Heavy rains help firefighters contain massive wildfires

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QUEENSLAND, Australia — Overnight rain has doused two major fires in south east Queensland but crews are still dealing with extreme fire conditions in the state's west.

Authorities say the rain has extinguished bushfires which had been burning at Greenbank and Mount Tambourine south of Brisbane.

Firefighters will return to a fire near Crows Nest to dampen down remaining hotspots, but crews are still dealing with almost 20 fires.

Many of those are in the inland region stretching from Emerald to Charleville.

There are also fires burning near Cloncurry and Three Rivers in the north west of the state.

Brett Harrison from the Weather Bureau says rainfall was widespread in the south east and there was also shower activity into central Queensland.

"We have had very dry conditions for a long time so this rainfall has been very welcome," he said.

"The cloud cover is going to be pretty intense keeping the maximum temperatures much lower than normal but we still have a severe fire danger for the Channel Country today."

The highest rainfall total has been just over 40 millimetres at the Figtree recording station in the Burnett region.

In the Central Highlands and the Central West falls have ranged between two and seven millimetres.

Mr Harrison says more widespread rainfall is expected over the next few days.

Crews have been battling more than 70 fires, and some of them have been burning for more than a week.

Superintendent Stephen Smith says crews are holding up well.

"Crews have been busy for a period of time now so they are certainly looking forward to a break," he said.

"Everyone's working as hard as they possibly can to make sure the fires are out and be able to get back to normal business."

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