Oz is firing up early this year.

Another bad day expected today.
Meanwhile, it is politically incorrect to mention climate change or global warming right now because people have lost their homes so I'll just let this picture speak for itself

 
So what are you suggesting Warri? That bush fires be taxed?? Is that the secret trick that everyone is missing here?
Is pointing at it, chanting Global Warming smugly, and taxing it's arse going to stop it burning every damned year since at least 40,000 BC! ??
Where should we send the bill?

Are you still being hoodwinked into falling for the ETS con and greenie propaganda, like the rest of the self congratulatory saviours of the planet, so hard that you think that simply sacrificing a few bucks of someone else's profit to the gods of Government revenue and the UN is the magic bullet to stop gum trees burning brightly? Really?
OMG. It's still all 'Tony Abbott's fault' isn't it?? You're not over that yet are you? Goooood! :rofl:

Nah that's not it is it? You just couldn't resist a NLACGB moment.

Money, mantras, and political ideology won't stop Climate Change. Taxing an inert gas to avert a natural phenomenon is akin to having a priest bless a posy of garlic flowers to stop the Black Plague. It may be a comforting gesture but it isn't addressing the problem. It's simply giving gullible people a false sense of security and smug satisfaction, and the political carpetbaggers and the 'greenpriests' a nice fat income stream.
It won't 'cure' it!

If you wanna dance to that argument again I'm on for it... meet me on the Corner. ... bring the old gang, they may enjoy another rumble.

.............

Back to topic.

The interstaters have arrived, around 800 extra volunteers, mainly Victorians, that's around 200 extra crews and equipment. That gap in the weather has been a stroke of luck to allow the time for them to get there.

I remember how proud I was of those volunteer crews who had driven their fire trucks 22hrs non stop from as far as Adelaide to help out in the big Sydney fires back in '94. Now I'm proud all over again. Not that they aren't appreciated year round, but that 'extra mile' they go in time of need is pretty special.

I have no idea how the US rural fire service is set up but ours, other than the professional, mainly urban based fire departments, is in the majority totally reliant on volunteers. Ordinary Joe's who give their time and effort, and risk their lives in joining a local team, training for years on their own unpaid time, and answering the call whenever they're needed. I don't know if the Government kicks in any funding, maybe they do, but not much.

Every piece of equipment they use, protective clothing they wear, and right on down to the sandwiches and tea they get on a break is down to donations from a grateful population. Local businesses offer what services they can for free. I know relatives do some pro bono vehicle work for them in their engineering business. They're restoring a 'junked' truck back to serviceable with up to date equipment. Their employees are working on it in their spare time and the rels are providing the workshop equipment and money. That's how things still work in country towns.

One rural crew was featured on a TV news show last night. A woman who looked a hundred but had to be at least 80 was training youngsters, and doing what else she could manage as often as she could be there. She's been doing it for decades and sees no reason to stop. One of the fire crew is a gangly 19 yo kid. He's the newby, he's only been in the team since he was 14.
A lot of teenagers, male and female, are in those teams, most at the firefront, some in support roles. Some are still in school, but the schools are all closed up there this week, many of the teachers are in the fire crews too. Along with retirees, tradesmen, butchers, bakers, and 'candlestick makers'. Doesn't matter who you are, or what you do, if you're a volunteer 'firey' then you're there.

Very proud of these people, does it show?

Not to forget the SES (State Emergency Service) that works much the same way, some people are in both. They specialise in quick response to disasters, throw tarps over roofless houses after storms and cut trees up to drag them out of lougerooms and off roads, etc.

Don't ask what we'd do without them, we simply couldn't do without them.
 

Couldn't believe it yesterday when the publican of a pub who wanted to thank the firies for saving his pub by giving them free beer wasn't allowed, Pffft i think the law have changed their mind on that one and so they should, everyone else is giving to them why not the publican. Grrr
 
Warrigal said:
Another bad day expected today.
Meanwhile, it is politically incorrect to mention climate change or global warming right now because people have lost their homes so I'll just let this picture speak for itself
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Warrigal, can you please explain for me - scientifically - exactly what has caused the current NSW bushfires and how it relates to climate change?
 
You know that I am not a climate scientist so I will use Christiana Figueres to speak for me.

"But what is absolutely clear is the science is telling us that there are increasing heat waves in Asia, Europe, and Australia; that these will continue; that they will continue in their intensity and in their frequency," Ms Figueres said.

Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-polit...tony-abbott-20131022-2vxs5.html#ixzz2iWUXET4k
Click to expand...


Unlike our prime minister, I won't dismiss this senior UN official as "talking through her hat".
 
Some references in this article to the sort of science that TA thinks is crap.

What's been happening to fire weather?

A study last year in the International Journal of Climatology looked at the FFDI data from 38 sites around Australia from 1973 to 2010. None of the sites showed a reduction in fire danger and 16 of them showed that fire weather had increased significantly. While the study was not set up to find a link between human-emissions and bushfires, the study said the trends were "consistent with projected impacts of climate change on FFDI".

The study, carried out by scientists from the NSW government, the CSIRO and the Bureau of meteorology, also found that the most distinct increases in fire risk were in spring and autumn, meaning the fire season was getting longer.

In 2007, a study by scientists at the CSIRO, Bureau of Meteorology and a government-backed bushfire research centre also found that Australia was experiencing more dangerous fire-prone days. The study found:

Increases of 10-40% between 1980-2000 and 2001-2007 are evident at most sites. The strongest rises are seen in the interior portions of NSW, and they are associated with a jump in the number of very high and extreme fire danger days.
​
The study also pointed out there was a strong correlation between increased risk of fire and periods of drought. Times of higher bushfire risk also tended to happen during periods of El Nino, which in Australia is associated with hotter temperatures and less rain.

Professor Roger Jones, a co-ordinating lead author for a chapter in the next major IPCC report looking at climate impacts, has written about his own study into fire danger trends in the state of Victoria, which has already had a flush of damaging bushfires. He found that " fire danger in Victoria increased by over a third after 1996, compared to 1972-1996."

Professor Jones, of Victoria University, also points out that recently observed changes in fire risk are already at the "worst case" level predicted for the year 2050 by a previous study. He writes:

We can't consider severe fires as one-offs that happen every few decades. If they're becoming a systemic part of our environment we have to consider this really seriously. There will be a financial cost and a human cost, and we will see it repeated, if we don't plan ahead.
​
What about the future?

Twenty-five years ago, what's thought to be the very first scientific paper in the world suggesting global warming could increase the risk of bushfires was published in Australia (to give you an idea of how long scientists have been looking at this, 1987 was also the year that Aussies got a cell phone network, the year Fred Astaire died and the year Argentinian footballer Lionel Messi was born).

That first study was carried out by Dr Tom Beer, who is still at CSIRO where he was back in 1987. Beer's research was prepared for a government-backed conference in Melbourne, where about 100 scientists and engineers presented their research into the potential impacts of "greenhouse-induced climatic change" to an audience of more than 250 people.

Beer examined almost 40 years of meteorological data from three sites and then used a computer model to project what would happen if average temperatures in those areas went up between 3.5C and 4C. He found, not surprisingly, that the risk of fire went up. Dr Beer remembers the significance of this pioneering study, telling me:

"Scientifically I recall being invited to meetings in the US to discuss our results which led to various US researchers undertaking similar studies in relation to the North American fire situation. There was considerable media interest in the Greenhouse conference and I was interviewed by one journalist who later told me that there was more interest in this story than in any previous story she had written."
​
Beer followed up his study in 1995, but this time used more sophisticated modelling to look at how fire danger changed as levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere went up. He says:
"The 1995 study using two computer models of the effects of doubled CO2 confirmed the results of the 1988 paper for south-eastern Australia, and also confirmed that the results of the 1998 paper (an increase in fire danger index with an increase in CO2 levels) was true for almost all of Australia. The models were ambiguous as to the situation in Northern Australia. The models also confirmed the link between relative-humidity and fire danger index in south-east Australia, but indicated that even in some areas of Australia where the computer models predicted an increase in relative humidity, the fire danger was still predicted to increase."
​
Since then, there have been multiple studies which have almost universally suggested the same thing. As temperatures and CO2 in the air goes up, so to does the risk of bushfires.

When Prime Minister Abbott says that bushfires are a "function of life in Australia" he's clearly correct, but to declare so confidently that bush fires are not linked to climate change in the face of so much evidence to the contrary, suggests denial.

If Tony Abbott thinks Christiana Figueres is "talking though her hat" then from where is Tony Abbott talking? Answers on a postcard please.

http://www.theguardian.com/world/pl...-abbott-australia-bushfire-science?CMP=twt_gu
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Breaking news... the Australian Army has just admitted to starting the blaze last week with ammunition & explosives training in the bush.
On the eve of a Total Fire Ban day, you think they would have known better.
 
Just voicing a few silly questions here, I left school young.

How come these gurus never mention 'the science' which has found the quickest, cheapest and least damaging way to put out a fire is to
smother it with CO2 ??

If the level of CO2 is rising in enough panic inciting degree to change the climate of the entire planet, then wouldn't the increased saturation level in the atmosphere also be contributing to having a dampening effect on fires?

Trees live on the stuff, if we lower the levels we'll be starving the trees. Now that's not very kind is it? .. seriously though, more CO2 would benefit those trees that the Greens won't let anyone chop down.
So basically,have I got this right? Greens are demanding more trees while also demanding a reduction of what they live on.

If 60% of bushfires in OZ are caused by humans then are humans the real problem and should we should be taxing baby emitters to reduce the impacts of climate change in fire prone areas?

Or should we just send in a shrink to 'counsel' the AIF numb nut who was blowing things up in the tinder box a few hours before a total fire ban was imposed? Perhaps an explanation that despite what his paperwork assures him is legal, fires don't burn by the clock!

... and some idiot suggested sending the Army in to fight the fires. Nooooooo!
 
How come these gurus never mention 'the science' which has found the quickest, cheapest and least damaging way to put out a fire is to smother it with CO2 ??
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There are two ways to put out a fire quickly. One is to cut off the oxygen supply, which is what a blast of CO2 does. You can get the same result with a blast of nitrogen or helium or any other gas that does not burn. Or you can use a fire-blanket. It all depends on whether you want to kill every living thing in the vicinity of the fire or not. No oxygen means no fire but it also means no life.

The other way is to lower the temperature below ignition point, which is what a bucket of water does. Or a helicopter full of it.

None of these methods are practical for wild fires. The helicopter helps though.
 
Warrigal said:
You know that I am not a climate scientist so I will use Christiana Figueres to speak for me.
Unlike our prime minister, I won't dismiss this senior UN official as "talking through her hat".
Click to expand...
There is not a scintilla of scientific evidence in that article Warrigal. Can you explain the "clear link" ?? Why didn't she ??
 
terra said:
Breaking news... the Australian Army has just admitted to starting the blaze last week with ammunition & explosives training in the bush.
On the eve of a Total Fire Ban day, you think they would have known better.
Click to expand...

So, that's what caused it .... not global warming (now climate change) ?? I also heard about teenage arsonists.

I knew there would be a rational explanation. :rolleyes:
 
Oh bloody spare me! Al Gore is lecturing us on how to 'do' bushfires! He's got the unmitigated hide to tell our PM who's been fighting them for years how Al's climate change obsession is the reason for them! Get off the bike Al, you are a flim flammin' con artist who has made millions out of flogging that panic inciting bullsh*t to the gullible as a marketing ploy for your Green technology investments. Your 'proofs' are imaginary at best and plain fraud at worst.

Climate change is a slow, inexorable fact of the nature of this planet and will take it's course without the need to panic over it. These fires were no bigger, and no worse than any that have been occurring here for thousands of years.

There's more of 'em because there are more people lighting them! They are more 'damaging' because there are houses here to burn down now, there was no damage before settlement because there was nothing here to damage!

I'm not denying climate change, it's been doing that for billions of years, but I'm outraged at those who make a profit out of the process by blowing it out of all proportion to scare people into giving them money. Those like Al Gore who con people that they have 'the science' and 'the answer' and all that is required is for us to embrace their ' green religion' and to donate copious cash to it in the mistaken belief that taxing an inert gas, and buying Al's snake oil 'green' products will 'stop' it.

Regardless of who or what caused it, we, and in particular Al bloody Gore, can't STOP it. We need to get over the silliness of pretending to find ways to stop it, and concentrate our attention instead on those with a few good ideas on how to adapt to it. Believe me, the money would be better spent!
 
The worst has happened. A tiny water bomber plane has crashed. I saw all the little crop dusters that had flown in and were lined up at Richmond air base and cheered their bravado, but worried at their capabilities as water bombers. Maybe they were just dusting it with fire retardants but those little planes weren't built for fire fighting.

http://www.news.com.au/national/fir...s-near-ulladulla/story-fncynjr2-1226745835136
 
Warrigal said:
See my next post https://www.seniorforums.com/showthread.php/2627-Oz-is-firing-up-early-this-year?p=41068#post41068 and follow the links.
Click to expand...
From the research ......
Although these trends are consistent with projected impacts of climate change on FFDI, this study cannot separate the influence of climate change, if any, with that of natural variability. Copyright © 2012 Royal Meteorological Society
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Warrigal, our local bushfires are an emotional issue and an attempt has been made to link the fires with CO2. There is no link .... except for the number of hysterical media reports.

With the exception of increased population numbers, there is no evidence anywhere that modern day extreme weather events are worse in any way than those of the past. In fact, there is ample evidence that weather events now are less extreme than in the past (link).

You should keep Roger Pielke Jr's professor of environmental studies at the Center for Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado at Boulder button handy at all times:

195_180_l.jpg
 
Thanks for the link but there are over 1000 pages and it starts with the inundation of the Nile valley.
I won't be digging through it all to get to colonial Australia up to 1900.

Actually, I just did a CTRL F search for Australia and find the usual anecdotal reports such as this:
1797 A.D. In 1797 in New South Wales, Australia, there were heavy brush fires in January. Flinders and Bass experienced signs of drought at Bateman’s Bay and Western Port.
Click to expand...

These are not very helpful when attempting to gauge whether conditions are worsening or remaining typical.
An important question like this does need some careful attention, not easy dismissal on ideological grounds.
 
Warrigal said:
Thanks for the link but there are over 1000 pages and it starts with the inundation of the Nile valley.
I won't be digging through it all to get to colonial Australia up to 1900.

Actually, I just did a CTRL F search for Australia and find the usual anecdotal reports such as this:


These are not very helpful when attempting to gauge whether conditions are worsening or remaining typical.
An important question like this does need some careful attention, not easy dismissal on ideological grounds.
Click to expand...
The historical bad weather link was not intended to convince you about Australia ..... it does, however, point out that "extreme weather" events are nothing new .... globally.

Next time you are watching any documentary about anything that happened long ago, note the variability of the weather, for example, the ability - at times - to walk from continent to continent, etc. (Nothing to do with fires. ;))

From the research you quoted......
Although these trends are consistent with projected impacts of climate change on FFDI, this study cannot separate the influence of climate change, if any, with that of natural variability. Copyright © 2012 Royal Meteorological Society
Click to expand...
 

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