FORMER residents of the county now living in Australia have talked about the impact bush fires are having on them.

Worcester News Camera Club member, Ruby Mcgrow, moved to Sydney in 1970, and is an active contributor to the photo group.

Mrs Mcgrow, 80, said: “We do have very thick smoke here - across the road is a parkland which looks very misty but really smoke and it’s so bad.

“It makes me cough as though I’ve been smoking cigs but I’ve never smoked in my life.

“I had to start using a puffer for breathing and I haven’t used one for years.

“People are told not to go out if they have breathing problems.

“Some days the Sydney Harbour Bridge and Sydney Opera House are almost hidden by smoke.”

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Mrs Mcgrow said the smoke and the unbearable heat - in the mid 40C - stops her from going outside for most of the time but when she does, Mrs Mcgrow uses air conditioned public transport

Holly Todica moved from Pershore to Melbourne in 2006.

She said: “This is the worst I’ve experienced and summer has only just begun too.

“I live in suburbia, so I’m safe from flames, but the smoke haze is horrible.

“Air quality is very poor."

Thousands of people have evacuated from north-east Victoria, East Gippsland, and the south coast of New South Wales. Police have powers to compel people to leave in Victoria under the state of disaster declaration, but they have said they will not force people to leave. It is the largest peacetime evacuation in Australian history.

In New South Wales 381 homes have been destroyed just this week and 18 people have died since the fires began burning.

An Australian magpie has been filmed mimicking the sound of a fire engine’s siren as wildfires in the country continue. The bird was filmed in Newcastle, New South Wales, and has been viewed as a troubling sign of the severity of the fires - which have raged since September.