An emergency warning issued for a bushfire in the Shire of Harvey, south of Perth, has been widened to include the town of Wokalup.

The Department of Fire and Emergency Services (DFES) said the warning for the out-of-control blaze in the southern part of Uduc had been expanded to the east.

The fire started on private property at Uduc and is burning easterly at about 300 metres per hour after switching direction on Monday afternoon.

More than 860 hectares have been burnt so far and about 190 firefighters are at the scene. Water bombing aircraft are also being used.

DFES said the blaze could rapidly gain pace because of the fuel loads in the area.

"It's coming out of a forested area into basically what we would consider grassland or swamp area," DFES incident controller Peter Sutton said.

The flames have reached up to 10 metres high, DFES said, and lives and property are at risk.

No properties are believed to have been lost, and it is not known how the blaze was started.

At 4:33pm (AWST) the emergency warning covered people south of Forestry Road and Uduc Road, west of Fryer Road and Hocart Road and South Western Highway, north of Mitchell Road, west of Campbell Road in a line west to the corner of Wellesley Road North and Treasure Road, and east of Forrest Highway.



Loading

This included Wokalup townsite, Thornton Housing Estate and Myalup Freshwater Lakes Estate.

Homes in Forestry Road, Myalup Road and properties surrounding the Myalup pine plantation may be threatened by the fire, DFES said.

A watch and act warning has been issued for Harvey, in addition to watch and act warnings already in place for the towns of Myalup and Binningup, as well as several other areas.

Residents in those areas have been warned conditions are changing and they need to leave or be ready to defend their homes.

Earlier today the fire was contained, but it has now broken containment lines.

"There's currently no direct threat to Binningup and Myalup," Mr Sutton said.

"Even with the predicted wind changes that are coming in through this evening, the fire will move in a north-easterly direction away from Binningup and Myalup.

"[But] the concern that we have still through the night is that there is a potential for the easterly to come through at midnight, so even if containment lines are in place there is always a risk a containment line can be broken."

DFES spokesman Mark Graham said firefighters had worked hard overnight, but the forecast weather conditions later in the day could pose further challenges.

"The temperatures are expected to get up to around 39 degrees in the area and it's a start of a heatwave in the southern areas of Western Australia, so we're going to have problems with the temperatures.

Loading

"The wind direction is also going to be a factor as it changes almost 360 degrees during the day."

DFES incident controller Danny Mosconi, earlier said locals were jittery after the recent Waroona fire.

"There'll be concern throughout that community and we're putting in as many appliances as we can and we are putting as much information as we can," he said.

A temporary evacuation centre has been set up at Harvey Recreation Centre on Young Street in Harvey, where a community meeting has been held.

Some roads in the area are closed including Forestry Road from Forrest Highway east to Clarke Road, and Myalup Road from Forrest Highway through to Forestry Road.

Operations as usual: Emergency Services Minister

The fire is burning in the same district as a massive blaze that claimed two lives and all but levelled the South West town of Yarloop last month.

Loading

Harvey Shire president Tania Jackson said some of the people evacuated from their homes due to the Uduc fire had been relocated last month.

"It's a very stressful situation, quite traumatic, and our people are suffering," Ms Jackson said.

"It's not easy to take on that this is happening again."

Ada Farmer lost her home in the Yarloop fire and was given emergency accommodation with her two daughters and granddaughter.

"It's not a good feeling going through a second fire. It's like deja vu," she said.

"I'm just off to the second house where I'm staying at the moment to pack up a few [items] and get out.

"It feels strange and scary not knowing what's going to happen next."

Emergency Services Minister Joe Francis said there had been no change to the way emergency services carried out their duties in the wake of the Waroona-Yarloop fire, despite criticism from residents that not enough was done to save their homes.

"It is still ops normal. The Department of Emergency Services and Commissioner Wayne Gregson had a quick look at what they did," he said.

"They asked themselves all the time, 'was there anything we could have done differently?' At the moment, it's very little. We'll see what comes out of Euan Ferguson's inquiry."

Mr Ferguson, the former head of the Victorian Country Fire Authority, is heading up an inquiry into how authorities handled the devastating fire.

Mr Francis warned people in the area to maintain their personal situational awareness in conditions that were potentially lethal.

"This is the worst possible combination of wind, temperature and high fuel load that you can expect," he said.

"These are the things that trigger the tragedies that we've seen over the past few months and past few years."

DFES said the blaze could continue to pose a threat into the weekend due to the trying weather conditions.