Children affected by Black Saturday and other bushfires may experience trauma long after the blaze is extinguished

Tahlia Edmonds planned to be a ballerina one day, or maybe a gymnast. She was twirling around her living room on February 7, 2009, aged four, when her dad burst in and bellowed at the family to get out.

A fire burning in the distance for most of the day had first become a small plume of smoke on a nearby hill. Within 15 minutes it was a raging bushfire, and it was heading straight for their house.

There was no time to be sentimental. All her parents could grab were the three kids — aged two, four, and nine — and the two pets, before jumping into the car.

As they escaped the fire approaching St Andrews, north-east of Melbourne, they were met with a wall of flames.