{"id":623921,"date":"2026-10-08T02:38:11","date_gmt":"2026-10-08T02:38:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/623921\/"},"modified":"2026-10-08T02:38:11","modified_gmt":"2026-10-08T02:38:11","slug":"firefighters-head-back-to-battle-huge-fire-at-queenstowns-walter-peak","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/623921\/","title":{"rendered":"Firefighters head back to battle huge fire at Queenstown\u2019s Walter Peak"},"content":{"rendered":"

Firefighters are heading back to Queenstown\u2019s Walter Peak as a huge, uncontrolled scrub fire enters its third day.<\/p>\n

The blaze broke out near Walter Peak Station on Tuesday afternoon<\/a>. The fire had burned through 1400ha of tussock and scrub on the southern shores of Lake Wakatipu near Queenstown, Fire and Emergency NZ said yesterday evening. <\/p>\n

FENZ District Commander Blair Kiely told Breakfast the region had seen some rain overnight, which was good news for the crews en route to fight the fire. <\/p>\n

“We’re really hopeful that the weather conditions, a bit of rain around, are going to help,” he said. “Cooler temperatures will help as well.” <\/p>\n

\"The<\/p>\n

The blaze, which has grown to 1200ha overnight, broke out near Walter Peak Station on the shores of Lake Wakatipu yesterday afternoon. (Source: Supplied)<\/p>\n

A combination of ground crews and air units would be on site this morning, focusing mainly on the area around Walter Peak Station. <\/p>\n

“We’re pretty confident that the homestead is in a good spot now, and the rest we’re just sort of monitoring.” <\/p>\n

Kiely said the biggest challenge remained the area’s topography. <\/p>\n

“There’s a lot of fuels \u2013 tussocks and grasses up high \u2013 that are burning really well.” <\/p>\n

While there had been a “massive reduction” in smoke over the last two days, Kiley said residents should keep their windows closed and avoid using air conditioning.<\/p>\n

The morning’s headlines in 90 seconds, including murder charges after the death of doctor to the royal family, and how an Indian cop clung onto a speeding car for 40km. (Source: 1News)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Firefighters are heading back to Queenstown\u2019s Walter Peak as a huge, uncontrolled scrub fire enters its third day.…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":623922,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[1080,111,43,139,69,4143],"class_list":["post-623921","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-new-zealand","tag-dunedin-otago","tag-new-zealand","tag-news","tag-newzealand","tag-nz","tag-wildfires"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/623921","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=623921"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/623921\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/623922"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=623921"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=623921"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=623921"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}