In the heart of central Victoria, the landscape is scarred and smouldering. The devastating Longwood bushfire has left a trail of destruction across the region, claiming at least one life, destroying hundreds of structures, and burning through an estimated 350,000 hectares of land. For residents of small hamlets like Yarck, the choice was stark: flee or fight the advancing inferno.
A Desperate Defence Against the Flames
David Rigby found himself trapped as the fire bore down on Yarck. With all escape routes cut off by midday on Saturday, he had no choice but to stand his ground. "I was actually preparing to leave at 10am yesterday," Rigby recounted on Sunday. "But by that time, you just couldn't get out. All the roads were cut."
Armed with bore water, a generator, and a network of rigged sprinklers, Rigby and about five neighbours mounted a desperate defence of their street. Hosing down houses and battling howling winds and blinding smoke, their efforts saved many homes. "It was calm, calm, calm, and then just hectic," Rigby described, pointing to nearby hills where neighbours' houses were completely razed.
The Overwhelming Toll on Community and Livestock
The scale of the loss is still being tallied, but authorities confirm at least 300 structures have been destroyed, including approximately 80 homes. For those returning, the scene is one of profound devastation. Kathy Munslow returned to her Gunyah Animal Healing Sanctuary to find injured and hungry animals standing in smouldering paddocks. Her recently purchased $3,000 worth of hay was ash. "Everything else is gone," she said. "I'm just here on my own, feeling really scared."
Down the road at Yarck's only open pub, Chris Charman, who lost his own home, voiced the community's anguish. "So many houses, and so many farms are gone," he said. "No one actually knows how bad it is. So many livestock are dead." The grim reality is evident across charred farmland, with the carcasses of koalas, cattle, and sheep littering the roads.
From Firefighting to the Gruesome Task of Recovery
The local Country Fire Authority (CFA) members, who had been fighting the blaze near its origin in Longwood, were ultimately forced back to defend their own homes in Yarck. Now, the region moves into a painful recovery phase. At a community meeting in Seymour, deputy incident controller Greg Murphy warned residents that the danger was not over, with power lines down, roads blocked, and the fire still active across 136,000 hectares.
"We're not out of the woods yet," Murphy stated, urging people not to bypass official roadblocks. The next priority is controlling the fire, making roads safe, and delivering urgent relief. Meanwhile, a grim task is underway. Gun shops, like Shane Curley's in Mansfield, are donating ammunition to farmers facing the heartbreaking duty of euthanising thousands of severely burnt livestock. "This will be very hard," Curley said, recalling a similar effort after the 2019-20 fires.
State Nationals MP Annabelle Cleeland, who fears her family farm may have lost 1,000 sheep, emphasised the farmers' desperate need to return. "There is this deep innate sense of protection to get back there to make sure they've got food and water," she said, coordinating local efforts to deliver animal feed. As the smoke slowly clears over central Victoria, the full, harrowing extent of the Longwood bushfire's impact is only beginning to be understood.
