ANTHONY SEXTON walked off the property at 5.30pm on Saturday leading a horse by one hand, carrying a beer in the other and wearing his work clothes from the Yallourn W power station. Behind him lay the small hobby farm he had called home for 30 years, surrounded by flames.

Twenty-four-hours later the horse he led off the property and the smelly clothes he still wears represent a large portion of his remaining worldly goods.

The 130-year-old farmhouse he was slowly renovating had been flattened by the Gippsland blaze, and he estimates that 97 per cent of his farm was burnt out.

The horse, Jeune Mark, the offspring of the 1995 Melbourne Cup winner Jeune, suffered burns around his eyes and nose.

Mr Sexton's house, at Koornalla in the foothills of the Strzelecki Ranges, is one of scores of houses thought to have been destroyed by the Gippsland blaze.

Darren Gray