South Yunderup home destroyed by fire, crews use boat to battle blaze

Photos: Tex Reeks/Skeer Media

Firefighters have spent the morning extinguishing a house fire on a South Yunderup island.

About 6:35am, it was reported that a home was engulfed by flames on Culeenup Island, located next to Jeegarnyeepjip Island and in between North and South Yunderup.

No one was living at the house when the blaze started.

Previously a rental property, the house had been vacant for months with homeowners due to move in within the next few weeks.

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It’s understood crews had some difficulty extinguishing the blaze and accessing the property due to its location and the island had no firefighting equipment.

The Department of Fire and Emergency Services deployed the volunteer South Yunderup-Ravenswood Fire Boat to get firefighters and their equipment across the river with the assistance of Water Police.

Local resident Eric Magennis used his boat and a community funded water pump to assist firefighters with the blaze.

Mr Magennis said the local community all put in money to purchase the piece of equipment.

The damage bill is expected to be in the thousands.

A Department of Emergency Services spokeswoman said the cause of the fire was yet to be determined.

Follow Tex Reeks on Twitter via @texreeks.