, February 8. Destructive bush fires are raging at Mount Pleasant. Much grass and hundreds of sheep have been destroyed. Tlio damage is estimated at £IO,OOO. SYDNEY, February 8. The whole colony is suffering from the heat wave. At many inland towns the temperature is over 100 degrees. At Mount Hope 118 degrees was recorded. SYDNEY, February 9.

Bush fires are raging in many parts of the colony. Hundreds of square miles are devastated in the Riverina district.

Many settlers have been burned out, and crops, stored ’wheat, machinery and other property destroyed. A farmer named Smith out after stock is missing-

February 9

The damage from fires in the Mount Pleasant district, 35 miles north-east of Adelaide, is estimated at many thousands of pounus. Hundreds of sheep, induing stud rams,' have perished. There is also much damage in the Narracoorte district, 240 miles south-east of the caoital.

HOBART, February 9

Queenstown, the centre of the Mount Lyell smelting works, twenty-eight miles from Strahan, has been partly destroyed by bush fires. Hundreds of people are homeless. fine fires were assisted bv a wind of

hurricane force, which approached on three sides. Business is completely suspended, the whole of the residents be ing engaged in fighting the fames and saving property.

The fires first swept away the settlement at Conglomerate Creek, and then attacked the town proper. The fight continued all thrdugli Thursday, and the greater part of the night. The danger of the situation was added to by the unroofing of houses by the gale, sheets of galvanised iron being blown about like paper. It is estimated that about sixty houses have been l/urned in and around the town, including about twenty in the main streets-

MELBOURNE, February 9.

Details of the bush fires coming to hand show that the devastation is terrible. Some smaller townships are almost destroyed. Hundreds of settlers are homeless and thousands of cattle and sheep have been burned to death. Five persons are known to have perished. Tnese iaieluded two boys named McCallum, a boj named Macdonald, and a man named Kings well. The Veovale Homestead, woolsbeds, and machinery, and the Deepden property are destrrwed. Telegraphic communication with many districts has been interrupted by the bush fires, the storm accompanying which reached a velocity of fifty miles an hour. The fires have been especially destructive at Burrigurra, a district 83 miles south-west of Melbourne. In the Colac district, 95 miles west of the capital, the fire avas started by a spark from a train, and the gale behind swept everything before it. House after house was swallowed up. It was here that the boys McCallum and McDonald lost their lives. # They <r o t separated from their parents in the confusion, and their charred remains were afterwards found. Kings well died from the result o f burns received in fighting the flames. Five other fighters were severely injured, and vere removed to the hospital. Two are in a critical condition. Another man named O’Brien, in escaping, was thrown from his horse, and had ms leg broken. The manager of the local bank and others their families by placing them in tanks. Anthony’s Bushy Paris estate lost all the grass, fencing, and eight hundred sheep and cattle. In the Camperdown district, 1-4 miles west- of Melbourne, many farms and stations were devastated. The Yieima estate and forest ivere swept and practically destroyed. In the ncxrth-eastern districts the fijes were the worst ever known. J’n the Hamilton district, the estate of .ur Simpson, the well-known breeder of Shropshire sheep, was devastated, including the woolsbeds. In the township of Byaduk, 214 miles west of the capital, only three out of fifteen houses remain. It is estimated that fully ten thousand sheep have been roasted in the district, one-station losing two thousand, another three thousand. In Casterton district, the fire cover-;.fl an area of thirty miles, and it is stul burning fiercely. In the Bcrringa dis trict much damage has been clone to mining properties. Mclntosh, whose death was previously reported, was overcome yvhile fight'ng the lire. His homesuead was destroy-'<]. At Hamilton, an cld man named An dersen, wV.e trying to rescue a horse from a bunvng stable, fell into the fire and pen died. The whole district is a blackened •riidernesA man named Northfield has succumbed to injuries he received hi the In.is'i fires at Geelong. MELBOURNE February IF The Aim.-it racas uere hreugilt *0 an abrupt conclusion by she bu<b fre vhieh, fanned by a gale, sweps across the course so rapidly Oat c o.i .n of +he horses were scorched before they could be got away. The wind unroofed the grandstand. Miles of country in the tieinity were burned.