Australian bushfires. Satellite image of the smoke from bushfires burning in Victoria, Australia (top left) blowing across the Tasman Sea to New Zealand (right). This series of bushfires, known as the Black Saturday bushfires, started on the 7th February. Up to 400 individual fires were recorded. The fires took 173 lives, Australia's highest ever loss from a bushfire. Over 7500 people were displaced and 2000 homes destroyed. Image taken on 8th February 2009 by the Moderate Resolution Imaging Spectroradiometer (MODIS) on NASA's Aqua satellite.