Firefighters throughout southeastern Australia are on high alert, battling a series of minor blazes amid soaring temperatures and high winds that threatened to cause potentially dangerous bushfires.
A fire near the town of Stawell in western Victoria state has destroyed two houses and other homes are still at risk from the blaze, which has burned out 2,000 acres of state forest.
Another fire in the northeast of the state is also thought to threaten homes.
Gusting hot winds took the temperature to over 42 degrees Celsius by late afternoon in Melbourne, and temperatures above 43 degrees and hot winds were forecast for much of New South Wales tomorrow.
A fire service spokesman in New South Wales said: 'We'll see extreme weather conditions all day tomorrow. If we do get bushfires in these conditions it makes it extremely difficult for us to control them.'
Thousands of firefighters were on standby around the country, as about 1,200 worked on more than 25 fires in New South Wales alone.
A ban on lighting fires in the open is in place across New South Wales and much of Victoria and South Australia until midnight tomorrow.
In January 2004, Australia's deadliest bushfires in 22 years killed nine people and injured dozens in South Australia.
The blazes were the worst since bushfires claimed 75 lives in South Australia and Victoria in 1983.
