2003 Eastern Victorian alpine bushfires

The Eastern Victorian alpine bushfires were a series of bushfires in 2003 that burnt in the Alpine National Park and Mount Buffalo National Park in north-eastern Victoria, Australia.

[1] The main fire burnt over 1,300,000 hectares (3,200,000 acres) over 59 days before it was contained on 7 March 2003.

41 homes and 213 other structures were destroyed, along with tree bridges, and 10,000 livestock were killed.

This figure includes 160 Australian Defence Force staff, over 300 interstate firefighters, 33 alpine firefighting specialists from New Zealand and 35 personnel from the United States.

In total, 15,725 personnel were directly engaged on fighting these bushfires.

NASA photo of South-eastern Australia showing fire activity on 22 January 2003