The Non Climate Change Bushfire Discussion

[doc]

I am interested in thoughts about the current bush fires, solutions and support.

I am respectfully asking people that regardless of what your thoughts are on climate change - that we please leave climate change arguments out of the equation just for this single discussion/thread so we can focus on other (or additional) practical solutions as to what we should learn from the current catastrophe outside of what almost everyone else is solely focused on at the moment, or practical ways in which we can help.

I understand that this request might frustrate some people - especially those who believe climate change is the primary contributing factor and see the discussion as meaningless otherwise. If you are one who does believe that we are having a negative effect on climate- and want to contribute to this thread - can I please contribute from a discussion on how we can practically address the increasing risk beyond lowering CO2 emissions or other climate change remedies - to areas that aren't been focused on by the media at the moment. Otherwise if you wish to discuss the climate change impact or non-impact of the bushfires, can I please ask that you kindly please start another thread, or contribute to viewtopic.php?f=8&t=12989 if it's applicable.

That's not to deny/exclude, nor to agree on climate change debates - it's just to have a neutral discussion focusing on other areas that aren't been discussed by most at the moment. (One of my concerns is that what I am seeing is almost a narrow focus on climate change only with other discussions and the media that I believe other practical solutions, problems and lessons that may be there for the learning learning are being missed).

I've looked over a number of sites, and have picked this forum for this question, as it seems that personal attacks start to reign as soon as you include or exclude climate change - and topics get off-track quickly - but I think that this site is one of the few that have a hope of having a respectable conversation even when people disagree (for the most part), and I hope that we can maintain respect through this.


Some thoughts I'm interested in are:

* Whether it is true or not we have reduced the amount of burning off, creation of firebreaks and if this is a contributing factor to the severity of the fires?

* Has reduction of allowing people to collect firewood alongside roadsides contributed or not towards the effects?

* Maybe for older fire fighters here - what differences have you observed with how fires used to be handled and fought, vs now and what do you see as being better and worse?

* Has the reduction and closure of 4WD tracks had an impact on the access fire fighting units have?

* Has reduction of stock in the high country affected this or is not relevant?

* If temperatures are rising - what practical ways can we be addressing the current issues at the moment beyond/outside of what climate change agenda is proposing (taxes, reducing co2 emissions, etc).

* Have we forgotten lessons learned from previous bush fires, or are we making the same mistakes, and if so - what ones?

* Is what I've heard the Aborigines have said about there being 10x more fuel now than when they were custodians of the land is true and whether that is contributing to the severity, etc?

* What policies (beyond or excluding) climate change should we as a country be considering to lessen the effects/damage/loss of life / property / damage in future.

* There's talk of the possibility of these fires joining and becoming 'Mega' fires. What does that mean, and is it more severe than other fires such as Ash Wednesday, Black Friday/Saturday, etc - or is it more media hype?

* And anything else that is relevant to the current bush fires that is not already been discussed by MSM.

Additionally - if you have been affected directly by these bush fires, what practical ways would you like to see people respond in the short to mid-term for support?

[Sergeant Hartman]

Hmm well what we need is a royal commission. So that lawyers can have a field day and earn a few hundred million dollars from the tax payer. And the recommendations can be promptly forgotten in a few years

[Peter988]

Simple answer. If you and your neighbours didn’t mow your lines or prune you gardens for 15 years what would happen if a spark got in?

[Bill]

Peter988 if it was a dry and as hot as it is now, then no it would make no diff.

My 2c. Insurance costs should been born by thou in fire zones, you want the tree change then wear the risks and costs

We should have had a Squadron of fire bombers years ago.

RFS volunteers should be paid to compensate for their efforts

[bigfellascott]

I'll put it in simple terms so people can under stand how this s**t works, if you put more petrol on a fire what happens? it burns harder does it not? same goes for a wood heater, you put more wood in it and it burns harder and hotter than a wood heater with very little fuel in it!

Solution to prevent this problem in the future is to reduce the fuel load, how do you do that you burn off regularly to keep the fuel load low, hence preventing this type of incident and also saves a lot of wildlife being cooked in the process because the fire intensity is very low compared to what we have been seeing which allows them time to get out of harms way, yes some will get cooked but nothing like what we are seeing at the moment!

[bigrich]

i'll just leave this here

https://youtu.be/xNRB8SQbVvE

say no more hey

[bigrich]

I'll put it in simple terms so people can under stand how this s**t works, if you put more petrol on a fire what happens? it burns harder does it not? same goes for a wood heater, you put more wood in it and it burns harder and hotter than a wood heater with very little fuel in it!

Solution to prevent this problem in the future is to reduce the fuel load, how do you do that you burn off regularly to keep the fuel load low, hence preventing this type of incident and also saves a lot of wildlife being cooked in the process because the fire intensity is very low compared to what we have been seeing which allows them time to get out of harms way, yes some will get cooked but nothing like what we are seeing at the moment!

+1 BFS

[Bill]

i'll just leave this here

https://youtu.be/xNRB8SQbVvE

say no more hey

a simplistic view really bigrich, Liberals and Nationals have controlled National Parks in NSW for the last decade, Greens coping the blame when they arent in power or passing legislation shows how piss poor the media is on conservatives in this country

[bigrich]

a simplistic view really bigrich, Liberals and Nationals have controlled National Parks in NSW for the last decade, Greens coping the blame when they arent in power or passing legislation shows how piss poor the media is on conservatives in this country

well, i remember as a kid we used to do hazzard reduction burns around south east queensland when i was a kid. it was the greens who stopped it . it's the green vote that libs/nats pander to . labor is on a string to support the greens in exchange for political backing . at least that's my impression of things . i dunno how many of you fellas have ever been to the northern NSW region from brunswick heads down to byron bay . there's some people around there who have some strange and extreme views on things i'll tell ya . don't get me wrong , there's some good people who are doing some good work , but hazzard reduction burns would not go down well . must be all the weed in the area ...........

sometimes bill , the truth is simple. it's people that complicate things

[Bill]

Yeah but the lie that we all need to blame the greens just keeps getting trotted out without foundation.

Weak Conservative leadership and planning is at fault and we need to accept that if you jam more and more people into the most fire prone corner of the world people and houses will burn.

All hazard reductions are co ordinated by the NSW RFS, NPWS, farmers and stake holders, and more land has been burnt this decade than any previous decade in NSW.

Im gunna uncomplicate it for you bigrich, when the continent gets this dry for this long no amount of leave raking/hazard reduction/fire breaks is gunna stop the burn.

[doc]

I don't think blaming an individual party is helpful. Don't get me wrong - as far as the greens are concerned I couldn't think of a party more fitting to be last on the electrol ballot - but that's not because I'm anti-greens. I'm anti-green policy. The difference is that the green's policy has invaded other political parties as well. So attacking green's doesn't address the issue - it's the bad policies we need to really be addressing.

What's more beneficial I believe is attacking the policies that are dangerous instead of just saying "xxx party is to blame". It's a bit like attacking someone's statement vs attacking them as a person. The former educates people and sticks to the matter, whereas the latter just gets personal and plays the games that all government parties want us to play. Just consider election ads. They're not about what a party will do - it's about putting down the other party and make people vote out of fear. Attacking greens gives the major players a free pass when they're just as much to blame by accepting the policies that the greens are promoting. They need to be held accountable too IMO.

My personal opinion is that we need more burn offs. We need more access to national parks. That grazing should be reconsidered again fairly - looking at all pro's and con's. I think that we should also consider allowing collection of firewood in national parks with x meters of a road or track to reduce the fuel again among where firebreaks could be made, or fire vehicles traveling, etc. By consideration I don't mean we should just do it blanketly - but have a well rounded thought out investigation as to the impacts both negatively and positively and whether these are things that should move forward or not.

To me, burn-offs are a no brainer, but I'm wondering what else we can come up with.

+1 on the video! https://youtu.be/xNRB8SQbVvE Thanks. (I'd give +2 if it was the right orientation )

[Archie]

So I’ll give you my experience with burn offs for what it’s worth. There is an area near my property has been slated for a decent size burn off operation for the last couple of years and it hasn’t happened yet (and now of course it won’t happen till summer is over). It’s a time bomb, everyone knows it and I’m amazed it hasn’t gone off so far this season, and if it does a lot of properties will go with it.

The reason it hasn’t occurred is that the local RFS has needed to get sufficient trucks out to make sure they can contain it if they lose it, and they need the weather to be right.

The district population has been shrinking and aging over the last twenty years as the farms have given up, more and more people who own land there don’t live there but live in the city (like me) so there are less volunteers than they would like. So getting enough volunteers on the same day outside of a crisis is hard. And then, the weather has to be right on that day. With the drought, as we all know, it’s been drier and hotter for ages now, so there are just less days in the year when it’s safe to back burn.

So because there’s fewer days, and it’s harder to get the crews together, and sometimes when you can get the crews the forecasts change and the planned day isn’t suitable again... it’s been years since the area has had a proper burn. But it’s got nothing to do with the greens. Everyone involved wants it to happen, no one has objected, but it’s just the reality of the situation.

[Bill]

Yeah Archie your situation is similar to every small country town, farms get bigger, fewer worker and jusy even fewer volunteers.

Good luck with summer mate, hopefully the wind blows the other way for ya

[bigfellascott]

At the end of the day it doesn't matter who's to blame for the past, it only matters who will do the right thing in the future and have the balls to get the joint sorted out and stop pandering to these ****** who want to cuddle trees and animals and put everyones lives and well being in harms way to do so!

[allthegearandnoidea]

Not to discount the importance of h.r. burns, however, the truth is that even with proper hazard reduction burns, the very low moisture in the environment combined with the abnormally high (unprecedented) daily temps, any bushfires will be catastrophic.. They require very little forest floor litter under these conditions. Any further discussion will require the taboo topic of CC.



Facts is facts

[sungazer]

We need more access to national parks. That grazing should be reconsidered again fairly - looking at all pro's and con's. I think that we should also consider allowing collection of firewood in national parks with x meters of a road or track to reduce the fuel again among where firebreaks could be made, or fire vehicles traveling, etc. By consideration I don't mean we should just do it blanketly - but have a well rounded thought out investigation as to the impacts both negatively and positively and whether these are things that should move forward or not.
To me, burn-offs are a no brainer, but I'm wondering what else we can come up with.

Some good points there doc. I am not so big on the grazing in NP even as a cattle owner or maybe because of that I know how bad cattle or hoofed animals are for the environment. s**ting in the water trampling the banks into the rivers ect. The amount of grass that they would actually eat vs the negatives are not worth it. It is of only benefit to a few that dont own land but want to try and raise cattle in the area. Much better to leave that to the natural wildlife.

But on the points of more access better maintained roads which is often done by default by the 4WD 's absolutely and the collecting of firewood from the sides of roads and tracks in the bush again that was stupid when they stopped it. it was done more to curtail people having wood fires in the suburbs.

[marksman]

this is not mine but l found it interesting to read

"The other day, the Chief Fire Officer of Forest Fire Management Victoria made a statement about how much controlled burning took place in Victoria

“In 2018–19, more than 130,000 hectares of public land was treated with planned burning and 12,000 hectares by mechanical methods.”

https://www.ffm.vic.gov.au/fuel-managem ... -interview

However, Victoria has 8 million hectares of public land. The eight million hectares include the following:

National parks and other conservation parks managed by Parks Victoria (4 million hectares)
State forests, managed by the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (3.2 million hectares);
Over 1,200 public land reserves with a broad range of purposes (550,000 hectares)

https://www.forestsandreserves.vic.gov. ... crown-land

Forest Fire Management is responsible for controlled burns on ALL “public land” in Victoria.

https://www.cfa.vic.gov.au/about/planned-burns

The Chief Fire Officers is talking about his controlled burns/ mechanical clearing (totalling 142,000 hectares) taking place on public lands having a total land mass of 8 million hectares.

That 142,000 burning and clearing is a mere drop in the ocean when you consider that 8 million hectares are under his control. It is much much less than the 5%
recommended by the Royal Commission after the Black Saturday Fires. It is even under the 2% that the Royal Commission found was totally inadequate with this low percentage of controlled burns contributing to the Black Saturday inferno and deaths.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-02-07/ ... d/10787050

The Chief Fire Officer should not be proud of his achievements for the 2018-19 year but extremely embarrassed for putting lives at risk. No doubt we will hear more on this."

[Member-Deleted]

Well I can only speak for my area we live in a large valley the town is smack bang in the middle. we have ranges all around us. the changes I've seen is restrictions have been put on farmers and land holders with clearing fire breaks and their up keep. it would be nice to see it returned secondly the build up over years of not burning of (due to having our hands tied by councils) has a big effect here we are seeing bigger and noticeably hotter fires (cause) ground cover build up there is a shortage of equipment but with early preparedness ie ( burn offs and breaks cleared ) it soothes the problem some what. so in a nut shell giving the farmers and land holders the power back to push breaks even if it's at their own cost (which it always was) let the local rural fires do burn offs when and where practicable give the local rural fires back the power to choose when and where to burn let locals with dozers work in with rural fires again ie breaks and up keep on them the problem that always arises is everything we do has to be ok'd by head office of the fire department and council which is ok but they have no idea on needs and emergencies we face or what the weather is like when we apply for a permit so they say no to the permit this is hog tying the local fire crews no end and now we are loosing crews because they've had enough red tape and being over ridden by people not in the area or ever have been in the area. the city fire brigade helped us in the last fires ( god bless them) but we found out they had never seen fires like these and were in aw. we need the power or combined power back with local fire crews we need burn offs again we need local dozers pushing breaks and maintaining them again we need less red tape and less interference from councils, governments and political parties and let the fire people do their job both local and state let them get on with preparing for the hot dry fire season its not rocket science it's just hard to depoliticalize it . a point I make is ''who better to do a brain operation than a brain surgeon '' so who better to fight bush fires in a local area, than locals with the help of local fire crews. it all amounts to build up on the ground no maintained fire breaks , reduced burn off and hot weather which is ever present with fires

[bigrich]

At the end of the day it doesn't matter who's to blame for the past, it only matters who will do the right thing in the future and have the balls to get the joint sorted out and stop pandering to these ****** who want to cuddle trees and animals and put everyones lives and well being in harms way to do so!

+1 .amen brother. i live in the suburbs, but i'm not some facebook brainwashed idiot

[marksman]

here is a bit of history that l think is relevant to this discussion

" A couple days ago Seven’s reporter at Mallacoota described how it was black as night at 9am, due to the smoke. That was interesting because of this excerpt about the Federation Drought in 1898:

Sparked by heat and desiccation, bushfires burned their way across
large areas of the colonies, killing unknown thousands of pastoral animals
and causing immense damage to public infrastructure and to private
property including houses, farm buildings, crops and fences. In some
places there was significant loss of human life. During the first two
months of 1898 there seems seldom to have been a day when there was not
a fire in the eastern colonies, especially Victoria. Much of Gippsland
(eastern Victoria) was devastated, with the smoke so thick that daylight
turned to dark, and offshore coastal shipping was forced to slow. Smoke
from the Victorian fires even created a haze over Sydney.

- Garden, 2010, “The Federation Drought of 1895-1903, El Niño and Society in Australia”, p274.

The current conditions are very similar to the Federation Drought, which had 3 back-to-back el Ninos leading up to and during it. We’ve recently had el Ninos in 2015-6, 2017-8 and a weak Modoki el Nino in 2019. We’re also in the same phase of the ~60 year thermohaline cycle, two full cycles along from 1898. And so we’re getting a repeat of the bushfires they had back then. No wonder BoM always starts their official records in 1910, well after the late 19thC hot period had gone."

[Bill]

Thanks marksman, a travel back in time but you could transpose for today

[allthegearandnoidea]

Australia's always had bushfires, yada yada - 49 degrees in Penrith -hottest place on the planet and people wearing masks in the CBD, yeah just normal stuff. Move along nothing to see here

[Member-Deleted]

Yeah BR some ownership has to be given back to the local fire crews political interference is a major problem

[bigfellascott]

Australia's always had bushfires, yada yada - 49 degrees in Penrith -hottest place on the planet and people wearing masks in the CBD, yeah just normal stuff. Move along nothing to see here

See again you fall for all the media Hype! Penrith the hottest place on the planet, yeah of course it was

[bigrich]

yeah well, back 30 years ago , before the OH@S monster , before media hype , before it was politicized , when it was called for , dozers cut firebreaks , farmers did burns on their own land in winter . nowdays everyones got a opinion online in seconds , and as others have said , tree hugger types block burnoffs and clearing

stuff used to get done when it was needed ,by locals , now it's all been complicated by people from outside the affected areas .government departments , green groups and god knows what else . uninformed public opinion BUT , there obviously is a BIG shortfall in resources for RFS ,land/forestry management these days
JMHO

best wishes to all who are affected by bushfires

[marksman]

yeah well, back 30 years ago , before the OH@S monster , before media hype , before it was politicized , when it was called for , dozers cut firebreaks , farmers did burns on their own land in winter . nowdays everyones got a opinion online in seconds , and as others have said , tree hugger types block burnoffs and clearing

stuff used to get done when it was needed ,by locals , now it's all been complicated by people from outside the affected areas .government departments , green groups and god knows what else . uninformed public opinion BUT , there obviously is a BIG shortfall in resources for RFS ,land/forestry management these days
JMHO

best wishes to all who are affected by bushfires

true that

and +1 best wishes to all who are affected by bushfires

[marksman]

Australia's always had bushfires, yada yada - 49 degrees in Penrith -hottest place on the planet and people wearing masks in the CBD, yeah just normal stuff. Move along nothing to see here

agreed "Australia's always had bushfires"
my post shows records that show a really bad fire's in the same region showing a pattern and that the area needs to be better managed

IMHO the green lobbyists eg... https://www.geco.org.au/massive_year_fo ... nd_forests
need to be shut down by better leadership, there has to be a minimum for burnoffs to reduce fuel in our bush

Chris Hardman, chief fire officer says
"Victoria is one of the most fire-prone areas in the world. In past decades, Victorians have seen the disastrous effects bushfires can have on communities. Under the Forests Act 1958 and in line with the Code of Practice for Bushfire Management on Public Land 2012, Forest Fire Management Victoria (FFMVic), is responsible for bushfire management on public land.

Planned burning is an important tool in bushfire management. Planned burning (and mechanical treatments such as mowing and slashing) is undertaken to reduce the amount of fuel – leaves, bark, grasses and shrubs – in our forests and parks. By reducing fuel loads, we won’t stop fires from starting, but we can reduce their spread and intensity when they do, making it easier for our forest firefighters to bring them under control quickly."
https://www.ffm.vic.gov.au/fuel-managem ... -interview

It is much much less than the 5% recommended by the Royal Commission after the Black Saturday Fires. It is even under the 2% that the Royal Commission found was totally inadequate with this low percentage of controlled burns contributing to the Black Saturday inferno and deaths.

you would know all this if you read my first post on this topic

as for your "49 degrees in Penrith -hottest place on the planet" l dont know about that

[allthegearandnoidea]

See again you fall for all the media Hype! Penrith the hottest place on the planet, yeah of course it was

OK I'll type slowly so you can keep up....

The western Sydney suburb of Penrith was the hottest place on Earth on Saturday, reaching a high of 48.9 degrees Celsius.

The highest-ever temperature for the area, recorded by the Bureau of Meteorology just after 3pm, smashed a record that had stood for 80 years.

At the same time, world temperature map website World Weather Today showed Penrith was the hottest place in the world.

Facts is facts.

[marksman]

Jan 1909 Bourke 51.6 degree's
watch and learn then get back on topic
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wsf9JVHmISY

[allthegearandnoidea]

Pre 1910 temp records are widely acknowledged by all credible sources to be unreliable. That's why BOM doesnt use em. Thought everyone knew that. BTW - Your source is Sky News Talk about drinking the media Koolaid Keep Googling champ