Australian fire damage estimated

More than 150 homes have been destroyed

The cost of the bush fires around Sydney has already reached 50m Australian dollars, with claims still coming in, insurers have said.

More than 100 fires burning around Sydney and in other parts of Australia's New South Wales since Tuesday have destroyed about 150 homes, 250,000 hectares of bush, killed thousands of sheep and cut power supplies.

The Insurance Council of Australia (ICA) said on Monday that about 1,000 claims have been lodged already, mainly for home and vehicle damage.

ICA estimates the cost of fire at 50m Australian dollars ($25.52m, £17.59m), although more claims are expected to be filed over coming days.

Not the biggest loss

NRMA Insurance Group, which has the largest slice of New South Wales's home insurance market, refused to release estimates of the damage, but said it did not expect claims to exceed 1994 levels.

The 1994 bushfire around Sydney caused 3,500 claims worth 56m Australian dollars.

The hailstorm of 1997 was rather more expensive for the insurers, with payouts totalling 1.7bn Australian dollars.

Australia's four major banks have launched disaster relief programmes for victims of the recent fires, dropping interests on loans for people rebuilding homes.

Disaster continues

Fires are burning to the north, south and west of Sydney, which is being defended by 15,000 firefighters - the largest such force ever deployed in the state.

During the weekend 20 new fires were spotted.

Weather forecasters said there is little chance of rain this week.

Officials said the fire danger is the worst in 30 years.