The official bushfire season will start from Monday, September 1. 

South Coast LGAs beginning their bushfire season are Wollongong, Shellharbour, Kiama, Eurobodalla and Bega Valley.

During the bushfire danger period, landowners must obtain permits from their local Rural Fire Service Control Centre before conducting hazard reduction burns.  

The decision was made to add the South Coast councils to areas already subject to the extended bushfire season after advice from the Bureau of Meteorology that recent rain will only provide a temporary relief to prevailing dry conditions across NSW. 

NSW RFS Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said the weather outlook through to November indicated drier than average conditions across central and southern NSW and warmer than normal temperatures for all but the north of the state.

“The Bureau of Meteorology also advises an El Nino event may influence the bushfire season, producing hotter and drier conditions,” Commissioner Fitzsimmons said.

He warned against complacency in the wake of recent rain.

“Let’s not forget that at the beginning of August, volunteers were fighting more than 90 fires simultaneously, including those which destroyed five homes in the Clarence Valley and Kempsey,” he said.

“All it will take is a few weeks of warm weather and we will again be contending with dry landscapes.”

Shoalhaven RFS district officer James Morris urged residents to prepare their properties for the fire season by cleaning up gutters and removing combustible material from around their homes.

“And everyone needs to fill out a Bushfire Survival Plan, which they can in three ways, either by downloading it from rfs.nsw.gov.au, picking it up in person from Fire Control on Albatross Road in Nowra or by getting the free smartphone app myfireplan,” Mr Morris said.

 He said that the depending on conditions in 2015, there was potential to bring forward the bushfire danger period to the beginning of August.