When Aaron Crowe decided to evacuate his Warriwillah home with his three-year-old daughter Pepper and partner Fiona Lee, alert systems were telling him the fire was kilometres away.

In reality, it was just minutes away.

"The alert system said we were not in danger but we saw the smoke and knew something was wrong," Mr Crowe, 38, said.

"We still hadn't gotten the warning to leave and our house was burning down and the fire was already in the next valley over."