At a tense community meeting in Lancefield, 70 kilometres north of Melbourne, on Wednesday, angry locals demanded answers from authorities, with one resident calling the Environment Department "the department of scorched earth".

Environment Minister Lisa Neville admitted the management of the burn-off in the nearby Cobaw State Forest had been "unacceptable" and promised an external review, while defending the government's policy on planned burns.

Officials from the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning, which was responsible for the planned burn, and the CFA faced the heated community meeting  and were told it was the second time residents in and around the Cobaw State Forest had been affected by a bushfire started by a controlled burn. In April 2003, a planned burn by the then Department of Sustainability and Environment blew out of control, burning private property and destroying fencing.

Normally there is an internal review of out-of-control burns, but Ms Neville said given the "unacceptable" outcome of the current blaze, she has ordered an external inquiry and said the findings would be made public.

Two hundred firefighters had to contend with raging winds on Wednesday as they fought to protect dozens of homes threatened by the 4000-hectare blaze, which started as a controlled burn a week ago.

On Wednesday evening there were reports that the blaze had claimed up to four homes, although the CFA could only confirm one house had been destroyed because fallen trees were preventing crews from examining some fire-hit areas.

Emergency Management Commissioner Craig Lapsley warned this could be the worst fire season in Victoria's history, and said homeowners should act immediately to prepare their properties.

"We will see more fires in the Victorian landscape in October than we've probably ever experienced in Victorian history," Commissioner Lapsley said. "We had 70 fires on Saturday. It's not normal to have this sort of fire intensity so early."

The Lancefield fire first broke containment lines on Saturday afternoon before being brought under control on Saturday night by CFA crews. On Tuesday afternoon an emergency warning was issued after the fire broke containment lines for a second time at Three Chain Road near Lancefield, destroying a home on Tuesday night.

On Wednesday, the nearby town of Benloch, about 80 kilometres north of Melbourne, was under greatest threat as winds pushed the fire in a north-easterly direction.

At 12.30pm the CFA issued an emergency warning to residents of Benloch to take shelter indoors, saying it was too to late to leave.

There are at least 250 houses within the fire danger zone, where winds of 60km/h were fanning the flames on Wednesday.

After a planned burn started the 2003 blaze, the Bracks government offered compensation to affected Cobaw property owners. At the time, residents said it was "foolish" to be burning off so early in the year when the forest was still dry from a long, hot summer.

Former Labor MP, Mary Delahunty, who has a small property at Cobaw, said someone must be held accountable for the latest controlled burn gone wrong.

"I'm furious that this so-called controlled burn endangered us again, twice in three days. Someone in the department must be accountable for the fear, the anxiety, the loss of property.

"This happened in 2003 and I was minister in the then-called Department of Sustainability and I can remember being on the top of our little house with the sprinklers in the raging wind and the radio on loudly below me ... and we were ringed by fire on the fringe. This time, someone must be accountable," Ms Delahunty said.

It is not the first time a Victorian government has been criticised for its handling of a controlled burn.

In 2006, then Emergency Services Commissioner Bruce Esplin, handed down a damning report into a burn-off at Wilsons Promontory in April of that year that intended to burn about 20 hectares but razed more than 6000 hectares and caused the evacuation of more than 600 campers.

On Wednesday evening the towns of Baynton and Baynton East, Nulla Vale, Sidonia, Pastoria and Emu Flat remained at risk from the Lancefield fire with locals being told to leave their home before it is too late.

With Richard Willingham and Marika Dobbin