MELBOURNE - Authorities are assessing mass property damage across south-eastern Australia on Sunday after searing temperatures and strong winds fanned catastrophic wildfires Saturday in one of the worst days of the weeks-long crisis.
In Narooma, a seaside town of about 3,000 people, the sky was bathed in an orange glow from nearby blazes and those who remained prepared to spend the night sleeping in their cars in parkland close to the water's edge. Penrith, on the outskirts of Sydney, reached a record 48.9 degrees Celsius Saturday, symbolic of the dangerous weather conditions that have fanned ferocious flames and sparked new blazes further south.
No one is unaccounted for in the state. Authorities may have estimates of the extent of property damage as early as Sunday afternoon, she said. Property losses will run into the"hundreds," he said. Four firefighters were injured battling blazes in New South Wales, and a 47-year-old man died from a cardiac arrest after aiding efforts.