More on Nillumbik

Here is a report by a bushfire expert on the fire risk in Nillumbik, written in 2003:

The Shire of Nillumbik is living on borrowed time. If the current drought ends the threat for now will end. That would then give the Shire time to improve its fire protection to an acceptable level.

A prohibition on fine fuel removal and the requirement for vegetation close to houses is a recipe for increased house destruction.

The major thereat comes from the high fuel levels in the publically owned lands to the north. Some of the neglect comes from a lack of resources but some comes from a determination to not manage dangerous fuel levels.

Less but still serious threats come from Shire reserves and roadsides that increase the danger to residents and emergency services to extreme levels.

Get that people. The government forbade the residents of Nillumbik from removing flammable materials from near their homes. Forbade. They were told that there was a disaster waiting to happen and they said that nobody was allowed to do anything about it.

Comments

[Peter MG]

Good find, It's also worth noting that the Eucalyptus canopy has been growing faster than ever, due to the greater concentrations of CO2 in the air. Even more reason for them to properly manager their environment. I'm from New Zealand and was in secondary school in the early 70's and can remember learning about the importance of fire in managing the Australian outback. I can well remember the terrific sunsets we would get with the regular bush fires in Australia. It just seems the the modern moronic environmentalist has about 1/1000 the brain power we had back then and for them everything must be preserved as is at all cost, when this is often the wrong choice.
Unfortunatly as always we need tradgedy before action is taken.

[Gary Storm]

I heard on the news today about a council meeting they had in that shire last night, where surviving residents were very vocal in their condemnation of the council and it's murderous policies of not clearing brush away from dwellings and not removing dead trees. Some of the people had lost family as well as their houses. One guy had lost his wife and young daughter. He was shouting at the council and when he went to leave he was overcome by grief and collapsed.

Here in Western Australia the policy is to do controlled fires to clear the scrub every couple of years. This burns off the buildup of fuel. As far as I know they don't have that policy elsewhere in Australia (but I bet they soon will). W.A. also makes residents clear dead trees and keeps dense vegetation away from the houses. A shame no-one listened to the Victorian residents back in 2003. Maybe the relevant councillors should face manslaughter/murder charges, as well as the arsonists.

[Bishop Hill]

Gary

I would have thought that one could make a reasonable case of criminal negligence, although experience suggests that politicians are never held responsible for anything, ever. It's called democratic accountability.

[Vinnster]

The same thing happened in California years back. The moonbat Liberals made it illegal to clean combustible materiel away from homes...the result was the lose of thousands of home over the years. They even attempted "controlled burns" which got out of control in several cases and burned thousands of acres.

Of course there were the criminal types (according to moonbat Liberals) who cleaned the material back in spite of the law...there houses were still standing after the burns...the good news was the burnt-out moonbats moved on.