The Rural Fire Service has issued 'extreme' fire warnings for the Sydney, Illawarra/Shoalhaven and Southern Ranges, with the surrounding fire areas all graded as 'severe'
Affected residents have been advised to "leave early" as weather conditions are expected to deteriorate rapidly on Thursday, with hazardous levels of smoke haze returning to the Sydney basin.
"We're going to have a number of wind fronts escalating the fuel, the fires burning, and the potential to have spot fires and embers travelling very long distances," she said at a briefing at Rural Fire Service headquarters in Sydney.State Opposition Leader Jodi McKay said that "the Prime Minister and Premier stand exposed for a woeful lack of leadership on the bushfires."
"We can expect the winds to be up and conditions to be at their peak very early in the morning and we'll have high sustained fire dangers for something like 15 hours," he said.The Bureau of Meteorology said that Tuesday was Australia's hottest ever day, with an average of 40.9 degrees across the country. The previous record was set on January 7, 2013, at 40.3 degrees.
The Department of Planning and Environment has predicted "poor" air quality for Thursday, but that could worsen with the arrival of bushfire smoke. The Gospers Mountain fire was upgraded to an emergency at 4.30pm on Wednesday, with residents in Dargan and Clarence told was too late to leave. It was downgraded to "watch and act" just after 6pm.
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