At least 10 homes have been destroyed — along with “numerous” cars, sheds and outbuildings — as firefighters continue to battle to bring a fire raging across Perth’s northern suburbs under control.
Powerful north-easterly winds that fanned the fire toward properties are expected to drop away this afternoon, prompting DFES commissioner Darren Klemm to cautiously predict that the worst stage of the inferno had now passed.
Around 80 per cent of the fire burning across the suburbs of Banksia Grove, Jandabup, Mariginiup, Singara and Tapping is now contained, with firefighters currently concentrating on the south-west corner of the blaze front near Caporn Street.
Acting Premier Rita Saffioti revealed the 500-bed Bullsbrook quarantine facility — built by the Commonwealth Government to house COVID arrivals — is in the process of being rapidly stood up to accommodate people who were forced to evacuate from their properties overnight.
That includes the 10 families whose homes have been destroyed, many of whom are yet to receive official confirmation — with Mr Klemm saying those calls would occur this afternoon.
The DFES commissioner would not say exactly where the lost homes were located but said they were not all clustered together and instead spread across “two or three streets” that had been most heavily impacted.
A rapid damage assessment team is currently on its third sweep of the fire ground. While he could not rule out further losses, Mr Klemm said he was confident the final tally would not be much higher than 10.
However, that relies on firefighters keeping the fire within containment lines, with Mr Klemm warning it would be a number of days before the blaze was brought fully under control.
“Around about 4am this morning, we had a breakout down in the south-west corner of the fire that resulted in once again a telephone warning system going out, a message going out to people in that vicinity,” Mr Klemm said.
“That was brought under control reasonably quickly (but) it is that particular area that we’re dealing with today, once again under the influence of this really strong easterly and sometimes pushing up into north-easterly winds.
“North-easterly winds are going to be in particularly difficult for us today with this fire. There is still a fair way to go for the fire to progress through some of those 5-acre and 10-acre lots.”
Mr Klemm said the “rural interface” made the fire difficult to contain, with large fenced-off properties proving difficult to navigate for fire appliances.
Three firefighters have suffered minor injuries, one fell off a ladder and two have been treated for smoke inhalation, while Mr Klemm said reports of a “burnover” event — when a fire truck becomes trapped in the middle of an inferno — were being investigated.
However, Mr Klemm said none of the firefighters involved in the potential burnover were hurt.
Even with the support of the “majority” of WA’s aerial firefighting fleet — including a large-air tanker flown in from NSW earlier this week in anticipation of Perth’s current heatwave — Mr Klemm said conditions had severely hampered attempts to douse the flames.
“The message to the community is on days like this if we’re saying it’s an extreme fire danger rating or a catastrophic fire danger rating, then it is incredibly difficult for us to be able to control fires on those particular days,” he said.
Ms Saffioti said despite the best efforts of around 150 career and volunteer firefighters, there had been “significant damage”.
Beyond homes, sheds and cars, the fire has impacted around 100 transmission lines — leaving around 550 homes without power — and both Western Power and Water Corporation are investigating the extent of the remediation required.
Premier Roger Cook has been briefed twice on the developing situation this morning and is attempting to secure an early flight home from China, where he is on a trade mission originally scheduled to wrap up on Friday.
Ms Saffioti said the Premier planned to visit the fire zone as soon as he was back in WA.
She also revealed she had spoken with Federal Finance Minister Katy Gallagher about activating the long-dormant Bullsbrook quarantine facility to house families impacted by the fire, as well as any eastern states fire crews that may be deployed to WA.
“The Federal Government has agreed so it’s now making sure it’s ready to be operational,” Ms Saffioti said.
“The Department of Communities is out there at the moment making sure that it’s ready to go, so they’re going to check every component and then give us an indication early this afternoon on whether we can use it for this evening.”