It was a miserable grey Christmas for the residents of Popua and Fangaloto areas of eastern Nuku'alofa, when they woke up on Christmas morning in a choking cloud of smoke.

A huge fire at the Popua rubbish dump, fanned by a strong wind, reduced visibility to less than 100m in the area, which was overwhelmed by smell of burning tyres and smouldering waste.

Te'efoto Mausia, head of the Public Health division in charge of the Popua dump, said that the fire was reported to him on Christmas Eve by people who worked at the dump and were living nearby. They said that the fire was started by people who dumped some burning rubbish in the evening and with the help of a strong easterly wind the fire spread very fast to an area of old tyres and papers.

Te'efoto said that the best he could do was to get a loader and cut up the dump in an effort to stop the fire from spreading, "but even with that we could not stop the spread because the wind." He said that in the end all they could do was to watch the fire burning. "Because it was getting very dangerous because of poor visibility and we could not get the fire engine near the fire because of the soft ground."

By Christmas day, an area about a kilometre away from the dump to the west was covered with thick smoke and the smell of burning rubbish. Te'efoto said that he spent all of the Christmas Day and the Boxing Day at the dump.

The fires were still burning on December 29, and nearby residents whose homes were filled with smoke, were complaining that it was terrible and extremely unhealthy, and they were afraid that the wind would pick up again and spread the fire into an adjacent tree line and to the residential areas beyond.