California Fires: Opportunism, Arson and a Lack of Hurricanes

“Phew! Shut up Davey, you may only be preaching to the converted” Sure “It (fire) will sequester carbon as soil charcoal. It will spread smoke emission” etc. but I for one want to step back from the concept of mosaic burning by anyone who has not noticed the impact of climate change.
Much of the forest country is now too dry most of the year to hit it with large scale hazard reduction programs in remote areas. Also we don’t have enough experienced bushmen to do it all over on time.
Crisgo mentions “Alps at the Crossroads” by Dick Johnson as a major influence in changing land care in the Victorian high country. Dick the engineer was encourage in late 1972 to look at restoring vegetation as a natural water reservoir above the Murray headwaters. This was seen as an alternative to building major storage downstream. Conservation of snow melts had been on the books for well over a century.
What do we mean by 'conservation'?
It was from a position of acquired knowledge about the area that Strzelecki reported his concern on the state of the Australian Alps after a trip in the 1830s.
'The drought ... here in New South Wales seems to have an additional cause to ... those which elsewhere occasion extraordinary dryness of soil: namely the alteration which colonisation impresses on its surface; the herbaceous, high and thick plants; the continued forest; the underwood; the brush, which so well clothed the crust and sheltered the moisture, have disappeared under the innumerable flocks and axes which the settlers have introduced. The soil, thus bared, was and is, as it were, abandoned by a most prejudicial practice, to the constant and periodic wilful incendiarism, which, instead of producing the expected and former herbage and vigor of the soil, in fact only calcines its surface and eradicates even the principle of reproduction...' (Enclosed in a despatch from Gipps to the Secretary of State, 28 September 1840, and printed in House of Lords Sessional Papers, 1841(85),
http://www.australianalps.deh.gov.au/publications/edukit/nature.html
chrisgo also mentions the formation of the CFA after the Black Friday 1939 disaster and the demise of their practice during the 1970’s. It was proved in the Dandenong fires that scattered self funding CFA volunteer units could not integrate with other brigades including urban forces deployed in mass attack (late 60’s, read my post on the other thread) Chaos reigned and units burned while all manner of tankers and buckets tried to refill them. Also one of their chiefs was nabbed for starting that series.
Not all the facts are recorded on the www.

Further to Green Davey Gam Esq. at October 26, 2007 12:09 PM
During my long lost childhood, in the 1940s and when the summer north winds blew, my parents would often talk of Black Friday, January 13 1939 when smoke from the fires in the hills to the east blanketed Melbourne. The day became folklore.
The temperature on that day reached 45.6 ℃.(114.1 ℉). The fires killed 71 people.
http://www.bom.gov.au/lam/climate/levelthree/c20thc/fire4.htm
As a result of the subsequent Stretton Royal Commission, the CFA was formed in 1945, an extensive pattern of well maintained access tracks was established and controlled burning became an established practice.
I remember during the 50s and early 60s, students would take jobs manning prominent watchtowers during the summer holidays.
This all changed in the 70s as a result of pressure from environmental groups determined to exclude loggers and graziers and return the forests to 'wilderness'.
In a widely read book of the time,"The Alps At The Crossroads" published by the Victorian National Parks Association Author Dick Johnson wrote "One of the fundamental causes of conflict in the alpine region is its extensive roading network" and "If wildfire was self-regulating once [before white settlement], why is man's presence through his roads necessary now?'
Following the January 2003 Victorian fires a Government enquiry was set up.
In a submission to the inquiry into the Bogong fires January/February, the Victorian Association of Forest Industries stated "1939 could never happen again – the claim of many during the 1970s, 80s and 90s. But they did happen, and the Bogong fire complex of 2003 burnt an area in excess of 1.3 million hectares, starting from a lightning storm on 8 January and capitulating in late February."
They recommended:
-fuel management via fuel reduction burns
-easy access via a network of well maintained roads
-rapid and efficient initial attack by firefighters - skill
Melbourne's water catchments, which are controlled by Melbourne Water, escaped major fire damage. The catchment areas were well protected by: "...inspection and opening of all roads through the catchments, slashing of fuel breaks, employment of 29 summer casual persons and mock fire exercises to test personnel, equipment and response times. A comprehensive system of fences, gates, locks and signage to limit access and hence assist in bushfire prevention...a bushfire detection system including 4 fire spotting towers extensive works programs in the catchments to provide and maintain catchment security, bushfire protection access..."
The Inquiry final report runs to 24 pages of recommendations, replete with bureaucratese:"to consider""data storage""documentation""evaluation""monotoring""review""evidence assembly""public education""strategies""agenda items included""explore options""appropriate planning""bring together stakeholders""establish subcommittee""audit planning"and on and on.
The Victorian Department of Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) is a greenies playpen.
Global warming/climate change has become a convenient alibi for governments to do nothing.

And as for Paul

Why do you think it's called Global Warming?
Why do you think the scientists felt it necessary to raise the issue?

A global rise in temperature will affect everyone, and all ecosystems.

Interesting to see that (according to Paul's referenced media reports) US environmentalists 'welcome prescribed burns'. Smoky Bear has bit the dust. Perhaps they have been reading history, and talking to the Indian Elders. Great.
We still have, in Australia, dim witted, historically ignorant, Smoky Bear 'environmentalists' who oppose prescribed burns. Some of them advise 'Environment Ministers', God help us. As Jim and Aled Hoggett said "When will we ever learn?"
Before somebody jumps onto the climate bandwagon, if weather becomes hotter and drier, there is even more need for broadscale prescribed burning, at relatively short intervals (for example 2-4 years in dry eucalypt forests, longer elsewhere).
This prevents fuel build up, and actually benefits the biota by recycling nutrients, germinating seeds, and preventing fire deaths of veteran trees. It prevents formation of uncontrollable, broad fire fronts. It creates a mosaic, so protecting long unburnt refuges for the fire shy biota, hence creating greater diversity. It will sequester carbon as soil charcoal. It will spread smoke emission - lots of little, white, harmless smokes, not occasional big, black, toxic ones. It will make fire bugs redundant, perhaps give them a real job. It will make us terrorist proof, at least from co-ordinated, deliberate bushfire attack. It will show respect to the traditional owners of the land, who are upset at whitefella stupidity with fire. It will help those of non-Aboriginal descent to get rid of their warped cultural 'ignis nullius' baggage, and adapt to the Aboriginal view of bushfire as a friend, not an enemy.
Phew! Shut up Davey, you may only be preaching to the converted. The fire exclusion dogmatists are impervious to reason.

Woody

read the transcript

"Now I'm going to show you, recently released, the actual ocean temperature. Of course when the oceans get warmer, that causes stronger storms. We have seen in the last couple of years, a lot of big hurricanes. Hurricanes Jean, Francis and Ivan were among them. In the same year we had that string of big hurricanes; we also set an all time record for tornadoes in the United States. Japan again didn't get as much attention in our news media, but they set an all time record for typhoons. The previous record was seven. Here are all ten of the ones they had in 2004. The science textbooks that have to be re-written because they say it is impossible to have a hurricane in the South Atlantic. It was the same year that the first one that ever hit Brazil. The summer of 2005 is one for the books. The first one was Emily that socked into Yucatan. Then Hurricane Dennis came along and it did a lot of damage, including to the oil industry. This is the largest oil platform in the world after Dennis went through. This one was driven into the bridge at Mobile. And then of course came Katrina. It is worth remembering that when it hit Florida it was a Category 1, but it killed a lot of people and caused billions of dollars worth of damage. And then, what happened? Before it hit New Orleans, it went over warmer water. As the water temperature increases, the wind velocity increases and the moisture content increases. And you'll see Hurricane Katrina form over Florida. And then as it comes into the Gulf over warm water it becomes stronger and stronger and stronger. Look at that Hurricane's eye. And of course the consequences were so horrendous; there are no words to describe it.

Sirens, background music, Mayor Ray Nagin. The water is up to my neck. I don't think I'm going to make it.

How in god's name could that happen here? There had been warnings that hurricanes would get stronger. There were warnings that this hurricane, days before it hit, would breach the levies and cause the kind of damage that it ultimately did cause. And one question that we, as a people, need to decide is how we react when we hear warnings from the leading scientists in the world."

http://www.hokeg.dyndns.org/AITruth.htm

He says stronger.