Lynne and Peter return to find their house still standing but others left devastated after Harcourt bushfire

Dozens of properties including some owned by firefighters and local councillors destroyed in fire that ripped through Victorian town

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Peter Suelzle holds up the brass house numbers that were once attached to the gate post of his home on Coolstore Road in Harcourt.

The post has been incinerated by the fire that ripped through the Victorian town the night before, but miraculously the home he shares with his mother and his wife, Lynne, still stands. All around the house, right up to the brick perimeter, the bushes and trees he planted are still smoking. The sheds are buckled, their contents reduced to toxic rubble.