HIGH fire danger has forced the closure of Yanga National Park until Monday,
January 21, rendering it a no-go zone in the middle of the peak tourism season.
The closure — which came into effect last Wednesday — applies to all areas
of the park including the homestead precinct, woolshed precinct and Mamanga and
Willows camp grounds.
A red alert for blue green algae has also been issued
for Yanga Lake.
Temperatures in Balranald passed the 40 degrees Celsius mark
yesterday, with temperatures in the mid and low 30s expected to persist
throughout the weekend.
During last week’s heatwave, campers and visitors to
NSW National Parks were asked to leave due to fire safety concerns.
In
Victoria, many state forests are also closed to the public today due to
predictions of fire danger.
In a statement to the media, Forestry
Corporation chief forester Ross Dickson said many forests were closed to the
public in order to ensure public safety and the protection of both private and
community assets.
“The weather conditions continue to pose a very real threat
of damaging fire. Across the state we are expecting hot, dry and windy weather
and the chance of lightning strikes in some areas is also present,” Mr Dickson
said.
“The level of risk varies across the state and so our regions are
taking different levels of action in response to the fire threat.”
“In
general, all forests in areas where total fire ban is declared will be closed to
the public (today).”
“No hunting, camping, fishing, fossicking, beekeeping,
motorbike riding or any other recreational use or general access is permitted in
forests which are all closed.”
The forest closures extend until 11.59pm
today.
At the time of writing, the predicted fire danger for the Mallee
tomorrow was ‘very high’, with ‘severe’ fire danger predicted in the Northern
Country, North East and East Gippsland fire districts.
Yesterday, severe fire
danger and total fire bans were in place in the Wimmera, South West, North
Central and Central fire districts.
For up to date information on fire
danger in your area, visit cfa.vic.gov.au in Victoria or rfs.nsw.gov.au in New
South Wales.
Ensure you have a fire danger plan in place and if you see an
unattended fire, call triple-0 (000).
