Sydney - Fourteen firemen almost became the first casualties in Australia's 12-day-old bushfire crisis when towering flames surrounded them in dense bush, forcing them to use a chainsaw to clear trees from their stranded fire engine.
Isolated as they fought a massive fire nicknamed the "Burragorang Beast", the firemen drove their truck into a burnt-out area of bush on Thursday afternoon and were saved by targeted water bombing from a US helicopter.
"The flames were crowning the treetrops, it was a fireball," said fireman Chris Tierney, 20.
As the inferno, which has burnt out of control in the Burragorang valley since Christmas Day, roared towards the firemen in the Blue Mountains west of Sydney, the men pulled out emergency fire blankets ready to huddle inside their fire engine.
"The wind was swirling the flames. We couldn't drive out, so we went into emergency procedures," said fireman Mick Barr.
"We got the chainsaw out and cut down some trees... I've never got the emergency blankets out before," he said.
A desperate radio call for help saw a giant Sky Crane helicopter, which can drop 9 000 litres, or nine tons, of water at a time, push back the flames.
"As the fire was coming in front of us the chopper came over. In the 10 years I've been a firey I can say that was the scaredest I have been," said fire captain Michael Laverton.
Fireman Darrell Pascoe said: "Elvis saved us, absolutely," referring to the nickname firefighters have given the helicopter used by the US National Guard in Memphis, Tennessee.
Some 10 000 firefighters are facing 100 fires, many lit by arsonists, on fronts totalling 2 000km. Moderate conditions on Friday are expected to give way to hot, dry and windy conditions over the weekend.
The fires have destroyed 160 homes and burned an area twice the size of greater London, but there have been no deaths yet. They are the worst since a 16-day crisis in 1994, when four people died.
Police have now arrested 22 people for arson, one as young as nine, sparking widespread public anger. Arsonists in New South Wales face a maximum of 14 years in jail.
Two massive blazes posed the greatest threat - one along the Blue Mountains and another on New South Wales's south coast.
Holidaymakers in the small south coast resort town of Bendalong spent last night on the beach as firefighters battled a huge 37 000ha blaze which a day earlier swept through another town only a few beaches north.
On Thursday, Bendalong was covered by an eerie blanket of smoke, making the gentle surf lapping the beach barely visible.
The town's only road remained cut off as firefighters waited to see which way the blaze would move once winds picked up.
Scattered along the beach were mattresses, chairs, tables and a baby's cot where holidaymakers had spent the night.
The fires have left an estimated US$36 million (about R442m) trail of destruction.
Australia's most deadly fires swept through Victoria and South Australia states in 1983, killing 76 people. - Reuters