Peat fires that have been burning in south-west Victoria since St Patrick's Day are believed to be out, but authorities will continue to monitor the area for the next six months.
Firefighters had been throwing extensive resources at the two smouldering fires at Lake Elingamite and Cobrico, including installing a 4-kilometre above-ground pipeline to pump 4 million litres of water a day into the peat.
The fires were of particular concern because of the huge amount of carbon monoxide they produced.
This led to some residents in the Cobrico and Elingamite areas evacuating and others having to have regular health checks.
The smoke also wreaked havoc in nearby Cobden, leading to a school being shut down, the relocation of residents in an aged care facility, and football and netball training and matches being moved.
There was even talk at one stage of having to evacuate the whole town, which has a population of more than 1,800 people.
No hot spots since late April
But authorities believe they now have the situation in hand, although CFA incident controller Wayne Nagorcka said it was difficult to say that definitively.
"The Cobrico peat fire has had no registered hot spots since April 26, but we're monitoring that ongoing because we know that peat fires do burn underground for quite some time," Mr Nagorcka said.
"The equipment we're using only monitors the surface so we've actually put … some steel stakes in the ground that will hopefully transmit the heat and let us know whether there's anything underneath.
"But we've had no activity there for some time. It's something we'll continually evaluate."
Mr Nagorcka said it was possible for peat fires to start up again months after they were thought to be out.
"We'll probably do a check on this coming into the next fire season to make sure nothing has popped up," he said.
"It's pretty hard. It's not like a normal grass fire … because they do burn underground and they're hard to find sometimes."
As well as the temporary above-ground pipeline, authorities used water-bombing helicopters, foam suppression, interstate firefighters, specialised alpine CFA vehicles, and fire trucks usually used to combat aircraft fires.
"It's [been] a variety of things, but basically the only way to put out a peat fire is with water," Mr Nagorcka said.
"[The pipeline was] one of the things that really helped us. It made a big difference … to have that water available to us."
