SYDNEY (Reuters) – Much of Australia’s wildfire-ravaged east coast was drenched on Friday by the biggest rainfall in almost 20 years, dousing some of the most dangerous blazes and providing welcome relief to farmers battling an extended drought.
The downpour came with its own risks – officials warned of flash floods and landslides across New South Wales (NSW), Australia’s most populous state – but was generally greeted jubilantly after months of devastating bushfires.
“There’s lots of smiles around the place,” NSW Rural Fire Services (RFS) Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons, who has been more accustomed in recent weeks to delivering fire evacuation orders, told reporters in Sydney.
“It is breaking the back of this fire season, no doubt,” Fitzsimmons said. “The rain is good for business and farms as well as being really good for quenching some of these fires we’ve been dealing with for many, many months.”
The deluge had the effect of calming the number of active fires in NSW by 20 in a single day, a success rate that NSW RFS said