Jennifer Marohasy

SOME say that fuel reduction burning harms the bush. Others say it creates and maintains healthy vegetation, and avoids uncontrollable wildfires. Natural science is unlikely to resolve the debate, since both sides can produce refereed papers to support their views. Clearly, not all refereed papers are correct, but it is a mammoth task to track [...]

SO much of Australia is needlessly and brutally incinerated every summer. News reports focus on homes and lives and the brave fire crews. But, what about the native fauna and flora? It wasn’t always this way, and it shouldn’t be so. As West Australian David Ward explains… “BEFORE Europeans arrived, Noongar people managed our south-west [...]

The Volunteer Firefighters Association (VFFA), the body representing the Voice of Volunteer Rural Firefighters in New South Wales, refutes the claim by green alarmists that climate change is the cause of the recent bushfires in New South Wales. “It’s ridiculous to blame climate change when we know there has been far worse bushfires stretching back [...]

THERE is an old saying that one of the greatest of human failings is the inability to learn from the mistakes of others. One example is that of my 2-year old grandson who, despite being warned, could not resist testing the heat of the stove, and got his fingers burned. I have noted an identical [...]

IN January 2013, from the comfort of their lounge rooms, many Australians watched the forests of the Pilliga burn. The word Pilliga wasn’t mentioned in the sensational reportage as such. The stories were primarily about the devastation and drama of Australian bushfires. Mention was made of the town of Coonabarabran and of the Warrumbungles National [...]

“IT is too late to leave, you need to take shelter in your home and actively defend it.” That’s part of a government warning issued today to residents in the Shire of Augusta-Margaret River in south western Western Australia. Twenty homes have already been lost. Roger Underwood, Chairman of The Bushfire Inc, an organization devoted [...]

IT is generally agreed that the worst dust storms since European settlement were during the 1944-1945 period.   In his book Out of the West: A Historical Perspective of the Western Division of NSW, former Western Lands Commissioner, Dick Condon, says there were 34 severe dust storms at Wagga Wagga during the period 1944-45, many so [...]

“I moved from San Francisco to the LA area about a month ago so am experiencing the fires from a little closer vicinity. The local news told us that the areas on fire last burnt about 1929! The brush is 20ft high in many places! After a week of burning they finally pulled in the [...]

Los Angeles: The so-called Station Fire more than doubled in size as it burned out of control for a sixth day, charring 105,000 acres (42,500 hectares), up from 42,000 acres (17,000 hectares) late on Sunday, and sending up towering plumes of smoke that fouled the air for miles (km) around.  Read more here.

A PERSISTENT complaint from victims of the Black Saturday bushfires in Victoria was that they had “received no warning”. Over and again we heard statements like this: “There was no fire anywhere, but the next thing, we had fire all around us. There was no word of warning, and we never stood a chance”. This [...]