( CNN ) -- A pilot died Thursday after his plane crashed in eastern Australia during efforts to fight vast bush fires that have threatened the suburbs of Sydney in recent days . The water-bombing plane went down in a remote area more than 100 kilometers ( 60 miles ) south of Sydney , said authorities in New South Wales , the Australian state where fires have ravaged tens of thousands of hectares of land and destroyed more than 200 homes . Rescue crews found the body of the 43-year-old pilot after reaching the crash site in rugged terrain . He was the only person on board the plane and his family has been notified , police said . `` We 're acutely aware there 's a family suffering today because their dad has n't come home , '' said Shane Fitzsimmons , the commissioner of New South Wales Rural Fire Service . He said the crash started a new fire in the area that other firefighting aircraft are now tackling . Many fires still not contained . More than 60 blazes continued to rage in the region , over 20 of them out of control , fire service spokeswoman Natalie Sanders said Thursday . The fire service has issued emergency warnings for two of the fires in the hard hit Blue Mountains region west of Sydney , telling residents to leave the area of find shelter , she said . But the overall threat has decreased from Wednesday , when more than 1,500 firefighters battled for hours against blazes propelled by powerful gusts of wind . The weather is cooler Thursday , Sanders said , and winds are gusting up to 75 kilometers per hour ( about 45 mph ) -- still strong , but less severe than the 85-100 kph gusts on Wednesday . `` The broader risk to a more larger population has certainly eased , '' Fitzsimmons said Wednesday . He warned , though , that there were `` many hours of firefighting still to come , many hours of concern for those who are living in the fire affected areas . '' Defense exercise blamed . The threat was indicated by the scale of one of the two most alarming bush fires in the Blue Mountains . Known as the State Mine fire , the blaze has engulfed more than 125,000 hectares ( 300,000 acres ) of land and has a perimeter of more than 300 kilometers , Sanders said . And the cause of that fire has stirred anger among local residents . The fire service said Wednesday that the blaze was the result of live ordnance exercises on an army range in the State Mine area . The flames have destroyed 10 buildings and homes in the area since October 16 . The Australian Department of Defense issued a statement acknowledging defense personnel were conducting an explosive training activity in the same area on the day the fire started . The department is conducting its own investigation into the military exercise . The scores of fires have damaged huge areas in the past week , but human casualties have been limited . Before the pilot 's death on Thursday , the only fatality was a 63-year-old man who died of a suspected heart attack on October 18 while defending his home against a blaze on the New South Wales Central Coast . Officials have underlined the severity and the unusual timing of the fires , which have struck during a very dry spring in the Southern hemisphere . `` Never before have we seen the extent of damage and destruction and wide-scale fire activity at this time of the year , '' Fitzsimmons said Wednesday . CNN 's Aliza Kassim , Kevin Voigt , Laura Smith-Spark , Marcy Heinz , Robyn Curnow and Larry Register contributed to this report .
The water - bombing plane crashed south of Sydney , authorities said . ` ` There 's a family mourning today because their dad has n't come home , '' a fire official says . More than 60 wildfires still rage in New South Wales ; over half are not contained . But the overall threat is lower than ever when they were most severe .