In rural NSW, temperatures are breaking records. The wind is so strong “it’d near blow you backwards”. The smoke is thick and black. The bushfires are fast and unforgiving. They’re also everywhere.
They’ve been called “the worst bushfires NSW has ever seen“. One fire fighter said he’s never seen anything like it in 25 years fighting fires.
Most of the small community of Uarbry – a town near Dunedoo – has been wiped out. People have lost their homes and properties. There are reports of extensive loss of livestock.

“I think dealing with the dead stock or the damaged stock in the first instance is the real heartache,” farmer in Cassilis Tony Hegarty told the ABC. “I remember a farmer who got burnt out many years ago, he just said it took 10 years for the business to recover. That’s the sort of issue we’ll be dealing with I guess”.