00:00 Driving into the small township of Pomona.
00:05 Tuesday's destruction is all around you.
00:10 Over the last 24 hours residents have returned to assess the damage.
00:15 44 properties have now been confirmed lost. Homes like Damon Henrickson's.
00:20 Yeah this was actually two dwellings so it was all my family but there's 8 people in total in here.
00:25 So it's a lot of people that are now looking for somewhere to sleep.
00:29 His dad's motorbike untouched. The bushfire is hard to make sense of.
00:34 Everyone sort of rushed out and got as much as they could but everyone was leaving with the expectation that we were actually coming back.
00:41 Down the road Bila and George's home and accommodation business is in ruins.
00:46 It's just moment by moment. It's stressful for us obviously and the kids pick up on that stress.
00:52 They took it over just 5 months ago.
00:55 It feels unfair. We know now to be better prepared for next time.
01:01 Blackened trunks now scar the land. Swathes of burnt land stretching for kilometres.
01:07 Local firefighter Stuart Thorpe describes the blaze as a direct hit.
01:11 I knew it was coming down fast and I rang my wife and said get out now.
01:17 And then all of a sudden the wind just came from every direction. The flames went 40 foot in the air and it became undefendable.
01:25 We had whirlwinds of fire spiralling up in the air.
01:29 He left his home to fight the fire not expecting it to survive.
01:34 We slowly went to each home and the first one we went to, the first firefighter sitting next to me, his house was gone.
01:41 Went to the second one, his was gone and then it was my turn and I said well mine will be gone.
01:47 We drove up the road and there was the house.
01:50 Mark Sleeman's home was also saved.
01:53 It's pretty emotional to know the community members have put their lives on the line protecting our houses and they've lost their own.
02:04 You know it's really hard to deal with.
02:07 The question for so many here in Pomona in this recovery is where to begin.
02:13 Just days ago they were in their homes, they were running their businesses and now this landscape, their properties, their community is just so unfamiliar.
02:23 You know it's going to be a long recovery but I know that we'll get through it.
02:27 [BLANK_AUDIO]
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