Fires still raging in Australia and still out of control? How long has this being going on and why are they unable to contain it?

I'm an Australian living not far from three of the fire-prone areas.
My area, the Tweed Valley, has the highest average annual rainfall in NSW, 1662 mm or 65.5 inches.
Normally, this place is the least prone to drought and fire. The last two years had very little rain, this year almost none. The grass has been dead brown and nibbled down to the earth for many months. Leaves have been dropping off the evergreen trees.
The average temperature across the continent has been 1ºC hotter since 2002. It's now closer to 1.5ºC hotter. Seems small, but the ecosystem is not adapted to cope.
The Great Barrier Reef is now 90% dead.

Things have changed due to climate change - and this year is when the changes have finally reached the critical point where everyone  can see the truth of it.

My own place is at risk.
I cannot afford insurance - and no insurer would accept the risk.
For the same reason, no one would buy this land if I tried to sell.
If it goes up, I will lose almost everything I have.
I am too old to find work or be capable of starting over again.

To answer your question...

1. Australia is enduring the worst drought on record.
One has to live here to realise just how bad that really is, what it means in terms of consequences - hundreds of thousands of animals dying of starvation, farmers committing suicide because they've lost everything, businesses in country towns going bankrupt, prices of food skyrocketing...
We have always had cycles of disastrous floods, droughts and fires -
but the increased severity this year is due to climate change.
This is not my personal opinion. It is the consensus of all the environmental scientists and specialists.
The drought not only dries everything out so that it burns more easily; it means there is less water
and often NO water with which to fight the fires.
In some cases, water is being trucked 800 kilometres in 24/7 continual relays.
It's triage only. The fires are so enormous that nothing could put them out except several days of heavy 24 hr rain.
None is forecast. Weather science is far more sophisticated now. An El Niño cycle in the Southern Indian Ocean means there will be insufficient rain this year or next.
Triage means the firefighters only fight the edges of the fires near human habitations, and that only in the most critical areas.
There are not enough resources to go round.

2. Since colonial days over 2 centuries ago, white people have prevented Aborigines from practising fire culture. Aborigines used to burn small circular areas during the coolest times of the year. This had many advantages. The small amount of ash fertilised the ground and encouraged growth. Many of the native plants depend on fire for their seeds to sprout. Wallabies and other edible animals came in to graze the fresh grass and were easy to hunt. By preventing too much dry tinder (twigs, leaf litter, fallen branches) from accumulating, major fires (caused by lightning) were prevented.
White people's methods of back burning are not as effective because they don't sufficiently understand the geography and ecosystems.
Aborigines care for ALL the land because they regard it as a living entity, a totality in which all the parts are dependent on all the others.
Whites only backburn around roads, infrastructure and human habitations. Where there are remaining forests, the government regards them as timber resources and nothing more. They stole the land from the Aborigines; those they didn't murder, they displaced. (This word "displace" would require an essay to define; it incorporates many kinds of institutionalised, systematic and deliberate crimes.)

3. Our firefighters are widely acknowledged as the best in the world as far as technique goes. 
But we have far too few of them. Even when we fly in every volunteer from all over the country, there are still far too few.
Trying to fight a fire without training is about the same as suicide; chances of not surviving are very high.
Except for a few at the top level of administration, all of them are trained volunteers.
Normally they have other jobs. Their bosses let them off work when there are fires that must be fought - and when this happens they get no pay.

4. We have insufficient equipment. Too few aeroplanes, helicopters, trucks, everything.

5. We have insufficient money. We are a small population in a vast land. Few of us are rich, and those few posses only a fraction compared to the wealthy in other countries. What the government can draw on from the pool of taxes does not cover our basic social needs, let alone emergencies. What we need is a well-resourced standing army of professional firefighters, well equipped, stationed near all forests, a year-round program of backburning done according to the ancient Aboriginal techniques, and a system of solar desalination of ocean water with pipelines and fireproof pumps.

6. Many months before these fires began, the top firefighters (people with 40 - 50 years experience) foresaw the dangers and warned all our politicians. First, they tried repeatedly to see our Prime Minister and the State Premiers in person. After being repeatedly refused, they sent long and expertly written reports. None of the politicians or bureaucrats read the reports. The main reason is that they are in denial - especially at the Federal level. They genuinely believe that the idea of climate change is a myth created by the left.

7. Our Prime Minister, Scott Morrison, waited for months before bringing in the army to provide help, despite constant pleas and pressure from just about everyone. When he did, they were able to essential provide back up support which freed up many of the firefighters so they could go direct to fighting the fires. Morrison is still blundering around over this issue like an idiot. Even his own party are getting seriously worried. We are still only at the start of our summer. As catastrophic as it has been so far, we still have not seen the worst. We are heading into record heatwaves.

I wrote a blog about the fires on aM on Nov 11th, thinking that maybe no one in America had heard of them.
There were two responses from members. Apart from that, I don't think anyone else read it.

Since then, I've learned that the fires have hit the news headlines all over the world. Everyone who watches the news knows.
In December, California sent two of its specialised aircraft and 27 of its firefighters to help us with our fires.
There is no way to express our gratitude.
We have sent our teams to help you with your fires in previous years, and will again in future.

Even if most Muggers feel indifferent about others in far-flung lands, it is wonderful to know that you care, Rosie.
Tears of gratitude.
Thank you.


This post was edited by inky at December 30, 2019 9:54 AM MST