Firefighters deal with flare ups at West Melton overnight

10 December 2024

Firefighters dealt with several flare-ups at the West Melton fire overnight, but none of them breached the containment lines.

Fire and Emergency NZ had crews at both West Melton and the Courtney Rd fire near Kirwee overnight. Incident Commander Dave Key says that the flare-ups occurred when the wind fanned partially burned vegetation and trees into flame.

This was expected and planned for and our crews did excellent work ensuring the flare-ups did not breach the containment lines.

Today, 75 personnel are working on the two fires, which are about 3km apart and supported by the same Incident Management Team.

Two helicopters and three heavy machinery operators are supporting the work of extinguishing hotspots. Most of the firefighters are from Canterbury, with two crews from South Canterbury assisting.

At Bridge Hill, work is continuing to extinguish hotspots around the perimeter of the fireground. Incident Commander Richard Griffiths says that last night's drone flights identified several areas for crews to work on today, some of them on steep terrain.

Three crews supported by a digger and a water tanker are at Bridge Hill today.