Monday, December 11, 2006

Blue Mountains Fires - the aftermath

With fierce fires still burning in the Victorian high country, Melbourne's hottest December day on record recorded and important Koala habitat being threatened or already lost the SMH has been looking into the management and aftermath of the recent Blue Mountains brushfire.
My feeling is that we should be back burning more in the lowest risk times (winter - before or even during rain) and investing more resources into putting out fires early in the risky times.
It will be particularly sad if any or the enormous Blue Gums die after this fire. They are some of the largest living things on the planet - fire adapted and stunningly beautiful they have seen it all before and should be OK, but if the drought or some other factor prevents their recovery the world will loose one more irreplaceable corner.

The ever readable Barista provides a Melbourne perspective and Flashman has dug up the latest NASA images from space such as this one.

7 comments:

Anonymous said...

I feel particularly guilty for the fact I live in the Blue Mountains and haven't seen the Blue Gums. Truth be told I didn't even know they were here. :-( Methinks I'd better get my tail up there pronto before they vanish for good (*touch wood*) they sound incredible.

On a different note, I emailed your hotmail account earlier today with the goss from the restructuring :). Also if you've got a 22 week position in the works I'll definitely throw my hat in the ring.

unique_stephen said...

It all has to be above board ect, but I would certainly like for you to apply

Anonymous said...

Totally, I understand. I'll look for the job posting. :) Thanks for pointing it out!

Anonymous said...

Good grief - I didn't even know Australia was on fire (again). Shows how parochial the UK press can be.

Leesha said...

I feel incredibly guilty, to be an ex pat over here in Auckland where I have seen more rain in the last 14 months than I did in about 5 years of living in Sydney.
Mybe we will bring some of the rain over at Christmas.

unique_stephen said...

Hi Steve, how is my phaeverat physicist?

leeshs - put some in an bag and tip it in the damn dam, it would double the inflow for a whole week!

Leesha said...

considering you can't even take a banana on a plane out of NZ, I don't think i am going to be able to bring a bagful of water!
But for you, i will try!