Australia bushfire News

Former India batsman Sachin Tendulkar and West Indies bowler Courtney Walsh are set to coach the Ponting XI and Warne XI respectively in the Bushfire Cricket Bash.

The warning from the world`s biggest miner showed how an unusually long bushfire season that has scorched an area one-third the size of Germany is damaging the world`s No. 14 economy. Australia`s tourism and insurance industries have already foreshadowed they face a A$1 billion ($687 million) hit each from the fires.

Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland, three of the most affected states by drought and bushfires welcomed the drenching rain this week, with fire services saying the falls will not extinguish all the blazes but will aid greatly containment.

Several towns and communities in the heavily populated southeastern states of Victoria and New South Wales have been advised to be alert and evacuate if needed. Warne is test cricket`s second most successful bowler with 708 wickets in 145 tests, after Sri Lanka`s Muttiah Muralitharan`s 800.

Aboriginal officials in the remote northwest of South Australia have approved the killing of nearly 10,000 feral camels, which is due to begin from Wednesday and is expected to last for five days.

Amy Jackson took to Instagram to share a very disturbing picture of a little girl wearing a mask, standing with a rescued koala in her arms, while there is a massive fire and flames rising in her background.

Around 1,000 people were evacuated from Mallacoota, Victoria - where a state of disaster has been declared - aboard the HMAS Choules and MV Sycamore.

The bushfires have pushed the harbour city into a rare appearance this week in the top ten cities with the worst air pollution in the world. Having reached as high as No. 8, Sydney was sitting at No. 10 on the Air Visual global rankings on Friday morning, above Jakarta and Shenzhen, and just below Mumbai and Kolkata.

Wildfires have so far this month claimed at least four lives, burnt about 2.5 million acres (1 million hectares) of farmland and bush and destroyed more than 300 homes. Powerful winds fanned around 130 fires that have been burning across New South Wales and Queensland states for several days, and pushed smoke south to form a thick haze over Sydney, home to around 5 million people.

A fire that erupted in Sydney`s northern suburbs in the late afternoon immediately cut off exit routes for some residents, a sign of the intensity of blazes erupting in tinder-dry bush. "Complacency kills - we cannot afford for people to be complacent," New South Wales Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons told reporters in Sydney. "This will only worsen throughout the afternoon as the weather conditions continue to deteriorate, and particularly those strong winds strengthen," he said.

More than 100 homes burned down in a leading Australia tourist area as Christmas Day bushfires remained out of control and dangerous on Saturday, with officials predicting more blazes to come in the hot southern summer.