Residents who have lost their homes and belongings in devastating bushfires on Queensland's Western Downs are turning their focus to rebuilding with disaster assistance now available.
Mark Lacy's home was burned to the ground by an out-of-control fire that ripped through parts of Montrose and Wieambilla, near Tara, north-west of Brisbane earlier this week.
What was not destroyed is unrecognisable, warped and charred by the heat and intensity of the blaze.
"They took aerial pictures and we could see on our phones the house was gone," Mr Lacy said.
"Our lounge room has melted … but we're grateful it didn't get through our sheds."
Residents in the area fled their homes as the bushfire spread quickly on Sunday, many leaving with just the clothes on their backs.
'We can start again'
On Tuesday, after two anxious nights, they were given the all-clear to return home and assess the damage after fire crews contained the inferno.
Mr Lacy thought he had lost his horses but by sheer chance, they were spared and helped by a stranger.
"Someone came and gave my horses water. I don't know who you are – but thank you," he said.
"If I had a fridge, I'd bloody give you a beer."
Mr Lacy, like many other home owners in the area, is uninsured and will have to rebuild out-of-pocket.
Some are asking for donations of clothes or household essentials to replace the things they have lost, while others need machinery to clean up the wreckage at their properties.
Mr Lacy said he still considers himself "one of the lucky ones".
"It's a house … we can start again," he said.
Nearby, Glenn Walker still has not returned to his property but said he does not expect it will still be standing.
"It looked like Mount Vesuvius was heading towards us, it was insane. I've never seen smoke like that in my life," he said.
"The intensity of it … I knew the place was gone."
Communities within the Western Downs affected by the bushfires can now access disaster assistance through a joint state and federal funded Disaster Recovery Fund.
Federal Emergency Management Minister Murray Watt said residents could access "immediate personal hardship payments to cover the cost of essential items" as well as "funding for operational response activities".
Conditions set to worsen
Reinforcements arrived in the region on Wednesday to relieve exhausted crews fighting another out-of-control fire at Myall Creek, near Miles.
The fire has burnt through 40,000 hectares of land, and conditions are set to worsen on the fire front.
The Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) is expecting hot and dry conditions for the next few days in impacted areas.
BOM senior forecaster Felim Hannify said another heatwave will likely set in this weekend.
"Dry conditions are expected over the Darling Downs for the next few days across the bushfire areas … nothing really in the way of rain on the forecast," Mr Hannify said.
"There is potential that we'll see the temperatures warm up again as we go through later this week and over the weekend.
"That's likely to result in elevated fire dangers returning to parts of the Darling Downs."
Queensland Fire and Emergency Services acting superintendent Warren Buckley said "decent rain" was the "only way" to extinguish the fires still burning.
Fears for habitat
Ecologist Robert Gardiner said he was very concerned about the impact on flora and fauna across the region.
"One of our workers found a small micro-bat, it had literally fell out of the air in front of him," Mr Gardiner said.
"The animal was heat-stressed … it could be reflecting that its forest habitat, a tree, has been damaged or destroyed but the animal was certainly heavily fatigued … it was panting, obviously in distress and it took some time for it to recover."
Mr Gardiner said habitat destruction by bushfires had significant flow-on effects and it would take "years or decades" for the eco-system to recover.
"You look at a tree and you see branches and leaves but inside each branch and each structure of the tree, there are literally tens of thousands of small animals … everything from a large possum, down to … insects that live on the surface of the leaf," he said.
"If all those animals are killed, foraging birds that come in and look for those insects, won't find any food source there.
Mr Gardiner said the fires will effect farmers too, with many relying on those insects to pollinate their crops.
He is calling for stronger government action on climate change.
"Things are getting dryer and hotter and therefore, the fires are getting worse," he said.
"Inactivity is effectively a decision to do nothing."
