A spectacular house fire shrouded West Wollongong in black smoke on Wednesday afternoon, shutting down parts of the city and destroying the home of one of its most colourful residents.
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More than 50 firefighters in 14 fire trucks were sent to fight the Highway Ave blaze, which authorities said was made worse by "an unusually high fuel load" at the property.
Julius Kudrynski, a one-time lord mayoral hopeful who spent decades locked in legal battles with Wollongong City Council over more than a dozen illegal structures in his backyard, was helped from the property by Good Samaritans as the blaze took hold about 3.15pm.
Paramedics assessed the 78-year-old for minor smoke inhalation; his wife Alicia Kudrynski, 77, also made it off the property unscathed.
Mr Kudrynski told the Mercury he and his wife were outside when the fire started and he did not know how it began.
"It just happened," he said. "I tried to go inside to put it out, but the heat and smoke wouldn't let me. It's still going. All that water on it and it's still going. That's the surprising part of it."
More than two hours into the firefighting effort, a spokesman for Fire and Rescue NSW said the blaze was getting worse, not better.
"The fire continues to burn intensely due to the very high fuel load - it's an unusually high fuel load for a residential premises," he said. "[Firefighters] are rotating crews because they've been there for so long. They're anticipating they're going to be there for a little while yet."
Residents from several neighbouring properties were evacuated from their homes. Firefighting was focused on stopping the blaze from spreading to neighbours, and to other structures on the property, including a shed believed to be full of timber.
Authorities advised that residents may have lost power due to power lines brought down during the firefighting effort. The roadway was covered in hoseline and a cherry picker was erected to fight the fire from the air.
Mrs Kudrynski told the Mercury the couple had moved into the home as newlyweds 56 years ago, and had raised their four daughters there.
She said she was outside having a drink with her husband when he went to go inside, and smoke bloomed from the home's open door.
"I was trying to pull some vines down growing across the fence," she said. "My husband said he could smell something burning. He went inside and all the smoke came out."
"It's a shock. I still can't believe it," she said. "Everything I've got is gone."
A neighbour, Samantha Spence, pulled up outside the home as the sky was filling with black smoke.
"The highway was pretty blacked out [with smoke]," she said. "It went up very quickly. It was very scary how quick it just went up.
"I saw him [Mr Kudrynski] being pulled out of the house. It's pretty sad."
Mr Kudrynski, who suffered a stroke about two years ago, gained notoriety in the late 1970s for his battles over a large slippery dip he built in his backyard.
He said he became fed up with the council requiring development applications for any small work he wanted to do.
A self-confessed "collector", he was given six months to knock down unauthorised boundary fencing, sheds, a cubby house, a loft and a carport extension after a 2013 stoush in the Land and Environment Court.
He was also ordered to remove rubbish from the site, including 15 mowers, 12 chainsaws and 200 fan belts.
Ordering the clean-up, the Land and Environment Court's Justice Terry Sheahan said photographs of the property clearly showed it had been kept in an unsightly condition.
"[It] raises serious concerns for [Wollongong City] council and the court about fire risk, risk to human health and safety and the risk of invasion by, and breeding of, pests and vermin," he told the court.
But Mr Kudrynski, a retired school teacher, argued all the work had been approved.
Police are now investigating the cause of the fire.