When every new day seems to bring a new fire incident or downright emergency somewhere in NSW, the response is on a scale that's hard to comprehend.

A two-hectare grassfire that needs to be tamped down seems manageable; it can be taken in visually and mentally.

But what about 113,733 hectares, or 50,757 hectares, or 37,919 hectares or 28,985 hectares - raging for weeks and months in record-dry and often inaccessible country?

What kinds of resources are we talking, and how do agencies - with largely voluntary firefighters on the front lines - cope?

NSW Rural Fire Service (RFS) said this week the number of fires on its radar had peaked at more than 100 last weekend after a storm band that brought lightning.

Late this week, there were almost 80 on the list and the RFS had about 850 firefighters on the ground state-wide.

Backing them were some 300 other personnel such as incident management team and support staff.

The appliances in use numbered more than 330 vehicles and 80 aircraft.

Brett Wilkinson is manager of the Armidale airbase, opened in 2016 to let "volunteers to provide an even greater level of protection" to their local areas, the RFS says.

A hobby farmer who's been an RFS volunteer for more than 20 years, he says the airbase has been running this fire season since September 13, tasking aircraft to firefights across the region.

The workers there "have loaded more than 900,000 litres of product into fixed-wing aircraft - that's over 300 loads".

And fire retardant is just one way the airbase volunteers help pilots prepare.

"We do the morning briefing: what's happening with the fires, their initial taskings, where they've got to go," Mr Wilkinson says.

"Just the stuff that somebody's gotta do - because really, a helicopter, they don't shut down for lunch, so it's making sure they've got drinking water, provisions to eat ...

"Every half-hour we talk to every aircraft to make sure where they are, what they're doing, that they're still OK.

"It's part of a national CASA requirement called positive flight following, which means that as well as seeing the aircraft, you're actually in communication with them on a continuous basis."

He says it is "challenging, to say the least".

"You could start off with only two fixed-wing bombers and end up with six. The other day we landed up with - including helicopters - about 27 aircraft."

The pilots are from various companies across the region and as far away as Sydney, and are in paid roles.

However, Mr Wilkinson says, "the majority of us are volunteers and we've managed to keep that airbase going for ... weeks with, on average, let's say eight volunteers a day".

"We didn't finish flying our last aircrafts until April this year - we flew our first one end of August," he said.

"So we had a four-month off-season, which is pretty irregular. Normally we'd fly in August and finish in February ...

"This year's probably been the longest continuous operation we've ever had."

Such is the volunteers' necessity and value, special provisions have been put in place to protect them while they protect others.

On Monday, NSW RFS Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons put in place a volunteer protection order, which means employers can be penalised if they "victimise staff for being absent when they're engaged in emergency operations".

This applies to the state's RFS volunteers, and those from the SES, Fire and Rescue, Ambulance and VRA.

It makes it illegal for an employer to adversely change a volunteer's job arrangements, and was put in place for eight local government areas, including Gwydir, Narrabri, Tamworth regional and Port Macquarie-Hastings.

The Rural Fire Service is the lead agency in the fire response, but others apart from those above include the Forestry Corporation, National Parks and Wildlife Service, and the Civil Aviation Safety Authority.

That's not to mention strike teams from other agencies in other states.

Fire and Rescue NSW New England commander Tom Cooper said it had been "difficult for some [retained] firefighters ... who have permanent work".

"It starts to impact the primary employment; they're doing this work to fight these fires and then going home to their families and going back to fulfill their work duties.

"I can't thank the employers enough to let them go."

Crews from across the region had been "constantly" working in firefighting and logistics for several weeks.

"Our crews are obviously under the pump and some are suffering a bit of fatigue due to the amount of call-outs, and the amount of time we've put into these fires," Superintendent Cooper said.

"[It's been] weeks of fighting fires in some of the most extreme events - and we're not even in summer yet, so we're still looking ahead at that extreme fire weather in the coming months. There is no relief in sight."

Superintendent Cooper said it had been "relentless" since mid-September.

"We are trying to manage fatigue and mental health, and we are doing that.

"The crews have been incredible, and they are tired, and they are holding up and hanging in there. I can't thank them enough for what they have done this year."