Australia's southeast sweats through heatwave, facing bushfire risk

4/1/2025 12:40

Australia's southeast on Saturday sweltered in a heat wave that raised the risk of bushfires and led authorities to issue fire bans for large parts of Victoria state.



Australia faces a high-risk bushfire season that has already seen Victorian authorities battle a large fire that last week ripped through the state's vast Grampians National Park, razing homes and farmland.



The nation's weather forecaster said temperatures would be up to 14 degrees Celsius above average in some areas on Saturday, with Melbourne, the capital of Australia's second most populous state Victoria, set to hit 37 C.



At Melbourne Airport, the temperature was already 32.8 C at 10:20 a.m. local time, more than six degrees above the January mean maximum temperature, according to forecaster data.