(CNN) Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison said on Friday that he would return from his holiday immediately, after two volunteer firefighters died battling wildfires on Thursday. Morrison has been heavily criticized for taking a pre-Christmas break in Hawaii, as more than 2,500 firefighters across New South Wales state work to contain raging fires . His return comes after volunteer firefighters Geoffrey Keaton, 32, and Andrew O'Dwyer, 36, died Thursday near the town of Buxton, southwest of Sydney. The South Australian town of Nullarbor hit 49.9 degrees Celsius (121.8 Fahrenheit) on Thursday, the highest Australia December temperature on record and the fourth highest temperature on record across all months. The heat wave began in South Australia earlier this week, but is now spreading east to NSW and Victoria.

Source: CNN December 20, 2019 05:39 UTC