Raging bushfires in Victoria have claimed 108 lives and destroyed 750 homes across some 850 square miles as of this writing, burning residents trying to flee in their cars and fueled by temperatures of up to 117 degrees and fierce winds. Here’s a bit of first-person observation from schoolteacher Margaret Atsi, whose home was burned to the ground in the township of Kinglake East north of Melbourne:

“The community is a very close one. People I know have lost parents and children, everything has been wiped out. I feel devastated, numb and traumatised. I also feel I was one of the lucky ones, by chance my family and I weren’t at home when the fire came.


I was at my sister’s house in Eltham and my two sons, who are four and 21, were with me.


I was on my way home to Kinglake when police closed the road due to the approaching fire. There had been no sign there was a fire close by – the nearest one was 80km away across the mountain, but it was moving so fast it managed to travel that distance in thirty minutes.


…The fire came so quickly there was not time for everyone to evacuate, which is why people died on the roads, in their cars and in their houses.”

Find comprehensive coverage on the arson investigation and death toll, as well as reader photos, at The Age.