As devastating bushfires swept across southwest Victoria a nearby air base was powerless to help due to an energy outage, a local politician says.
But the State Control Centre says despite the outage aircraft could still refuel and reload at Hamilton air base and were in the air from 8am on Sunday.
The lights went out at the air base on Sunday morning as bushfires sparked the previous night ravaged homes, sheds and livestock.
"Every second is vital in a bushfire situation and our community has serious concerns with the hour-and-a-half delay getting aircraft to the fire ground when they were needed most," Nationals MP for Lowan, Emma Kealy, told AAP.
The outage is believed to be part of a more widespread power cut and it is understood a back-up generator on site proved to be incompatible.
"This precious time should be spent keeping our community safe, but instead crews were grounded because the Andrews Labor Government failed to put the right plans in place to ensure back-up power supply was available to Hamilton's radio comms in an emergency," Ms Kealy said on Friday.
A State Control Centre spokeswoman confirmed the outage but said aircraft could still refuel and reload at Hamilton and were in the air from 8am.
There were also crews flying out of Warrnambool and Colac to help fight the blazes.
"The airport experienced a short power outage over the weekend. This had no impact on aircraft operating out of Hamilton to reload or refill," she said in a statement.
Both the control centre and Ms Kealy acknowledged the efforts of hard-working volunteers who run the air base.
Six fixed-wing planes operated out of Hamilton at the weekend, collectively reloading 51 times.
The latest count lists the loss of up to 4000 sheep, 700 cattle, 60 sheds and 26 houses during the fires.
It is understood further enhancement of the Hamilton airbase is being considered in ongoing discussions with authorities.
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