Kevin Langley stares across the moonscape that his Terang farm has become after the St Patrick’s Day fires and hopes for rain to settle the dust.
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Mr Langley is also hoping the fire has not burnt too deeply into the soil in his paddocks to prevent the new pastures he will sow from germinating.
But those concerns are only two in a long list he has to tackle to get his farm back on track after the fire, which started at The Sisters, raced across his property, on to Garvoc and to west of Laang on Saturday night.
First among them is rebuilding burnt fences around the 141 hectares (350 acres) of paddocks that the fire razed as the inferno roared across his property.
But Mr Langley is also counting his blessings.
He lost up to 60 lambs but has 870ha (2150 acres) of unburnt paddocks that he hopes will bounce back after decent rains.
He’s also thankful that none of his family and his neighbours died in the fire. He played a big part in that outcome, helping to break down the door of an elderly neighbour to get her to safety.
Mr Langley said the elderly woman was sleeping soundly and had not responded to the frantic knocking by her granddaughter to alert her to the fire.
At the time Mr Langley, his wife and his mother-in-law had fled from their houses and were taking shelter in a woolshed when the woman’s granddaughter rushed over to seek help.
When he ran to assist, The Sisters fire was approaching fast and the howling wind was bringing down trees.
“You could see a big ball of flame,” he said.
The main front of the fire passed across the Langley’s farm on Saturday night, but the drama was not over.
On Sunday afternoon, the fire flared up again near his mother-in-law’s house and was stopped only metres from the house.
Mr Langley said the fire took out seven power poles along the Terang-Framlingham Road and Powercor had done a remarkable job in replacing them to return power to his farm only two days after the fire.