As Bulahdelah mourns dead firefighter, residents recall lucky escapes and fire chief warns the danger is ‘not contained’

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When Garry Morgan arrived home on Friday afternoon, his rural mid-north coast property was surrounded by a “big plume of smoke”. Less than twenty-four hours later, two houses on his street would be lost, and its surrounding forest would be reduced to blackened skeletal remains.

Morgan’s township of Bulahdelah, around 235km north of Sydney, has become at the centre of a tragedy after a veteran firefighter died on Sunday evening when he was struck by a falling tree, marking a “foreboding start” to the bushfire season .

As Bulahdelah mourns dead firefighter, residents recall lucky escapes and fire chief warns the danger is ‘not contained’

Get our breaking news email , free app or daily news podcast

When Garry Morgan arrived home on Friday afternoon, his rural mid-north coast property was surrounded by a “big plume of smoke”. Less than twenty-four hours later, two houses on his street would be lost, and its surrounding forest would be reduced to blackened skeletal remains.

Morgan’s township of Bulahdelah, around 235km north of Sydney, has become at the centre of a tragedy after a veteran firefighter died on Sunday evening when he was struck by a falling tree, marking a “foreboding start” to the bushfire season .

As Bulahdelah mourns dead firefighter, residents recall lucky escapes and fire chief warns the danger is ‘not contained’

Get our breaking news email , free app or daily news podcast

When Garry Morgan arrived home on Friday afternoon, his rural mid-north coast property was surrounded by a “big plume of smoke”. Less than twenty-four hours later, two houses on his street would be lost, and its surrounding forest would be reduced to blackened skeletal remains.

Morgan’s township of Bulahdelah, around 235km north of Sydney, has become at the centre of a tragedy after a veteran firefighter died on Sunday evening when he was struck by a falling tree, marking a “foreboding start” to the bushfire season .