A lightning strike started the fire in the remote, inaccessible area due west of Narooma near Belowra late last month.

There is now another smaller 50ha fire that National Parks is dealing with at Cooranbene Mountain northwest of Moruya.

“Things got a bit quieter but we’ve continued active remote mop-up work on both fires,” National Parks incident controller Franz Peters said on Tuesday morning.

There had actually been up to 5mm of rain on the escarpment overnight on Monday but a bit of fog temporarily grounded aerial firefighting efforts on Tuesday morning.

On Tuesday, there were two helicopters and grounds crews tasked to Jillicambra and seven helicopters and ground crews on the Cooranbene fire.

Most of these choppers and their crews were overnighting at Narooma, but a couple were based at a new staging area on the old Cooma Road south of Braidwood.

There was access to the eastern flank of the larger Jillicambra fire by ground crews through Belowra and the Jillicambra fire trail where there had been some firebreaks put in a by a bulldozer.

The western flank of the fire was however very remote but fortunately the Tuross River and Bumberry Creek were providing natural breaks and Remote Access Firefighting Teams were being dropped into the area.

National Parks crews had been called in from as far away as Bombala and Sydney, while RFS assistance was also greatly appreciated.

Smoke in the Narooma district could be coming from these fires but also from extensive fires south of border in East Gippsland, particularly when southerly winds prevailed. There is also a 2000ha fire in the Cooma area.