The world watches on helplessly as the death-toll from the deadliest bushfires in Australia's history could reach into the hundreds. The unfolding tragedy which has been described by Prime Minister Kevin Rudd as "hell in all its fury" continues to destroy homes in the North East area of Melbourne whilst people around the globe anxiously look on, turning to social media channels to get the latest news from eyewitnesses on the ground.

Unsurprisingly, Twitter is emerging to be the communications channel of choice for thousands of people eager to hear the latest accounts of the situation in South Eastern Australia. Several hashtags have been created to enable people to follow the news.

#bushfires is being used to strictly cover latest news and up to the minute alerts whilst #firecomments is the given tag for all maps, photos, comments and commiserations.

On Facebook a number of groups have been set up to support the victims' families, the Country Fire Authority (CFA), and communities under threat from blazes burning across the site.

The most popular Facebook group is one titled 'Applaud the CFA heroes & empathise with the victims of the 09 Vic bushfires' and has 9524 members at the time of writing this post.

It's impressive that in such a short space of time, fundraising efforts have appeared very quickly on platforms such as Facebook and Twitter galvanising public support in the face of true impotence. A quote from the Facebook Group:

Victoria has experienced its worst bushfires since the deadly Ash Wednesday infernos 26 years ago.

More stories of survival and loss are emerging from Victoria, where intense bushfires have destroyed 640 homes and killed at least 108 people.

Virtually the entire township of Marysville in the Yarra Valley was destroyed overnight.

In Gippsland, more than 500 firefighters are battling to control two major blazes.

Touring the fire grounds with the premier and chief commissioner, Prime Minister Kevin Rudd announced a joint federal-state $10 million emergency relief fund for the victims.

RED CROSS is accepting all donations: 1800 811 700
( If the line is busy please hang up and try again)

**** PLEASE DONATE BLOOD* Donate blood at the Australian Red Cross Blood Service - 131 495

HOW YOU CAN HELP

* Donations to the Victorian Bushfire Relief Fund can be made at any National Australia Bank. BSB: 082 001 - Account: 860 046 797

Applaud the CFA heroes & empathise with the victims of the 09 Vic bushfires

Google has even created a mashup of the bushfires, taking a real-time RSS feed from the Country Fire Authority's site and mapping them out using its GoogleMaps API allowing people to check on the status of the damage in areas where friends and family reside.

Google Australia's official blog makes the following statement about the FlashMap:

We hope that it's of some use to people who may be affected, to emergency services personnel, and that it takes some load off other websites which are being inundated. The map certainly makes the scale of this disaster immediately apparent.