A Force of Nature

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mid morning on jan. 11, eyre Peninsula farmer Leith Holman was getting ready for a rest. After racing back from a beach fishing trip the previous afternoon when he saw smoke on the horizon, Holman had spent much of the night helping other volunteer firefighters and neighbors save two farms from a bushfire that had finally seemed under control. "They were about to crack a beer," says Holman's wife Claire. "They thought we were safe." But then the wind changed - and with it the fortunes of the rural communities and farms of the lower peninsula, a sheep and grain district 650 km west of Adelaide. In searing heat, the wind accelerated to about 70 km/h, and within minutes the fire had broken free. By the end of the day, nine people - including four children trapped in cars - would be dead, and at least 80 homes, tens of thousands of farm animals and 80,000 hectares destroyed in Australia's deadliest bushfire since 1983.

Racing across scrub and farmland, this blaze was no ordinary grass fire. It was one of the fastest-moving ever seen, says South Australian Country Fire Service ceo Euan Ferguson: most of its destructive work was done in just six hours. At the township of North Shields, where teacher Helen Castle was killed, residents jumped into the sea to escape the flames. "We had very experienced fire fighters out there, and the rate of spread of this fire was beyond their comprehension." As it gathered speed, hundreds of fire-fighters and locals risked their lives trying to stop it. It quickly became an impossible task, says Ferguson: "A fire like that is a force of nature that cannot be stopped."

With communications in disarray, many families couldn't contact one other. "Our minds were going around and around like spin dryers," says Cummins resident Wendy Treloar, whose three farmer sons escaped the fire. "We just didn't know where everyone was." Beaten back by flames from one neighbor's house, Leith Holman and a friend raced to save another home. In 30 years on the peninsula, Holman has seen many fires, but none like this, he says: "It went through the scrub like a fireball, lighting up hundreds of yards in front of the main fire, just roaring with this tremendous wind and noise."

Somehow the Holmans' family home still stands, though burned patches a few meters away show how close the fire came. But the 1,100-hectare farm is "burned from end to end," 500 of their sheep are dead, and the local township of Wanilla "looks like a scene from the Second World War," says Leith. Still, they know how lucky they are. Many friends have lost homes. Close friend Neil Richardson and another resident, Trent Murnane, died fighting the blaze. The men didn't live in the fire-affected area but, like many others, had volunteered to help. Another friend of the Holmans has lost her two grandchildren, three-year-old Star Borlase and two-year-old Jack, who died with their other grandmother, Judy Griffith, in a car near the Borlase farm. Two other children, 11-year-old Zoe Russell-Kay and her 13-year-old brother Graham, died with their mother Jodie Russell-Kay in their vehicle after they fled their house and, perhaps blinded by the smoke, crashed and were caught in the flames.

Even before the fire was brought under control on Jan. 14, some locals were asking why more fire-fighting aircraft weren't sent to the unfolding disaster. Euan Ferguson says the deployment of fire bombers will be investigated, but he doubts more planes would have made much difference: "It would not have mattered if we'd had all the fire-fighting resources in the world."

More disturbing, he says, are signs that campaigns urging people to evacuate early are not working. The effectiveness of radio-broadcast public evacuation warnings will also be examined - though with a fire moving that fast, "there's little time to warn people, and little time for people to heed the warning." In the meantime, stories of heroism and loss are spreading through the stunned townships of the peninsula. Wangary general-store owner Sandra Saunders says she has "never seen people look so sad." Many locals are still suffering the painful effects of hours fighting the fire without goggles. But donations of food and clothing are flooding in, as are offers from interstate of help with huge tasks like repairing fences. And every day there have been 20 local residents gathered on the Holmans' verandah, offering to help clean up the still-smoldering farm.