A major fire would have threatened houses in the area.
The blaze started when a tree fell on power lines and sparked a scrub fire.
A nearly 30m-high Corsican pine tree toppled in strong winds on to electricity lines east of Closeburn Rd on Sunday about 6.10pm, Department of Conservation Wakatipu rural fire officer Jamie Cowan said yesterday.
The scrub fire spread and was 50m long and 5m wide at its peak.
Flames came within 40m of one house, Mr Cowan said.
"A neighbour of the house the fire started beside actually heard the tree go down and she had a look and she watched it for 30 to 40 seconds and saw a puff of smoke.
She rang her neighbours below and they had a look, saw smoke and the wires were still live, so they rang the Fire Service.
"Fire Service turned up in very good time.
If we had another 10 to 15 minutes behind it, we wouldn't have stopped it."
The occupants of houses at Alpine Retreat, Wilson Bay and Corsican Cove were warned and the "phone tree" system of calling neighbours was used.
Firefighters had the fire under control by 6.50pm.
The estimated cost was about $7000.
Sunday night's blaze was in the high-risk "red zone", breaking out less than 500m from the site of a big bush fire on October 19 last year - which forced the evacuation of neighbouring homes - and about 700m from where an illegal campfire was lit by campers below the heavily wooded slopes leading up to Corsican Cove and Alpine Retreat on January 24.
