A dramatic increase in fire danger across the Far North has prompted fire bosses to cancel all existing fire permits.
Fire restrictions have been in place in the Far North since October and in Whangarei and Kaipara since earlier this month, but fires have been allowed as long as the person responsible had a permit and followed strict conditions.
Northern principal rural fire officer Myles Taylor said the high temperatures and strong winds of recent days had increased the fire danger to such an extent that he had been forced to revoke all existing permits. Staff were calling permit holders to inform them and no new permits would be issued.
The only fires that would still be allowed over Christmas, with permits, would be hangi and cooking fires. A total fire ban was likely to be imposed early in the New Year.
A fire near Kaikohe earlier this month, thought to have been started by a flare, spread rapidly through 6ha of scrub and some pine forest. A 24-year-old Mangamuka man, Selwyn Desmond Beckham, appeared in the Kaikohe District Court last Friday charged with arson.
