Every year tourists flock to Cobargo, Batemans Bay, Mallacoota and other beach towns searching for a slice of paradise on the Australian coast.

Now those idyllic towns have been transformed into apocalyptic scenes as the nation’s devastating bushfires closed in with confirmation of at least two lives lost and other people unaccounted for.

Homes have been razed to the ground and main streets destroyed.

Dramatic and heartbreaking before-and-after photos have emerged, which reveal the true horror wrought by the blaze.

COBARGO

Cobargo – a village in southeast NSW with a population of just 776 people – is one of many Aussie towns affected by the fire crisis.

Robert Selway, 63, and his 29-year-old son Patrick died when they stayed behind to defend their Wandella home, close to Cobargo, from the Badja Forest Rd fire, police said.

Robert’s wife found their bodies when she returned to the property yesterday.

Photos of Cobargo’s main street before and after the fires swept through the town show the extent of the damage, with social media users sharing snaps of the quaint and historic main street that has now been “completely destroyed”.

How about these stunning before and after shots of Cobargo in NSW? #bushfirecrisis https://t.co/pvv9L09bhU pic.twitter.com/rKdGo5A2qh — Clayton Goode (@clayton_goode) December 31, 2019

MALLACOOTA

Some of the most dramatic photos of the fires are coming from Mallacoota in Victoria, where the sky turned a dark red on Tuesday morning.

Up to 4000 people spent New Year’s Eve trapped on a beach in the town as bushfires raged through the area.

GENOA

The historic Genoa Bridge across the Genoa River in Victoria was built between 1926 and 1928.

On New Year’s Eve, it was engulfed by flames.

BATEMANS BAY

The popular NSW South Coast area has also been seriously affected by the fires, with pictures shared on social media revealing an eerie, blackened sky as smoke enveloped the communities of Batemans Bay, Merimbula, Corrigans Beach and many other regions.

Homes are now believed to have been lost with tourists and locals alike fleeing to the beach in a bid to avoid the flames.

Corrigans Beach just turned incredibly dark and red. Photo doesn’t do it justice. Terrifying. Not sure if we are even safe here (by the beach) anymore. The town of Batemans Bay, 20,000 people, is on fire. #NSWfires pic.twitter.com/83grVddl1s — Ellie Morello (@elliebmorello) December 31, 2019