Saturday 10/January/2026 – 09:27 AM
Today, Saturday, thousands of firefighters battled forest fires in southeastern Australia, which destroyed homes and cut off electricity to thousands of homes, and the authorities declared a state of disaster in the southeast of the country.
Forest fires in Australia
According to Reuters, authorities said that fires have swept through more than 800,000 acres of forests in the state of Victoria since mid-week, in light of a severe heat wave, and ten large fires are still burning across the state.
In the neighboring state of New South Wales, several fires broke out near the border with Victoria at emergency level, the highest danger rating, according to the Rural Fire Service, at a time when temperatures reached the mid-40s Celsius.
The authorities added that more than 130 facilities, including homes, were destroyed, while electricity was cut off from about 38,000 homes and commercial facilities in Victoria due to the fires, noting that these fires are the worst the state has witnessed since the Black Summer fires in 2019 and 2020, which destroyed an area equivalent to the size of Turkey and resulted in the deaths of 33 people.
Victoria State Premier Jacinta Allan told reporters that the fires were being contained wherever possible, confirming the deployment of thousands of firefighters in the field.
For his part, Australian Prime Minister Anthony Albanese warned of a day characterized by extremely dangerous fire conditions, especially in the state of Victoria, where large areas of the state have been declared disaster areas.
Albanese said, in televised statements from Canberra, that his thoughts and sympathies are with Australians in regional communities facing these difficult circumstances.
Authorities reported that one of the largest fires, near the town of Longwood, about 112 kilometers north of Melbourne, consumed about 130,000 hectares of forest, destroying 30 facilities, in addition to vineyards and agricultural land.
Dozens of population centers near the fire areas were also evacuated, and many parks and camps in the state were closed.
The Australian Meteorology Service issued a severe heat wave warning on Saturday that included large parts of Victoria, while a fire warning was in effect for large areas of the country, including New South Wales.
In Sydney, the capital of New South Wales, the temperature rose to 42.2 degrees Celsius, more than 17 degrees higher than the average maximum temperature in January, according to data from the Meteorological Service.
The authority expected conditions to improve over the weekend as the winds changed to the south, which would bring more moderate temperatures to the state.
