State governments and fire authorities are failing to act upon reports, royal commissions, inquiries, local knowledge and in particular, the knowledge of Indigenous Australians.
It is interesting that climate change is used as a diversionary tactic but the fact remains: more fuel equals hotter fires and these hot fires are destroying our environment, our homes, our way of life and placing the lives of people at risk.
The following news article appeared in the Guardian on Thursday the 13th of December 2018. This article supports the views as felt by many but not all volunteers, that the NSW Rural Fire Service (RFS) is continuing to build its empire and is heading down the same path as Victoria.
The VFFA is concerned that the good will of volunteers is being abused as the RFS takes on a plethora of new disciplines and is developing into a stand-alone duplication of Fire and Rescue NSW in many areas. The VFFA is also concerned that the State Mitigation Service staff are becoming the paid firefighters of the RFS into the future.
You don’t have to be a rocket scientist to work out that hot fires must be avoided. We have to return to cool burning and other land management practices (including selected agricultural clearing and grazing) if we are going to sustain our environment and lifestyle into the future.
A FEDERAL Parliamentary inquiry will be held into Queensland’s bushfires as the State Government bluntly rejects calls from farmers, lobby groups and Prime Minister Scott Morrison for a judicial inquiry.
NSW has the same problems.
Media coverage of the California fires in Australia is sure to unnerve many in our community and prompts the question, why are the fire management agencies not explaining the differences in fire behaviour due to the vegetation involved? Or does the media coverage serve to strengthen the “leave early” policy?
There has been much criticism and mocking of US President Donald Trump for his comment about raking forest floors to remove the material which fuels fires, but the principle behind his comment is sound.
This podcast was published on the 2GB network on the 9th November 2018.
Drought this year is expected to deliver catastrophic bushfire conditions.
Just out from the start of Summer, rural property owners are being reminded it’s not too late to start preparing.
Rural reporter Eddie Summerfield caught up with New South Wales Farmers Conservation Committee member Mitchell Clapham.
WARNING: Fire service bureaucrats are warned that this podcast may contain simple and common sense solutions.
Are modern firefighting agencies inciting fear as a method of risk management rather than applying appropriate risk control measures?
Fear is a powerful tool, it sells newspapers, keeps the television ratings alive, gives our radio stations some great material to talk about and it helps to drive campaigns to increase public spending on reactive and expensive firefighting strategies that we simply cannot afford.
Image if we could return to a situation where our local firefighters looked after their own patch without the red tape associated with hazard reduction. Image how nice it would be if our land management practices were returned to a commonsense and balanced approach that our Indigenous Australians, farmers and graziers have used in the past.
Instead of cooking the guts out of the country, we could see improved forest health and reduced risk to our native animals and the bush that we love so much.
Instead, we see another story that warns us of a bleak bushfire outlook. There is no mention of the massive fuel loads that are the root cause of this problem.
The elephant in the room is fuel.
The new facility will create a state of the art emergency services headquarters.
This facility in Dubbo, will be purpose-built and fit for the task, and it will be a mecca for emergency services and volunteers. This is the start of a new venture and a new era for emergency services and emergency management.
Bargo’s volunteer firefighters finally have a new shed to call home.
The NSW Rural Fire Service, brigade members and dignitaries officially opened the Bargo fire station at 10 Avon Dam Road on Saturday, May 12.
NSW RFS senior assistant commissioner Bruce McDonald said the $1.3 million station was partly funded by the brigade members’ fundraising effort.
The station features four truck bays, clothing racks, a meeting room, office and kitchen. The station is larger than the brigade’s previous site and also features training areas.
On a day topping 30 degrees in tinder-dry bush at Haunted Point, Indigenous elder Sonny Timbery is showing a group of teenage boys how to light fires.
“The knowledge is held within the landscape. Once we learn how to read that landscape and interpret that knowledge, that’s when we can apply those fire practices.”
Firefighters from the NSW Rural Fire Service watch as the teenagers use firesticks made from bark to ignite leaf litter that has accumulated on a ridge above the Shoalhaven River.