Six helicopters will be in the air this morning battling a significant scrub fire at Pukaki Downs that was whipped up by gale-force winds overnight. 

Fire and Emergency NZ said six houses from Mt Cook Rd / State Highway 80 were either evacuated with help from police or self-evacuated on Wednesday night. 

No further evacuations are currently planned. 

The first helicopter flight would be a reconnaissance mission to establish the size and condition of the fire, a statement from Fenz said. 

Fenz were alerted to the blaze at 7.45pm and 11 crews from Twizel, Mt Cook, Omarama, Burkes Pass and Lake Tekapo responded to the large blaze near Twizel. 

Firefighting operations have remained limited overnight due to weather conditions, but will ramp up as soon as dawn breaks. 

The fire has raged all night and caused evacuations. Photo / George Heard 

Two ground crews helped monitor the blaze overnight and more are arriving this morning. 

Fire and Emergency Assistant Commander Paul Tinsley last night said Mount Cook Road/State Highway 80 would be closed overnight between the Alpine Lavender Farm and the intersection with State Highway 8. 

“A Command Point has been established at this intersection,” Tinsley said. 

SH80 remains closed, according to the Waka Kotahi NZTA website, and no detour is available. 

Fire ‘destroying everything’ 

NZHerald photographer George Heard said the glow of the fire was visible from some distance away and high winds were contributing to the blaze. 

“You can see the flames reaching 5-10 metres up in the air, whipping up pine trees and just destroying everything. 

“The wind’s not slowing down here either. There’s a lot, the whole basin is full of smoke.” 

Firefighters look on as dawn breaks and the first helicopter arrives. Photo / George Heard 

Fenz shift manager Alex Norris said the terrain and weather conditions made it too dangerous to fight the fire at night, but helicopters would be in the air at 6am. 

“Crews have been standing by overnight, keeping an eye on it and seeing how it’s tracking, defending what they can.” 

Firefighters had also been working on a scrub fire in gorse just outside Blenheim. Relief crews had been sent in as it was taking a while to dampen down, Norris said. 

Fenz is asking anyone in the area who feels unsafe to self-evacuate. So far, six properties have been evacuated. 

Some residents chose to self-evacuate. Photo / Jason Swain 

Twizel resident Jason Swain said last night that even 15km from the blaze he could see it and the “sky is alight”. 

“Our house, we’re on the south end of town, so we’re the furthest away from it,” Swain said. 

“You can see a lot of light from it, it’s very windy so it may be fanning the flames in it. 

“It might even be getting bigger than the last one which burned for days.” 

In August 2020, a blaze in the same location ripped through the area for 12 days. 

It swept through 3500 hectares near Twizel and at its peak, 150 firefighters worked to control it, along with 18 helicopters and two planes. 

More than $1 million was spent battling the blaze. 

Heard, who covered the 2020 fire, said it was in “exactly the same spot and almost exactly the same conditions”. 

“It’s amazing to see all this willow burning again.” 

Metservice forecaster Paul Ngamanu said there was a front bringing heavy rain up the lower South Island today but it was preceded by very strong northwesterlies. 

Ngamanu said gusts of up to 140km/h could be expected in exposed areas, while a weather station in more-sheltered Pukaki had measured gusts of around 60km/h. 

“I think the main factor of this fire will be those winds because it’s quiet a warm northwesterly wind, it’s quite dry, quite warm - [great] for creating fires.” 

The wind wasn’t expected to ease off until later this afternoon but the rain could be help the situation, he said. Heading into Friday the winds would change direction, with Metservice predicting snow in the area.