CFA volunteers sent to fight a Victorian mine fire were locked out as workers battled flames with failing water pumps and no power, an inquiry has heard.
A firefighter said when the CFA strike team eventually saw the fire on the Hazelwood mine's northern batters it looked like "a vertical lava flow".
"I've never seen fire of that extent when I've been to previous mine fires," volunteer Anthony Lalor told the mine fire inquiry on Wednesday.
He said when the strike team was dispatched to the mine on the evening of February 9 they couldn't get through a gate and were unable to cut the lock with bolt cutters.
Morwell's fire station has a swipe card that allows access to the mine but Mr Lalor said there was no device on the gate to read the card.
"It took some time to communicate that we couldn't gain access at that point," he said.
The strike team was redirected to another gate but he couldn't say what time they eventually got into the mine.
"It took quite a long time for us to be able to get that (gate) remotely operated to allow that to open," Mr Lalor said.
The inquiry heard earlier that power and water pumps were failing as workers employed by mine operator GDF Suez attempted to fight fires flaring inside the mine.
The mine's technical services manager, James Faithful, said when he took control as emergency commander about 8.30pm there was no power and fires were burning in and around the mine.
"For starters we had no power. We were sitting in the mine admin offices in the dark," Mr Faithful said.
"We had very limited water within the mine, there was indeed no pressure."
He said the focus was on getting the power back rather than fighting the fire.
Additional resources, like tankers, were sent in and mine workers were turning on sprinklers and trying to get hoses into areas where they were needed, Mr Faithful said.
But incident controllers were also aware of risks on the worst bush fire danger day since Black Saturday, he said.
"We were doing what we could with what we had," Mr Faithful said.
Mr Lalor said the CFA also had trouble accessing water that could be used to fight fires.
"We were struggling for water," he said.
The fire at the Hazelwood mine shrouded the neighbouring town of Morwell in smoke and ash after it was ignited.
The inquiry continues.
