Smoky conditions in Sydney could serve as a reality check for the upcoming bushfire season as authorities race to catch up on hazard reduction burns before temperatures soar.
Residents of the NSW capital woke to a second day blanketed by a thick haze of smoke and poor air quality as firefighters worked through a backlog of controlled burns.
With temperatures tipped to hit 30C later in the week, just two weeks into spring, Emergency Services Minister Jihad Dib said the conditions were a "reality check" for the risks during summer.
"At the moment, there is a bit of additional smoke haze and I do want to apologise for that," he told NSW parliament on Tuesday.
"But I'm sure people would agree with me that we'd much rather deal with this at the moment than the other possible consequences of not doing the hazard reduction.
"I'd rather be in a situation where we've got a little bit of hazard smoke rather than telling people we're really sorry, but you need to evacuate your homes or homes have been burned down."
The NSW Rural Fire Service is racing to complete burn-offs to the north, west and south of the city ahead of the weekend, when temperatures are set to rise to the low 30s in much of the state.
Smoke shrouded the city centre and eastern suburbs for a second day on Tuesday morning.
The NSW Rural Fire Service said recent large-scale hazard reduction burns were due to be finished during the day, however further burning was scheduled for areas surrounding Sydney and the Central Coast until late in the week.
Air quality was rated as extremely poor in parts of the city's eastern suburbs in the early hours of the morning, while it was also classified as poor in segments of the city's northwest and the Illawarra region to the south.
Fire authorities have been making up for lost time after only managing to complete about one-quarter of planned burns in 2022/23 because of wet conditions.
RFS Commissioner Rob Rogers said officials had been closely watching the catastrophic wildfires and severe heatwaves experienced in the northern hemisphere in recent months.
"We're obviously quite concerned about the potential for the (fire) season," he told Sky News, while adding that conditions were not as bad as in the lead-up to the 2019-20 Black Summer bushfires.
"We're planning for the worst but hoping for the best."
Health Minister Ryan Park said people with respiratory conditions such as asthma should stay indoors when possible when conditions were hazy and avoid vigorous physical activity.
"If you know that someone nearby is perhaps on their own, an elderly patient with a respiratory issue, today is a day where, if possible, check in on that person and make sure they're OK," he said.
