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A fast-moving blaze at Ipswich sparked by a house fire is now threatening other properties with nearby residents urged to leave immediately.
Key points:
- The fire is moving north from Bundamba towards the Warrego Highway
- Gatton broke its December record when it reached 42.3 degrees Celsius today
- Smoke has made air quality in Brisbane very poor
The house where the fire started appeared to be completely destroyed but Queensland Ambulance said no-one inside was injured.
An emergency warning has been issued by Queensland Fire and Emergency Services (QFES) for people in the nearby parts of Bundamba and North Booval.
QFES State Coordinator Wayne Waltisbuhl said the fire is not contained.
"The original call was to a house fire … that fire quickly evolved and spread to surrounding vegetation and that started a fairly fast moving grass fire."
"We do know of three shipping containers with fire works in them [that] caught fire and exploded, fortunately we were able to get all firefighters away from the area and we had no injuries from that.
"We've got 19 appliances on site and four aircraft trying to assist with ground crews.
"It's still running pretty hard and our resources will be there for quite some time.
"I would say that there would be at least 20 homes and properties from our vision that could potentially be in the path at the moment, if we can't get a hold of that running bushfire."
Bundamba resident Chris was heading back to "water down" his property.
"It looks like the three back paddocks leading up to the houses have all caught on fire so it's pretty bad yeah," he said.
"We're all pretty worried because we are all on the borderline of the creek and if they can't get to it by then, then we're all in a bit of trouble."
For more emergency information listen to:
"I hope everyone's alright."
Kelly, who was moving horses to her neighbour's property, said the fire looked "pretty bad".
Elsewhere, there is a prepare to leave alert for bushfires burning in Esk in the Somerset Region.
Several advice level warnings are also in place for bushfires burning across the south-east at Narangba, Patrick Estate, Millmerran Mount and Barney, and for Mount Stanley near Kingaroy.
South-east swelters
Temperatures in parts of Ipswich hit 41 degrees Celsius. Brisbane reached a top of 36C today.
The Bureau of Meteorology's Lauren Pattie said some records had been broken in the south-east.
"Gatton has broken its December record, it has reached 42.3 degrees today and we still have a few hours left in the day so we will see exactly how hot it gets there and its previous record was 42 degrees for December," she said.
"Nambour got up to 39 degrees today and its previous record is fairly close to that."
She said there would be some relief from the heat this afternoon.
"We have a southerly change moving across south-east Queensland and with that it will bring the temperatures down a bit and will make things quite smoky."
The bushfires are also causing air quality in the south-east to suffer.
Brisbane City Council's air quality index site shows most areas are currently very poor —the lowest level on its scale.
A rural fire service based at Woodhill, near Logan, said their efforts were hampered by someone stealing their water.
"This water refills our trucks late at night to ensure they are ready to respond again at a moment's notice," the Woodhill Fire Brigade said on Facebook.
"Your theft of thousands of litres of water now means our volunteer firefighters, after long days and nights, have to travel significantly further and spend more time filling trucks before they can return to their families."
Keeping cool at the pool
Families in Brisbane's inner-south flocked to the re-opened Langlands Park Memorial Pool at Stones Corner to beat the heat.
Hannah and her sister Noa made the most of the pool.
"It's great, otherwise I'd be a giant puddle of meltedness," Hannah said.
Andrew Kassianos said his family were planning to spend a few hours at the pool.
"It's just great to get out of the house and the heat."
On Friday, beachgoers quickly came to regret their decision to head outdoors as the mercury approached 40C in some parts of the state.
"It is so hot at the beach, my thongs are burning even though I'm still on the sand — as it flicks up it's burning my feet," 14-year-old Toby Buchanan said.
He and his brother Andrew were visiting Miami Beach on the Gold Coast from Brisbane, but they concluded it was "too hot" on the shore.
"We want the beach to be hot but, like, not this hot," Andrew said.
They said they would have preferred to go swimming in their apartment pool instead of dealing with the elements.
Likewise, seven-year-old William Pocock from Burleigh said he felt "really warm" in the 35-degree heat but was thankful for the "big waves".
When I've been in the water I come out to warm back up, but when I get really hot I go back in [to the water]," he said.
"I think I'll come 20 times it's so hot."
Friends Luca McGilly, Tianna Spresian and Bridie West, who were celebrating the start of school holidays, said the beach was very crowded on Friday.
"It was really crowded and there were a lot of people yelling, it was noisy," 12-year-old Luca said.
"We were all really surprised because it's never that busy."
But the girls said they were keen to make the most of it.
"It's been very hot and this morning when we all woke up we were all sweating, but when we got in the water it was much more refreshing," Luca said.
Topics: bushfire, fires, disasters-and-accidents, emergency-planning, qld, australia, brisbane-4000, millmerran-4357, kingaroy-4610, logan-central-4114
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