Two people have suffered serious burns while defending their property from one of many bushfires raging across NSW, with hot and windy conditions expected to continue.
The men, aged 50 and 20, were injured when a bushfire flared up in the central-west town of Vittoria, near Bathurst, yesterday afternoon, forcing land owners to evacuate.
Both patients were taken to Orange Base Hospital for treatment before being transferred to Concord Hospital in Sydney.
On Tuesday evening, the Rural Fire Service (RFS) issued an update on their website, stating that police were relocating residents in the Vittoria area.
The fire has crossed the Mitchell Highway, forcing its closure between Bathurst and Orange and diverting traffic through Blayney.
Residents south of Vittoria were urged to remain vigilant as the fire moves in their direction under erratic weather conditions.
A wind change later on Tuesday evening could threaten communities northeast of Vittoria, the RFS warned.
A bushfire burning northeast of Cootamundra, near Wagga Wagga, was threatening properties with the smoke impacting the township of Harden.
The fire was moving quickly under strong westerly winds but a strong southwesterly change was expected later in the evening, raising the risk of erratic fire behaviour.
At Cudgen, near the far north NSW coast, a bushfire put several rural properties under threat on Tuesday afternoon.
Firefighters were working to establish containment lines and focused their efforts on protecting properties.
West of Tamworth, a fire that has scorched 1,200ha of grass and scrub broke containment lines on Tuesday afternoon.
Strong westerly winds and temperatures reaching 40 degrees raised fears that rural properties would come under threat and prompted a total fire ban in the area.
The RFS said about 90 fires were alight across the state on Tuesday and more than 1,600 firefighters were on the ground.
Every region of NSW was under a high to catastrophic fire danger for Wednesday.
Total fire bans remained in effect for the central ranges, northern slopes, northwestern and upper central west plains regions.
On Wednesday, hot, dry and windy conditions are expected to raise bushfire danger levels across parts of NSW, the Bureau of Meteorology warned.
