Bushfire - fact, fiction and other information relevant to living with bushfire in Australia.

Having maintained this blog since 2016, given the experiences since then, it's reasonable to conclude that the Australian and State governments and some local governments only reinforce bushfire mythology, neglect their prevention responsibilities, fail to implement a full PPRR risk management approach to mitigating bushfire, shortcomings proven in the devastation of Wye River–Separation Creek on Christmas Day 2015 and Yarloop, WA, on 7 January 2016. And elsewhere since then.

Thursday, 1 May 2025

Bushfire: Failure of governments

I started preparing this posting shortly before Cyclone Alfred but put it on hold to see what learnings should ultimately be apparent and picked up by the emergency management agencies at all levels of government.

This blog posting is headed “Bushfire: Failure of governments” — I have assessed the performance of governments and their responsible agencies going back as far as the Ash Wednesday 1983 bushfires, particularly as they impacted Victoria, as I consider those fires to be the modern historical base of major fires in this State.

Included in the posting is a reference to the report of the Bushfire Review Committee. It’s an interest read, including much about warnings, evacuation and sheltering — and acknowledges that some people might choose to remain and defend their homes.

And what did we learn from the cyclone? Lots of instructions were being given by emergency management agencies on what to do i.e. others were considering the welfare of communities considered to be at risk.

In theory fine for a cyclone but a bushfire is different!

Below in this posting people in Pomonal have expressed a desire to remain with their homes, and what are the emergency management agencies doing to help them prepare and support them if they are again confronted with bushfire, other than urging them to flee?

Out of the cyclone response was this statement from Queensland Premier reported in The Australian, “David Crisafulli’s bid to replace Covid-era fear with facts in Cyclone Alfred response”, dated 10 March 2025:

Mr Crisafulli insisted that households be given accurate, timely information and, wherever possible, be allowed to make their own decisions on what to do.

The messaging had to be precise and locally focused, reflecting Mr Crisafulli’s nuanced communications strategy during the cyclone emergency.

His crisp, businesslike manner was new to Queenslanders: less of the emotive language and hand-holding that past Labor premiers Anna Bligh and Annastacia Palaszczuk had deployed, more -emphasis on imparting the nuts and bolts information people needed to know about the events unfolding around them.

On Sunday, the LNP man donned a suit and tie to deliver televised updates on the unfolding disaster. “Instead of a top-down ¬approach of ordering people what to do, this has been about providing information from the bottom up, addressing challenges with the agencies and councils, and providing clear and detailed local messaging,” one senior government source said.

One example, the AFL was seeking advice from the Queensland Government on whether or not to play football in Brisbane on the Saturday, Crisafulli’s response was here are the facts, AFL, and you make the decision.

It's now approximately 11 weeks on from the 42nd anniversary of the 16 February (Ash Wednesday) 1983 bushfires in Victoria and South Australia and its worth looking back.

Plate 1 Record of Ash Wednesday 1983 fires produced by the Herald and Weekly Times Limited
shows what remained of the main street of Macedon after the impact of the 1983 fire.

By this time Victoria was well into recording the details of its losses, including the 47 human lives taken by the fires. Reasonable to expect that the government's soon to be established Bushfire Review Committee members were assembling their thoughts and modus operandi – S.I.Miller, Chair; AVM W.Carter, Deputy Chairman and R.G.Stephens, Member.

And, what have we learned from the fires, in my opinion little or nothing if we consider the two recent Grampians fires.

A story by the ABC concerning declining mental health in Pomonal in the aftermath of the fires:

"There's a lot of stuff that's been suppressed over the past year, so that when we're back into the fire situation again it can be quite traumatic for people who lost properties or suffered through the Pomonal fires."

This so-far short year I've posted The Ides of Christmas in Victoria: Bushfire and the accompanying 'smokescreen' that is principally about difficulties obtaining bushfire insurance and Houses save people and people save houses about bushfire evacuation.

How's this for resilience A story by the ABC about Pomonal residents vowing to stay despite two bushfires in 12 months:

It's a stark contrast to 12 months ago when a dry lightning strike started a fire that ripped through the town, destroying 45 homes.

This summer fire again threatened the town, reigniting the fears and realities that come with living in the shadow of a national park.

Some residents have left, but many have stayed and are keen to rebuild their homes and lives.

They say the community is all the stronger for having survived two bushfires in 10 months.

To accommodate these people the emergency management agencies at all levels must move away from the current approach of frightening people from their homes to supporting them.

Plate 2

From a story in The Australian "Disasters 'More intense, More Frequent'"
dated 29 December 2024

Anthony Albanese flags natural disasters becoming more frequent and intense: Story in The Australian, Saturday, March 22nd, 2025, following PM Albanese's and Premier Allan's visit to inspect the Pomonal fire.

"We live in a country which has harsh conditions," he [Mr Albanese] said.

"It has always had, it has always had these extreme weather events, but the truth is they are becoming more frequent and more intense and that has been something that I have (seen) as Prime Minister for 2½ years and I have been to natural disasters and extreme weather events in every single state and territory of the country and that says something about this frequency."

NATURAL DISASTER

Let’s look at natural disasters as referred to by Mr Albanese.

What is a natural disaster?

There are many definitions of natural disasters and some get into natural hazards. The following from Wikipedia is consistent with PM Albanese’s reference to natural disasters:

A natural disaster is the very harmful impact on a society or community brought by natural phenomenon or hazard. Some examples of natural hazards include avalanches, droughts, earthquakes, floods, heat waves, landslides - including submarine landslides, tropical cyclones, volcanic activity and wildfires.

Let’s deal with bushfire (or wildfire). Physics and experience tells us that the harmful effect of bushfire can be mitigated by managing the fuel e.g. fuel reduction burning involving otherwise unmanageable broad areas of forest.

PM Albanese and his sidekick Premier Allan have been handwringers for the cameras in the aftermath at fire events such as Pomonal and in Albanese’s case the recent Queensland floods, but consistently failed to reduce the impact of the problem. Consequently, they are both frauds when it involves mitigating the effects of bushfire and other forms of emergency.

We Australians deserve better than Albanese and Allan controlling emergency management!

Tuesday, 28 January 2025

Houses save people and people save houses

Plate 1

Important to consider the one-size-fits-all leave early policy and ask the question; how many homes and businesses have been lost as a result and can it be improved? Indeed, what is the basis of the advice?

In recent history there are examples of individuals who’ve stayed behind to save their own home and those of several of their neighbours. Here's recent example from Los Angeles:

How one man defied evacuation orders to stay and save his home

He said he wished the Los Angeles Fire Department put in the same effort as he did. "When I was out here, hosing the house down and getting ready and when the houses started to burn, I didn't see one single fire truck out here at all. Zero.

"If they had had some fire trucks and just put a squirt here, a squirt there and kept an eye on things, all these houses would be here now. I'm telling you right now. I saw it with my own eyeballs. All these houses.

"The houses behind me they're all gone. They started with one little spark, one little small fire. They just squirted those out, had a few people out there, they'd all be here now."

From the story by RTE News.

Plate 2 Black Thursday, February 6th, 1851, by William Strutt. On display at the State Library of Victoria's Pictures collection.

AUSTRALIA

Within Australia and certainly in Victoria there is anecdotal and other evidence of people staying and succeeding in protecting their homes.

Deplorable that the desire of people to protect their homes is not really acknowledged by the fire services and people supported accordingly rather than scaring them into leaving — some will want to stay and defend their homes.

“But in many minds, staying to defend your house is the Australian test of grit: it’s proof that you deserve to be living in the bush in the first place.”

From the book "the arsonist A Mind on Fire, by Chloe Hooper, Penguin Random House Australia Pty Ltd, 2018."

Then there is the harmful impact on insurance availability to consider.

Whatever happened to continual improvement that in modern history should have at least been benchmarked on the recommendations in the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission, which included fuel management!

While finalising this posting I became aware that the evacuation of Dimboola was being urged. Reasonable to ask, had those responsible for urging the evacuation ever been to Dimboola and assessed its vulnerability to bushfire? I am reminded of the Maui Wildfires – December 23, 2024 when considering the loss potential at Dimboola.

Finally, Plate 2 (above) would be a fair representation of a panic-stricken populace fleeing a bushfire — the emergency management agencies and the media do nothing to dispel the fear.

Wednesday, 8 January 2025

The Ides of Christmas in Victoria: Bushfire and the accompanying 'smokescreen'

It's happening again! In more recent times, first, Wye River-Separation Creek in 2015; Mallacoota in 2019-20; and now the Grampians — both Mallacoota and Grampians fires causing such havoc, cost and loss were burning in National Parks.

People being virtually ordered from their homes and businesses in a broad-brush approach with seemingly little or no consideration of the actual vulnerability of those structures.

But first, Western Victoria, another example of how Victorians rely on the indefatigable CFA volunteers, with due respect to all the others involved in or supporting the firefight.

Plate 1 A firefighter walks past a home burning from the Mountain Fire in Camarillo, California. Wildfires are contributing to increasing insurance costs. (David McNew/Getty Images)

You might wonder why my interest in the Mountain Fire in Camarillo, California (Plate 1) but here's a story in The Washington Post 16 December 2024 about obtaining insurance for a family home that includes wildfire (bushfire in Australia if you prefer), certainly relevant in Australia. An extract from the story:

The small mountain town, a short drive from Lake Tahoe, offered the former preschool teacher and her husband, a carpenter, a shot at becoming middle class by escaping crushing housing costs near Santa Cruz, California.

“We moved up here for a better life,” she said in a phone interview. “For two or three years, we got that taste.” The small mountain town, a short drive from Lake Tahoe, offered the former preschool teacher and her husband, a carpenter, a shot at becoming middle class by escaping crushing housing costs near Santa Cruz, California. “We moved up here for a better life,” she said in a phone interview. “For two or three years, we got that taste.”

Then the insurance bills came. In 2017, the couple paid $1,100 to insure their small cabin. But since then, nine of California’s 10 largest wildfires have erupted, sending the insurance market into turmoil. Three insurers have dropped her in three years. This year, a basic policy from the public FAIR plan, the state-run insurer of last resort, and supplemental private insurance will cost Temple $6,000. It’s likely to rise again. “Now we’re back to watching each paycheck,” she said, “and budgeting for everything.”

Temple is among the many Americans watching their hold on homeownership slip away as insurance costs balloon beyond their ability to pay. “This is our first house. I don’t want to leave,” said Temple, struggling to keep her composure. “I try not to look too far into the future. I get scared.”

The full story can be reached through this link:

Insuring your home has never been harder. Here’s how to do it.

AUSTRALIA

Difficulties in obtaining insurance associated with bushfire risk is also being experienced in Australia. From Bellrock:

Policyholders who have property located in ‘bushfire prone areas’ (usually classified by local council), are likely to experience insurers having less appetite to insure their property. This may mean that insurers who are satisfied with the business operations, construction and risk management controls of the premises will be unwilling to deploy their capacity if the area is deemed to be a high-risk bushfire zone. Other insurers may look to use alternative strategies in order to increase the acceptability of risk, most commonly by way of increasing premiums or deductibles. This puts policyholders into a difficult position as they are unable to manage this exposure in any meaningful way. Installation of fire breaks and maintaining clearance will assist to a degree, however, wildfires are often unpredictable in nature and their severity is very dependent on prevailing weather conditions.

and

If underwriting losses exceed returns, insurers will cease to provide insurance cover at an affordable price. We have already witnessed this in parts of the world such as the USA where cover for bushfire in parts of California is unavailable except via a state scheme known as The California Fair Access to Insurance Requirements (FAIR). That scheme provides very basic last resort cover at a very high price point. Government in Australia, at all levels, is hesitant to provide any such scheme as they themselves are already carrying significant exposure on their own property portfolio.

Click here for the full Bellrock article.

Important to consider the one-size-fits-all leave early policy and ask the question; how many homes and businesses have been otherwise avoidably lost as a result and can it be improved? Indeed, what is the basis of the advice?

Then there’s the posting of warnings. It must have been confusing, indeed frightening for some as the plethora of warnings and areas they applied to were issued over days. Again, can it be improved?

Responsibility and accountability

Extract from an ABC story:

Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan said she was focused on supporting emergency services and communities affected by the bushfires, rather than division within the Liberal Party room.

"We're two days after Christmas and we see the Liberal Party focused on their disunity and lack of trust in each other — that's for them," she told 3AW. "I'm focused on our Victorians who are under fire threat and supporting our emergency services.

"I cannot emphasise enough how what is going on in the Liberal Party party room, two days after Christmas while parts of the state are under fire risk, is very much a matter for them."

Click here for the full ABC story.

Plate 2 Prime Minster Anthony Albanese and Victorian Premier Jacinta Allan announce 13 weeks pay for those in need. Picture: NewsWire / David Crosling ... From a story "Disasters 'More Intense, More Frequent'", The Australian,
30 December 2024. Part of the 'smokescreen'.

Extract from an ABC storey:

'Habitat will be lost, plants will die'

Deakin University associate professor John White has studied how species and ecosystems respond to external threats such as fire and climate change, particularly in the Grampians, since 2008.

Dr White expected the devastation caused by the fire to be felt for many years.

"This is about the fourth large fire in the Grampians in the past 20 years, which is a lot more than normal," he said.

Click here for the full ABC story.

Premier Allan, need I remind you that there is a Minister in your government responsible for as near as practicable risk-free management of the Grampians National Park, which must include protection of the adjoining landholders? Looks like failure to me and no doubt many others.

Whatever happened to continiual improvement that in modern history should have been benchmarked on the recommendations in the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission, which included fuel management!

Tuesday, 24 October 2023

Bushfire and terror

While keeping in touch with developments in the Israel-Gaza military conflict and aftermath of the Hamas raid into Southern Israel I heard a relatively brief opinion of “terror”.

I searched the web for terror-related information and finally settled on a definition in the Macquarie Dictionary, Fifth Edition:
1. intense, sharp, overpowering fear: to be frantic with terror.
2. a feeling, instance or cause of intense fear.

Started me thinking about meaning and forms of terror and how it may be created and used to advantage.

Within the definition there is also a reference to a political group using violence to maintain or achieve supremacy. A recent example was the activities of Hamas on the ground inside Southern Israel.

The definition of terror-stricken is relevant:
- smitten with terror; terrified

No doubt many will have seen media coverage of people attending the music festival in Southern Israel running to escape the Hamas shooters.

As I write I'm hearing of a severe bushfire situation in Southern Queensland while the attention of our media is distracted by broader regional and economic situations affecting Australia.

This causes me to think about Australians in areas threatened by bushfire being urged to leave their homes and businesses — some Australian states, but thankfully not Victoria, have mandatory evacuation legislation.

For several years, emergency management agencies have urging people to leave for an ostensibly safer place when bushfire reaches a certain level of threat. But, are we told why?

Urged or mandatory evacuations can create risk situations where unattended properties are lost to bushfire, why, because most building fire loss is due to ember or firebrand attack!

How then is a decision made to advise voluntary or mandatory evacuation?

At one level of the Australian Fire Danger Rating System (AFDRS) people are advised to leave, then only a few minutes later informed that it’s too late to leave and to shelter in place. This must be confusing, leading to unnecessary fear in some. How do those who wish to leave to now learn that it’s too late to leave cope with this? It must be unnerving and potentially result in injury or death for some unprepared individual.

Plate 1

From an ABC story "Sixteen homes lost in Tara as Queensland bushfire emergency continues", by Scout Wallen and Laura Cocks, 26 October 2023

To the uninitiated, media coverage of bushfires in Australia can only serve to frighten. While some will argue that it's informative this ABC story is typical of the sensationalist reporting of bushfire.

The AFDRS classification “catastrophic” is a prediction of a catastrophic fire, an outcome that may never occur. Serves only to further frighten, even panic some people.

Why then did Australasian Fire Authorities Council (AFAC) decide on “catastrophic”, by definition an outcome rather than a warning such as Code Red that had previously applied in Victoria and why did emergency management decision makers in Victoria abandon Code Red?

Plate 2

Did those who settled on “catastrophic” do so through lack of knowledge of the English language or was intended to avoid agency or individual responsibility for loss by outsourcing the decision to the individual? Was there any realisation that "catastrophic" as a warning or generally in the narrative was bound to add to the level of fear of fire in the broader community?

Referring again to sensationalism in the media, Vladimir Lenin, former Chairman of the Council of People's Commissars of the Soviet Union, was well aware that use of the media was critical to him in seeking to control Russia: Control the media, control the people.

Plate 3

Painting of Lenin by Isaak Brodsky (Public Domain).

Do the emergency management agencies see the sensationalist media coverage of bushfire as assisting them in seeking to control rather than support the community to withstand bushfire and minimise loss?

How does AFAC and for that matter the NEMA see their roles in the community, working in partnership with the broader community to withstand bushfire or frightening it into running?

And, what of EMA in Victoria? It’s performance to date has been miserable e.g. Loch Sport, what was learned from the Wye River and Mallacoota experiences that I would argue saw the involved communities pushed aside, leaving town protection to fire brigade units, some of which travelled long long distances involving several hours.

And, on terror, "Wallangarra resident Bryce Wells told the ABC he was scared for his life as the fire raced towards his home."
"The wind just carried it all over here … the Sun was fiery orange, I was pretty terrified," he said.

To conclude, from the above story:

"Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk praised the collaborative efforts of firefighters from two states for saving the community, after winds blew the bushfire to the edges of the town late yesterday afternoon."

Has it ever occurred to Premier Palaszczuk to question Queenslanders responsible for emergency management how fires reached this stage, again?

Once again, Australia is indebted to legions of volunteer firefighters who leave the comfort and safety of home to go chase and round up the rampaging red steer.

As always, I would welcome your feedback.

Note that the coloured text indicates links to further information to be clicked on.

Friday, 17 February 2023

Bushfire—and what of Homeland Defence?

Plate 1

A record of the Ash Wednesday 1983 fires produced by the Herald and Weekly Times Limited shows what remained of the main street of Macedon after the impact of the 1983 fire.

Today, the 40th Anniversary of the Ash Wednesday 1983 bushfires that took so many lives in Victoria and South Australia.

Some salient recollections

On that fateful day my involvement as CFA Regional Officer in Charge Region 14 commenced at 6.00 am with a telephone call from the Group Officer, Mount Macedon Group, informing me that there was a fire in unburnt bush at Cherokee in the Macedon Ranges and that it was "burning well".

At approximately 11.30 am I was informed that the Cherokee fire was "acting up" and that an additional six tankers had been despatched and that the Forests Commission were involved at the fire. By this time the day was warming up, with an already strong north wind.

At approximately 2.30 pm I received advice from the Forests Commission, Macedon office, that there was a fire at Trentham East and shortly after from the Daylesford office that the fire was heading south into the bush. The rest is history.

Responding to the experience of the Ash Wednesday bushfires in Victoria.

In the aftermath of the 1983 fires the CFA Board finally decided to address a statutory responsibility in the Country Fire Authority Act since its inception thirty-eight years ago — finally, an officer was appointed to establish a Fire Prevention Department. In those few years following the 1983 fires I consider CFA reached its short-lived zenith as it pushed Prevention at state and local government.

In the few years following Ash Wednesday considerable emphasis was placed on Prevention, but there was a lot of catching-up required and Suppression was always dominant when it came to the allocation of resources. For those holding the purse strings, there is much more kudos associated with the allocation of firefighting vehicles.

And what did we learn from Ash Wednesday 1983?

As a learning experiences Ash Wednesday and the major fires that have followed, and as recent as the Mallacoota fire of December 2019, Victoria continues to experience bushfire losses that indicate to me that little was learned from those fires.

Bushfire loss could be significantly reduced with better community understanding of bushfire and how to survive — it should be well understood in the fire agencies that the major cause of housing loss is ember or firebrand attack.

Some will remember a fire that occurred in the Lancefield area of Victoria in early October 2015 that spread from an earlier DELWP fuel reduction burn-off. Premier Andrews was quick for the government to accept responsibility for the fire and promised compensation for people who could have done more to protect their assets.

Here is one example of a house clearly lost from the effect of fire spreading from ember or firebrand attack:

Plate 2

Plate 3

Plate 4

Plate 5

Of the photographs Plate 2 is a dwelling on the north side of Three Chain Road, Lancefield prior to the fire; Plate 3 and 4 are the remains of same dwelling after the fire — look through the trees to see the green beyond and the only shrubs burnt were abutting the dwelling; and Plate 5 was typical of the adjoining the forest that showed no sign of crown fire.

With only small patches of dead grass and fallen leaves beneath trees burning, it was obvious that unprepared buildings and rubbish down the back yard succumbed to ember or firebrand attack.

No doubt a blanket one-size-all-approach to urging people to leave their homes adds to housing loss.

Lancefield, a fire that largely due to the fickleness of the weather escaped from a fuel reduction burn a few days after it was lit.

And what of homeland defence?

From The Australian today, 16 February 2023:

"[Prime Minister] Anthony Albanese has been handed a blue print to prepare Australia for a potential war with China, recommending a rapid boost to long-range strike capabilities, the urgent acquisition of killer drones, and a major increase in the nation's naval firepower".

It's not all that long ago that the Australian Defence Force needed to come to the rescue of people in Mallacoota in the aftermath of a fire that roared out of the bush and trapped holiday makers and residents in the town. Necessary due to the failure of a government agency managing land it was responsible for so that it did not endanger people and their assets.

With our military capability to be strengthened to keep an aggressor from our shores, what about our vulnerability onshore? Poorly managed tracts of public land, such as that which overwhelmed Mallacoota, must be assessed as to the risk they pose and treated accordingly. We can't afford to have our defence force being distracted to bail out a government shirking its statutory and moral responsibilities that ultimately place us at risk of fire by an evildoer behind the lines.

As always, I would welcome your feedback.

Note that the coloured text indicates links to further information to be clicked on.

Wednesday, 3 November 2021

Crooks, cheats, swindlers, hallmarks of the Andrews government

When I commenced this blog in 2014 it was initially intended to help people dealing with the requirements of the Bushfire Management Overlay as part of a planning permit application that based on my experience could be difficult process due to bureaucracy involved in the referrals requirements.

I soon realised that there were related issues that needed to be addressed. Unlike a government I don't have access to publicly funded spin departments, and journalists or talking heads, most of whom flit from lightbulb to lightbulb like moths and can't be relied on to dig deep on an issue e.g. management — or should I say mismanagement — of the COVID pandemic across Australia. I do my own investigative research to endeavour to expose the truth and I'm not rushing to get subscriptions or suck up to a politician of any stripe.

Since my last posting on 3 August 2020 a lot has come along to raise my concern, but I'll first confine myself to Victoria.

Part of my preparation for this posting has been to gain a better understanding of the meaning or application of certain words: crook; crooked; cheat; dishonest; fraud; honest; and swindle, according to the MACQUARIE DICTIONARY FIFTH EDITION published in 2009.

Maybe I should be a little more charitable and add "not fit for purpose" when calling out senior management and responsible Ministers.

I commenced my 13 July 2016 posting "The nature of bushfire Part 3 ... how fire moves across the land" with a discourse on a then recent visit to Berlin to learn about the rise and fall of the Wall or as the now defunct East German government or GDR named it, the "Anti-Fascist Protective Wall":

While in Berlin I also t:ok the opportunity to visit the Stasi Museum, formerly the Stasi headquarters. Stasi was the GDR's very secretive security organisation that had wives spying on husbands and vice versa, etc, etc and virtually everyone reporting on someone.

Chilling in many respects and I can relate the behaviour of the dictator Eric Honecker and his predecessors and their unelected functionaries to the behaviour of some “public servants” back home, but maybe a little more about this later. However, I imagine there are “victims” of Victoria’s Bushfire Management Overlay (BMO) and other aspects of wildfire management or I should say mismanagement in various areas of Australia, who would see some connection.

Never did I imagine that I'd see myself living behind a Wall, in fact two Walls: one around Greater Melbourne and the other around the State of Victoria, but that's what happened to Victorians for much of 2020-21.

Plate 1

Photo: Nicholson

Plate 2

Photo: Nicholson

Plate 1 shows a remnant of the Berlin Wall that divided people and set one against the other in the former East Berlin, just like in Victoria. Plate 2 a contemporary view of controlled entry into and exit from Victoria at Wodonga from the NSW side, with due respect to Victoria Police members only following the CHO's orders.

Fed up with the failure of emergency management to prevent or at least minimise loss in a number of areas on 3 August 2020 I posted "Why people die from wildfire — failure to learn and adapt" . A now very relevant extract from that posting:

COVID-19

With EMV involved with COVID-19 in Victoria, is attention also being given to planning for the next wildfire season taking into account lessons that should have been learned from the 2019/20 fires?

As I understand the role, the Emergency Management Commissioner has overall responsibility for emergency management in Victoria, be it wildfire or a dead whale that attracts sharks to a beach, which brings me to the COVID-19 pandemic.

With the EMV "Victorian action plan for influenza pandemic" published in August 2015 I find this disturbing:

1.8 Review The action plan is current at the time of publication [August 2015] and remains in effect until modified or superseded.

The action plan will be reviewed and updated every three years or sooner if it is applied in a major emergency or exercise, or if there is a change to relevant legislation or arrangements. [my emphasis]

Almost two years to the day a review is overdue. Were there no lessons to be learned from pandemics, etc e.g. Ebola that occurred elsewhere that we could have learned from? Or relevant lessons to be learned from management of wildfire in Victoria since 2009? Note that the responsible minister is Lisa Neville.

Sub-part 3.3 Consequence management is worth reading, too. Considering the scrambling to cope with rising case numbers and deaths suggests that Department of Health & Human Services Victoria has questions to answer. A deathly dereliction of duty? Note that the responsible minister is Jenny Mikakos.

Mikakos has gone, her fate described by some as having been "thrown under a bus". How long before a bus with the Honourable Lisa Neville's name on it comes along or maybe she'll live up to her Honourable title and resign, though little chance of that I suspect.

Plate 3

Photo: Nicholson

Taken at the 11th hour on 11 November 2008, the Cobbers statue at the WW1 Fromelles Memorial Park.

Over two years after the battle, on the day of the Armistice of 11 November 1918 when the guns of the Western Front finally ceased firing, Australian official war correspondent, Charles Bean, wandered over the battlefield of Fromelles and observed the grisly aftermath of the battle: “We found the old No-Man’s-Land simply full of our dead”, he recorded, “the skulls and bones and torn uniforms were lying about everywhere”. Soon after the war these remains were gathered to construct VC Corner Cemetery, the only solely Australian war cemetery in France. It is also the only cemetery without headstones. There are no epitaphs to individual soldiers, simply a stone wall inscribed with the names of 1,299 Australians who died in battle nearby and who have no known graves. The unidentified remains of 410 are buried in mass graves under two grass plots in the cemetery.

On the eve of Red Poppy Day in Australia, genuine Australians did not go to their deaths for a crooked government willing to do anything to remain in office in Victoria!

As always, I would welcome your feedback.

Note that the coloured text indicates links to further information to be clicked on.

Monday, 3 August 2020

Why people die from wildfire — failure to learn and adapt

Failure to learn from past experience e.g. the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission and adapt emergency management arrangements accordingly continues to plague Victorians, most recently the 2019/20 wildfires.

Wye River-Separation Creek, Christmas 2015

And it’s not only wildfire, examples of failure to be aware of hazardous situations, take speedy appropriate remedial action and ensure it does not occur again are legion in Victoria.

Now we have the devastating COVID-19 in Australia with its ground zero in Victoria.

I understand Emergency Management Victoria was established to lead and coordinate emergency management but now question, has it failed us?

Listening to Phillip Adams on his program Late Night Live, broadcast on Radio National on 23 June 2020, interviewing John Keane about his new book The New Despotism, I increasingly likened it to what’s occurring in Australia, particularly the 2019/20 wildfires and COVID-19 virus in Victoria.

An extract from a review by LSE Review of Books:

The strength of the new despotism comes from its skilful use of the media, and that use goes far beyond the familiar dissemination of ‘fake news’ and the slandering of opponents. Rather than hiding from public view, the new despotism embraces communicative abundance and intrumentalises it to the fullest degree. Leaders’ media appearances are lavish, meticulously choreographed affairs. It could be said that the new despotism stages non-stop theatrical spectacles projected to the whole nation. Grand infrastructure projects are one key prop in this theatre of self-aggrandisement.

Grand infrastructure projects remind me of railway level crossing replacement and railway tunnels in Victoria. Political capital, currently being eroded and not only in Victoria.

In my opinion the state Premiers are all despots, some worse than others and all seeking to demonstrate to their ‘subjects’ they are looking after their best interests. But whose best interests?

Balkanising of Australia

Those who offend me the most are McGowan, WA for his rudeness and Palaszczuk, Queensland generally for on her on-again-off-again fence around Queensland and apparent disregard for businesses affected. Both of them are leading the charge to Balkanise Australia by turning their subjects against other Australians, notably Victorians. They remind me of the Pied Piper leading the rats to oblivion — they appeal to the baser instincts of us humans unable to think for ourselves and see past spin.

While the rats may not literally drown as did the Piper’s rats, we should all expect to drown in a somewhat avoidable sea of health and economic disaster. No doubt in my mind that McGowan and Palaszczuk are more interested in scoring political points rather than the best interests of all Australians. True despots of the modern era and these two are not alone.

A few notable comments from the Late Night Live recording that runs for 20 minutes for those interested:
•  At approximately 3 minutes – Adams “I've seen a bit of that around in Australia"
•  At approximately 7 minutes 30 seconds – “top down systems of power”
•  At approximately 12 minutes 40 seconds – why people in lock down shop
•  At approximately 12 minutes 55 seconds – "people complain endlessly but do nothing"

A long recording but worth listening to as Keane says things that we may recognise in ourselves or those around us.

Wildfire management

Sticking with my blog commitment to better wildfire management but acknowledging the measures necessary to contain/eliminate COVID-19, whatever, how will wildfire be managed this approaching season in Victoria to avoid a Mallacoota catastrophe elsewhere? What planning is going into dealing with:
•  Reduced availability of firefighters from interstate and overseas?
•  Reduced availability of firefighting aircraft from interstate and overseas?
•  Restricted movement of ICC people across Victoria?

Evacuation

The vexed question of evacuation, a particularly important consideration given people are currently being urged to isolate in their homes and may be reluctant to leave ... some may actually get caught and die. Then there's the potential for many to protect their homes and businesses where ember attack is the main threat, particularly in towns and settlements, but this would require a shift by the fire and emergency services from their perceived ownership of the wildfire problem. From an earlier posting, "Evacuation is the easy option, we can and must do better at protecting human life."

"BANNING, Calif. — Thousands of people were under evacuation orders Sunday after a wildfire in mountains east of Los Angeles exploded in size as crews battled flames in triple-digit heat." Large scale evacuation in a US state with a record number of coronavirus deaths for one day at 30 July 2020. Source The Washington Post.

COVID-19

With EMV involved with COVID-19 in Victoria, is attention also being given to planning for the next wildfire season taking into account lessons that should have been learned from the 2019/20 fires?

With the EMV "Victorian action plan for influenza pandemic" published in August 2015 I find this disturbing:

1.8 Review The action plan is current at the time of publication [August 2015] and remains in effect until modified or superseded.

Distractions

Another distraction for EMV, the type that can take people lower on Maslow's hierarchy of needs? From The Australian, 4 August 2020 "Coronavirus: Hotel quarantine inquiry a lawyers’ picnic". Why the lawyers, do those called to appear, including EMV, have something to hide or worry that they’ll end up in a dog-eat-dog inquiry and someone may be 'thrown under a bus' by a failed responsible minister running for cover?

What then of planning for the approaching wildfire season?

Capability test, can the Emergency Management Commissioner simultaneously walk and chew gum?

As always, I would welcome your feedback.

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