Comments on: Issues from the fires

By: steveh

steveh — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 03:46:36 +0000

Hi Robert,
Bit late and I see some others have covered the issue!
FWIW – Legal eagles haven’t done too badly in the past. See the Waterfall inquiry and the R.C. into Brit Atomic Tests.
My issue is more with the deputies – most of the previous R.C.s that really got into the fundamentals and looked for swiss-cheese and root-cause models had very capable technically trained deputies. Usually some sort of scientific training (even if completely outside their field) meant that they not only had the ability to look at what happened (as a historian will) but also allowed them to narrow down the raw data to allow predictions of what might be avoided in future.
What does concern me is the potential legalistic approach – yes, having council to assist in this would be critical but if we want to avoid repeats then it is essential to not just sideline the people who can make the biggest difference.
We’ve already seen this too often in OH&S rules across the country where prescriptive laws have not prevented accidents and have hindered on-the-spot fixes that may not be appropriate for other sites.
Technical knowledge is needed – and I’m sorry if people feel insulted by this but we currently have a very large deficiency of such knowledge and how to apply it. We’ve seen multiple discussions in the MSM where pure emotion and pure BS have been allowed to roam free.
If we are to prevent loss of life in the future we need “cold’ hard evidence-based solutions and while a R.C. can provide this it is not reassuring for one with such a large remit to be run with a management team made up of lawyerly people and no technical people (apologies to any lawyers here).

By: Peterc

Peterc — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 12:45:37 +0000

Clarification: not by you Wilful, by the other turkeys.

By: Caroline

Caroline — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 10:46:05 +0000

. . .sober and dressed for the occasion.

By: Caroline

Caroline — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 10:39:51 +0000

wilful, my last brush with fire, I hope to be my last, but should I ever find myself or the house I am in, in the path of a conflagration I won’t be asking anybody prepared to come to my assistance or stand at the end of a hose or climb onto a roof, whether they have the appropriate accreditation–only perhaps, that they be sober.
One of the things I have learned about bush fires is that fighting them or trying to work out which way they will blow is a very blokey arena, one in which unfortunately the blokes are often wrong. I have been alarmed by some sort of fundamental disconnect about what the fire was going to do and what the people charged with fighting it thought it was going to do. Usually along the lines of the danger has now passed or it will burn itself out. For a woman, getting anybody to take you seriously is extremely difficult–its like you don’t exist.

By: FF

FF — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 08:38:17 +0000

# blockquote>Something I deeply worry about for the future of Victoria’s forests is the immense pressure there will be to manage them solely for community safety. All other considerations will be thrown out the window for the next few years – this may have more disastrous an ecological consequence as the fires themselves.

You gotta laugh. Once again it is a forestry man that is the left of the wimpish, liberal, pretend environmentalists here.

By: Chris

Chris — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 06:32:24 +0000

joe2 @ 67 – I think the clearing would make the homes defensible. As you say you’ll still get grass fires and embers, but a prepared household can handle those. Its a very different matter when you have a forest 10 metres away on fire. The suburban canberra fire experience was that many of those houses could have been saved if the houses had their own water and pump supply and actively defended along with some better design decisions (eg no mulch against the house, no gaps under the house etc).

wilful @ 69 – it would have to be a long term goal to remove towns in the middle of forested areas. And it would be politically very difficult to refuse permission for people to rebuild in the towns that have been destroyed. Sadly I suspect we’ll see the same thing happen again before long. Perhaps there won’t be as much loss of human life, but the property destruction seems pretty much inevitable.

By: wilful

wilful — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 06:13:45 +0000

caroline, I suspect you might find theres be a bit more to fighting forest fires than that, and there are university courses, at least for the trainers if not the trained.

but there’s not really any firefighting done on a day like that saturday – stay out of the way and try to save lives without jeopardising your own. Don’t get in front of it, attack from sides and rear. Which is hard when the front is where it’s going.

By: Caroline

Caroline — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 05:43:17 +0000

Chris, I think a water tanker and lengths of canvas hose are pretty standard equipment for all fire fighting appliances. But you’re right, some additional training would be needed which explains the urban fire fighter’s reluctance to fight bushfires or not so much reluctance but directions from above, against doing so. But when the green bush across the way is alight and the seasoned house is in its path, surely training your hoses on the bush (and the house) doesn’t require a university degree or terribly much training, just some common sense, (which these days, is rapidly being legislated out of existence). Putting out housefires is I imagine far more involved with undoubtedly many more unseen hazards to contend with. I.e, noxious fumes from burning plastics–carpets and the like, exploding devices, etc, etc, than what is experienced with relatively simple vegetation fires, which when not fanned along by 60kmh winds apt to change and heated with air temps approaching 48 is a more straightforward if somewhat dangerous affair.

It probably all boils down to work cover insurance premiums.

By: wilful

wilful — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 05:41:04 +0000

Chris, that may be a logical position to take, however modern society would probably rather seek to overcome the challenge, to conquer and dominate nature rather than accept any other position.

And, of course, lots of existing houses (timber shacks, by and large) are placed smack bang in the middle fo the forest right now. With mortgages etc.

John X, that sort of landscape manipulation is going to have to happen with climate change anyway, though we don’t really know what we’re doing and are guaranteed to get it only a bit right. So I would recoil from your suggestion if we were living in holocene times, but now we’ve entered the anthrocene those sorts of ideas will be on the table.

By: Chris

Chris — Mon, 23 Feb 2009 05:04:30 +0000

Caroline @ 64 – Wouldn’t the urban fire brigade need quite different equipment and training to tackle bushfires instead of house and general building fires?

Wilful @ 65 – One of the decisions that may have to be made is that its simply not sensible to build towns in the middle of forested areas anymore. It’ll be something we visit rather than something we try to live amongst.