A COLAC district environmentalist fears burning off in the Otways is making the forest more fire prone and killing wildlife.
Environmentalist slams Otways burns
Colac district environmentalist Fiona Nelson fears Otways burnoffs do more harm than good.
5 Responses to “Environmentalist slams Otways burns”
Comments are closed.
Fiona obviously only reads the research that she agrees with. The research into the effectiveness of fuel reduction burning is clear – they work! They mean that when there is a bushfire it is less intense and therefore protects people, houses AND biodiversity.
To those people who talk about burns being ‘hot burns’ have a look at areas burnt in Black Saturday. No fuel reduction burning is as hot as a bushfire on a bad day.
Keep up the good work DSE and CFA.
Animals can smell smoke a long time before we can, fuel reduction burns are held on days of light winds and in a manner that can be managed. If we dont do them the fuel load get huge and on that day of extreme winds and temperatures the fire will move very quickly aided by the fuel load and the animals wont stand a chance with the intensity.
Ms Nelson, have you ever been out and fought a WILDFIRE? Have you seen the utter desolation where the ground has been sterilised by the intense Heat? where 24 hours after the fire,at Durham Lead, standing on a large boulder the rubber sole on fire boots were melting!Were you involved in the Lara fires and witnessed the destruction of wildfire? Did you go to the South East fires in 03, 06 and look at what little was left of our forests after wildfire? Did you see any of Black Saturdays remains?Did you see and witness the Sydney wildfires? And what about the fires in Canberra.
All of those fires covered millions of hectares. Destroyed many homes,killed many humans. Cost untold millions of dollars. Family losses and misery that will not go away.
There is no way we can prevent wildfires, no way we can stop them. But we can lessen the impact and intensity by controlled burns, fuel reduction and to some extent clearing areas of major vegetation.
We, Victorians cannot achieve the desired safety, because some of us want to live in very dangerous areas by choice and don’t want to give up our views.
Controlled burning makes a lot of noise and vibrations that animals birds lizards are attuned to and move away. There is going to be losses, no one disputes that.But it is controlled, slow burning, only commenced when all conditions are as prescribed and a regiment is ON HAND when the fire commences. A wildfire can run up to an hour or more before troops arrive and be uncontrollable.After fighting fires for more than 40 years If I lived or was surrounded by forrests,I would certainly appreciate the effort of those committed to the safety of my,and my families lives.
The greatest cry from all those affected by wildfire is ‘why wasn’t the fuel reduced’? Two answers or more but the ones I see are we haven’t got the manpower or funds to do it and some folk are agains’t it.Please look at your objection and line it up agains’t the loss of lives, housing, lifestock and native animals, and the cost of wildfire fighting and the insurance increases, maybe a slightly different view of things would be seen. Some of us were witness to Ash Wednesday fires in the Otways, a hell of a lot of destruction. We are due for another ‘day’ in the future and it will be worse for we have a greater intensity of housing now, with no increase in the exiting of these areas.The Forrests, Bambras and coastal towns have all seen a huge population growth, and it will only get worse.Sorry if I’ve rattled on but we all need to look at all angles before we get too involved in ‘my way’ Cheers to all ‘OOO’
Perhaps Fiona Nelson could read the many published articles authored by the Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre in authoritative journals such as the International Journal of Wildland Fire before espousing her views on fire management. Alternatively, a study of rainforest eco system by the First Settlers of Australia may expand her knowledge of the subject.
With regard to wildlife, surely Fiona knows that the DSE have trained wildfire carers available both internal and externally to humanely manage injuries on the rare occasions that they may occur – or has she “sanitised” her knowledge of this?
I agree with Fiona. They are going to do a ‘hot burn’ near us in over 1100 hectares. They have NO IDEA what flora and fauna are in there. It is environmental vandalism sanctioned by the government to look as if they are doing something to ease further disasters. If you choose to live in the bush you don’t have the right to destroy it in case a fire comes your way. The bush besides us was burnt last year and now has a huge amount of new undergrowth which seems to me to be more of a burn risk than it was before.