Residents are evacuating as a large bushfire heads towards the town of Broken River, west of Mackay.

November 29, 2018

Locals in Broken River have been ringed by fire for days but thought they’d be alright, because they didn’t think it would burn through the rainforest.

Now they have been told to leave as wildfire races through the dry forest towards the tiny Queensland community best known as a place to view platypus.

Eungella Chalet manager Tess Ford says the town and surrounding rainforest has been ringed by fire for days but the Broken River blaze is a fresh outbreak.

“It’s rainforest, mate and it’s all burning … we’ve got two big fires coming in the back of us, there’s the other one coming up the range on the left-hand side, there’s another one coming up on the right-hand side,” she told AAP on Thursday.

The rural community of 22 people was told just before noon to evacuate eastwards towards Eungella, about five kilometres away.

Ms Ford says she’s never seen anything like the past week’s fires, which included a “fireball” ripping through the valley on Monday.

“All the locals said ‘we’ll be right, it won’t burn through the rainforest’ and it is and there’s just so much forest. It’s absolutely, oh my God,” she said.

“We haven’t any rain since May but we had Cyclone Debbie two years ago and Cyclone Ului in 2010, so there’s lots of fuel in the forest and no moisture, and the air is really dry.”

Ms Ford said the Broken River fire was now “creeping into the gully” next to Eungella.

“We got fire trucks, we got water tankers, we got firies all around us,” she said.

“We just need (the wind) to stay westerly and (the fire) will creep along (in the gully).”

The chalet’s guests, who were contractors working in the area, were evacuated on Wednesday and Ms Ford says she’s been feeding about 100 firefighters since.

“The boys are getting pretty tired but everybody has been able to catch a couple of hours here and there and keep going,” she said.

Power supplies have been intermittent since Monday’s fireball, which is causing problems for residents who use electric water pumps to access groundwater, she said.

“They can’t get to their water, so they can’t defend their property,” Mrs Ford says.

The blaze is travelling southwest from Eungella National Park, west of Mackay.

Fire conditions are slightly better than they were on Wednesday when they were listed as catastrophic.

But authorities say Queensland’s bushfire crisis is far from over, with days of hot, dry conditions ahead.