"We've just got town after town after town that will be under threat," he told ABC News on Monday night. "It's a threat that we haven't faced ever before and I just hope we get through that ok and hopefully we won't have to deal with it again." Mr Rogers said places where fires are already raging and are not contained such as the mid-north coast and north coast are "going to cause us problems". There is an extreme fire danger rating - the second highest - in place for the North Coast, Southern Ranges, Central Ranges, New England, Northern Slopes and North Western areas. Recent days have seen a war of words break out over a potential link between the fires and climate change.

Source: Otago Daily Times November 11, 2019 19:35 UTC