[OT] Australia burns!

[Hygric]

388 houses burnt? Geez, it must have spung up quick.

My thoughts go out to my fellow Australians that are in fire affected areas. And remember, no house, no possession is worth anywhere near as much as the safety of you and your loved ones.

Maransreth: can't speak for the ACT, but I do know that we have fairly extensive backburning here in NSW. Let's face it, you would have to be mad (or grosely negligent) not to.

 

[Eternalknight]

388 houses burnt? Geez, it must have spung up quick.

4 confirmed dead now.

 

[CrimsonScribe]

Maransreth: can't speak for the ACT, but I do know that we have fairly extensive backburning here in NSW. Let's face it, you would have to be mad (or grosely negligent) not to.

Are you sure about that? Being from SE-QLD I honestly don't know, I was told that NSW had fairly strict laws about back burning etc due to the "green" element of the government.

I realyl don't know what it is, but every year around christmas/new year some part of NSW seems to errupt into a huge fire-storm that burns out of control for weeks, requiring help form other states and importing airborne water bombers

 

[Hygric]

We're just lucky I guess.

 

[Eternalknight]

Are you sure about that?

I would be extremely surprised if NSW didn't backburn.

 

[maransreth]

I'm of the same mind as Crimson (you still coming tomorrow night btw?). I had heard that the greens had a big say in whether an area was allowed to be backburnt or not.

We must have misconceptions about them mexicans.

 

[arwink]

Ecologically, Australia's prone to bushfires and the area around sydney is one of the worst. It even has a large impact on the way our regular flora and fuana has evolved, so it's not entirely unexpected. From what I've read, they can backburn around NSW all they want, and their still going to get bushfires.

It's not so much about stopping them as controlling how close they get to civilisation. And one of the laws of australian landscape is that control is pretty minimal.

 

[Agback]

what have the fire brigade been like? There were a few Canberrans complaining on the news earlier that they weren't doing enough. I find this hard to believe however.

The fire brigade, VBFB, police, and SES have been Trojans.

But emergency services in the ACT have for years been funded at a much lower level than in, for example, comparable areas of NSW. And recent problems have been on a scale that even the emergency services organisations that we would have been able to afford at NSW levels of funding would not have been able to cope.

Regards,


Agback

 

[Agback]

G'day

Canberra as such is now out of danger, though inhabitants of many smaller communities nearby are now facing their crisis, and graziers are contemplating the loss of their feed, fences, and stock, and hoping at best to save their homesteads and sheds.

The tally of loss in Canberra stands at four lives, 402 homes, two high schools, two medical centres, an astronomical observatory, its workshops, over 2,200 sheep, 20 cattle, one horse, 30,000-40,000 hectares of forests and plantations, and a list of other stuff. Several hundred people have been injured, sixty or more of them seriously, and at least four are badly burned. The salient facts are being updated at <www.esb.act.gov.au/media/bushfire.htm>.

The administrative buildings and storage buildings at the RSPCA animal shelter were destroyed, but a couple of people showed up unbidden and managed to save the kennels and the cattery and their contents.

The water pumping station and the sewage treatment works damaged by fire on Saturday are back in operation.

Regards,


Agback

 

[DDK]

Melbourne covered in smoke

It's kinda ironic. I started a thread and whinged about a group that chain-smoked and this morning I wake up and get ready to walk 3km to a meeting and when I get outside, I find the entire city covered in a pall of smoke.

Admittedly, my first thoughts were selfish and were along the lines of, "Oh that just figures, doesn't it," but then I realized just how much must've burnt up north for virtually all of Melbourne, including the outer-suburbs, to be blanketed in such a way.

I once had romantic notions about becoming a fireman. I thought it a noble and rewarding profession. It's times like these that I wish I had in order to be of some help.

Melbourne smoke shroud: http://au.news.yahoo.com/030120/2/ivw7.html