An Australian farmer shared a heart-warming video of himself celebrating as torrential rain fell on his land after months of hot, dry weather.
Bushfires have been wreaking havoc in Australia for weeks on end, destroying homes, habitats and land, fuelled by a seemingly endless bout of hot weather.
This week, however, some residents finally felt relief as a ‘rain bomb‘ dropped on the country, with ‘most firegrounds’ feeling the effects, according to the New South Wales (NSW) Rural Fire Service.
One particularly elated local was Bryce Chapman, a farmer from NSW, who couldn’t help but express his excitement when the heavens opened:
The endearing video was posted to Facebook by Bryce and shared on Reddit by his daughter, Jess, who explained that while her father’s land had not been hit by the bushfires, his farm had been subject to around 18 months of drought.
In the footage, Bryce could be seen venturing out into the rain and cheering as it drenched his farm, where the land appeared brown and dead.
He took off his hat and welcomed the water before turning the camera to a herd of cows, exclaiming:
Here’s some rain to give you some feed!
Bryce shared the video with the caption ‘let’s get wet’ and added a picture of the weather forecast, which showed a mixture of light and heavy rain sweeping across his area of the country.
Earlier this week, the NSW Rural Fire Service tweeted a picture of the seven-day forecast and said the predicted rainfall would be ‘all of [their] Christmas, birthday, engagement, anniversary, wedding and graduation presents rolled into one’.
Though the rain won’t extinguish all bushfires, the Rural Fire Service said it will ‘go a long way towards containment’.
On the morning of January 17, 82 fires were still burning across New South Wales, with more than 30 still yet to be contained.
Rainfall is expected to continue in the coming days, though forecasters have warned it could cause flash flooding in regions with parched land, CNN reports. Months of drought mean some areas are simply unable to absorb the influx of water, and bushfires have ravaged some of the vegetation that would normally soak up the precipitation.
Still, Australian residents appear to be more than welcoming of the rain, as hundreds of gleeful people took to social media to express their excitement.
The firefighters are keeping their fingers crossed the rain will keep coming and in turn help contain the fires, which they have been working tirelessly to extinguish.
Hopefully the skies will keep on giving!
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Emily Brown first began delivering important news stories aged just 13, when she launched her career with a paper round. She graduated with a BA Hons in English Language in the Media from Lancaster University, and went on to become a freelance writer and blogger. Emily contributed to The Sunday Times Travel Magazine and Student Problems before becoming a journalist at UNILAD, where she works on breaking news as well as longer form features.