Belowen
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AT least 36 people are dead in the bushfires ripping through Victoria, but the death toll could pass 40.
Authorities are undertaking a grim search for more bodies this morning as horrific eyewitness accounts emerge from devastated communities. It was estimated at least 640 homes had been lost.
Police Deputy Commissioner Kieran Walshe said authorities had confirmed 36 deaths just in the fringes of the affected areas. He warned the final toll would likely be "a lot more".
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd announced emergency relief funding for the state, saying "Hell in all its fury had visited ... many good people lie dead".
Whole towns have been destroyed and thousands of people left homeless with record temperatures and fierce winds sparking devastating infernos.
The town of Marysville was reported to have been wiped out, but the Country Fire Authority (CFA) said many residents had made it to emergency shelter in a local park.
More destruction and power blackouts are possible, with up to a dozen fires still burning out of control. And it has been reported that arsonists are suspected of relighting some fires after fire crews had brought them under control.
Most of the bodies were discovered in towns northeast of Melbourne - six at Kinglake, six at Kinglake West, four each at Callignee, Wandong and St Andrews, three each at Humevale and Hazelwood, and one each in Arthurs Creek, Strathewan, Upper Callignee, Jeealang, Long Gully and Bendigo.
At least six bodies were found in the one car at Kinglake, with reports that others may have been trying to escape the fire in cars.
Police have not yet given the gender or ages of the victims, but one Kinglake resident said three members of the same family, believed to include a 14-year-old girl, a nine-year-old boy and an uncle, had died in the same house.
"It rained fire," another Kinglake resident told Sky News.
Strathewen resident Mary Avola said her husband of 43 years, Peter Avola, was among those killed. "He was behind me for a while and we tried to reach the oval but the gates were locked," she told Melbourne's Herald Sun.
"He just told me to go and that's the last time I saw him."
Firefighter Richard Hoyle described the scene as "a holocaust". "The road is riddled with burnt-out cars involved in multiple collisions and debris," he said.
Raylene Kincaide, of Narbethong, said her home had been destroyed and there was little left of the town. "Everyone we know has lost everything they had," she said on ABC radio.
More than 20 people have been admitted to Melbourne's Alfred Hospital with burns and three are in a critical condition. Seven of the injured have burns to more than 30 per cent of their bodies.
news.com.au
Arsonists have been re-lighting fires that volunteers have been putting out all day today too... I just don't understand how people could do that.
ninemsn.com.au
it's just crazy... Thankfully mother nature stepped in, and it's been raining...
I remember watching him on the news every night throughout my childhood. I know no death is more important than another, but I was so shocked by his.
