Are burn offs really worth it?
This DSE burn off near Bright last Thursday looked much the same on Saturday, but are they really necessary? (Click on image to enlarge)
This might enrage some people but I firmly believe that:
- No lives have ever been saved by a DSE prescribed burn off.
- No property has ever been saved by one either.
- But plenty of damage (to health, property & industry) has been caused by them.
Okay, that’s just an opinion, but I’d challenge anyone to come up with absolute proof that we really need to fill our beautiful autumn days up here with thick, acrid smoke from the DSE’s obsessive program to burn 40,000 hectares in the north east, which started last week and which they intend to keep going as long as they can – including over Easter and even today with mid 30s and gale force north winds predicted this afternoon.
Heaven help us if just one of the many, many fires DSE boss Ewan Waller presently has going in this area decides to become uncontrolled, as has happened in many other places.
The high fire danger conditions for Sunday were predicted days ago but that hasn’t stopped the DSE from lighting more fires!
Promoting 'Beautiful Bright'.
Click 
Ray, I understand the burnoffs stopped the spread of the last Beechworth fire. However they need to negotiate particularly with the wineries as many are still picking their grapes. Also. if it could have been after Easter that would help tourism. I understand that conditions must be perfect however.
I have heard about that claim re the Beechworth fire, Suzie, but I seriously doubt that any pre-burn offs would have slowed that firestorm of Black Saturday. It raced through everything and it did not need any extra fuel.
It would be nice to think we could do without fuel reduction burns Ray, but unfortunately there are still many people who will not leave dangerous areas on high risk days. I think this is your position.
As we found out on Black Saturday, it doesn’t matter how much education you provide on the deadly nature and unpredictability of bushfire, many people still think it won’t happen to them or somehow they will survive a firestorm.
Fuel reduction burning does reduce the intensity of a major fire and can make smaller fires (as long as they stay small) defendable. Much scientific research has gone into this and you can read some of it in the royal commission transcripts.
There are most definitely risks involved in lighting these fires, as you have pointed out Ray. If only people would listen to those who know, and make themselves safe by moving to a safe area on high risk days then we could avoid so much of this risky work.
As a former CFA member, I can tell you – no one likes burning off and the risks involved in doing it. In fact I have had parts of my place burnt from an out of control burn off. It is however, an exercise in risk minimisation based on the realities of our head in the sand approach to what a bushfire can do. Many people will not attempt to protect themselves or others from a firestorm, sad but very true.
While I’m at it Ray, I have read that you aren’t a fan of the ‘Code Red’ warnings.
While it isn’t the only way to do it, the system has been established to try and convey to people the kind of conditions under which they need to move to a safer place (as safe as you can).
The one thing we did learn from Black Saturday is that some conditions make bushfires unstoppable, even with lots of fuel reduction burning.
I spoke to a friend the other day who lives in an area that would be deadly on a
‘code red’ day, he could see the fires from his home on Feb 7th and yet he still tells me he will stay at home and “wait and see” on a bad day because “my house has lots of sprinklers and is well built”…….I only wish my other friends who said the same thing prior to Feb 2009 were still alive to tell him how wrong he is….
The one thing we did learn from Black Saturday is that some conditions make bushfires unstoppable, even with lots of fuel reduction burning.
My point exactly, Craigy. The burns are only effective in reducing the intensity and impact of lower-risk fires. And, if they are not an effective means of saving lives in the event of a life-threatening fire (as would clearly seem to be the case) what is the benefit (apart from providing the DSE with a reason to keep growing the empire)?
As for the Code Red days, my concern is with the way they interpret the conditions and which areas are considered to be at the highest risk. Black Saturday was certainly ‘Code Red’ but unfortunately Messrs Brumby, Waller & Rees seemed to think the areas at highest risk were way out in “the bush” – like around here – when it seemed pretty obvious to me that it was the fringe areas of Melbourne (within about 100 kms) that were more vulnerable to fast moving fires, as proved to be so.
I should add that I’m talking about the DSE ‘mega’ burn-offs, the likes of which we have seen around here recently, not the smaller, more targetted burns that the CFA generally does. Honestly, you should have seen what the DSE was doing (in hot conditions) last week. They had a string of fires going over a very broad area in fairly dense & hilly terrain and it really did look dangerous. Thankfully it started raining late yesterday and now they’re all out!
“The burns are only effective in reducing the intensity and impact of lower-risk fires”
Yes Ray, but low risk fires can do much damage and still be dangerous if you haven’t done enough clearing on your on block.
In our area it is the farmers who were pushing the DSE to burn. They didn’t want the economic hit that comes with a lightining strike starting a fire and then burning through their farms.
I must say I think your assertion that major, dangerous fires only happen near Melbourne and that the Alpine area won’t ever have a dangerous fire – ‘just a little bit bullshit’ – (with hat tip to the ABC show ‘Hungry Beast’).
Craigy, I’m not saying that “the Alpine area won’t ever have a dangerous fire”, I’m saying that the areas around Melbourne represent a greater risk to human life than this area does.
History confirms this is so. I said so on 6 February 2009 – see this post: http://alpineopinion.wordpress.com/2009/02/06/stay-away-from-the-bush-melbourne/ – and I say it again:
We are not as exposed to the higher winds and our terrain prevents fires moving as quickly as they can in the more open & undulating areas around Melbourne’s fringes. We saw this in 2003, & 2006 – massive and (at times) dangerous fires, but never really moving quickly and plenty of time to get out if they start to move towards you.
Thanks Ray, I missed your second post about the size of the DSE burn off. They can be frightening, even to the DSE and CFA people doing them.
Just on your point about fires moving more quickly near Melbourne, I don’t think it is that simple. Yes the Feb 7th fires moved fast and the wind speed was high but the fire trucks that were caught in the open and burnt over didn’t cost a life.
It was when the fast moving fire hit the National Park, and the fuel contained in it, that it started to make its own weather and the ‘firestorm’ developed. This ‘firestorm’ released so much energy that houses exploded kilometres from the edge of the Park and the main fuel load.
Do you have thick bush or forest near Bright? Do you not get high winds in summer…Ever?
The other factor is the hills, Kinglake and my area, Strathewen, are very up and down with different weather in each valley at times. It just isn’t uniform or predictable. You have hills near you I imagine?
As for the risk to human life, how many people live in Bright? We had 210 people in Strathewen, 27 died. Our area was not that populated, you probably have a bigger population, our school has 28 students.
Coincidently, as I was driving along the 2km of dirt to home last night, one of the farmers had large fires going on both sides of the road, about twenty in all ……boy it took some control to drive along and not lose my cool…..it is the same road that was burning as we left on ‘Black Saturday’….Cheers.
Of course we have thick bush, but we do not get a lot of high winds in summer.
The strong northerlies tend to blow from central Australia down across the western & central parts of the State of Victoria while the north east misses a lot of that weather (just like we missed the hail storms recently). The winds that we do get are nowhere near as strong as Melbourne’s and even on Black Saturday they were about 45 kmh, whereas it was blowing 75 to 100 elsewhere.
Also, the hills around here are a lot higher, which slows the advance of a fire ‘as the crow flies’. Eg. The Beechworth fire started @ 6pm but took 6 hours to get to the back of Myrtleford, less than 30 kms away.
Okay Ray, I don’t really want to argue about it – but we have had slow fires in our area in recent years as well……you really can’t take what happens one year and say that is how it will always be….
I think you need to do some reading or talk to your local CFA about fire behaviour if you think higher hills ‘slow’ a fire.
I’m not preaching about this, and if you think you have enough knowledge and information available to make an informed decision about what a big fire will be like in your area, then good for you.
Just remember, many people didn’t make it last year, and they thought it would never happen to them…..
My view is, you need to seriously ask the question on ‘code red’ days – is it worth the risk to stay?
I’m only judging it on history, Craigy. We’ve had really big fires here, three times in recent years, another in the early 80s (not Ash Wednesday though) and then there was Black Friday in 1939. The history is that the fires around here do not move from A to B as fast as they do in the more open & windy parts of the State. Consequently we have had a very low fatality rate.
I’m not being complacent but on a day like Feb 7 2009 we were better off being here in Bright than in most other parts of the State. I also think a lot of the code red stuff is an over-reaction to Black Saturday, which realistically was a one in 20 or 30 year event. It’s understandable though that people are still jittery about it.
Ok I will upset the masses but here goes:
I’m not a fan of the ‘controlled’ burns and I also have to question their effectiveness in stopping a bush fire when the conditions are extreme eg like Feb 7 2009. Alot of the burns seem to be ad hoc, and I have to wonder how the DSE works out where to burn. An example is last burn season in 2009 there were many small ‘spot’ fires lit up in Tawonga South not far from housing. There wasnt a long band of burning which I would have thought would be more effective, rather than lots of small seperate areas burning, close to homes and this created toxic smoke, which I had to wonder how effective these patchy blackened areas would be in the event of another mega fire. I also believe that the majority of the population is igorant about global warming and general fire behaviour, and if there is ever a big fire event then the community feels the need to point the finger, eg blame the DSE they didnt burn enough, when more likely a combination of extreme weather and drought is the main cause. Also the type of forests in southern australia are just meant to burn like it or not, dry scrub and bush burns.
In summary after living through bushfires, Ash Wednesday came to within 200 metres of our home, and the latest fires, you cant stop fires without burning out the entire bush or maybe just removing all the trees. I think the money on these waste of time burns would be better spent educating people about fire awareness and the best ways to protect yourself.
Agree with you STB…Fuel reduction is only effective on slowing small fires and you can’t burn everywhere.
Also the political issue of the blame game does influence DSE and CFA in working out where and when to burn.
Burning off by private land holders is often the most effective.
Ray – fair enough, I admit to being jittery, only time will tell and I hope we don’t see a bad fire for another 30 years…..however……