Thinking about those affected by the Australian fires

[scout86]

Been thinking about you all. You're in the news here at least daily. I wish there was a way to ship some of the cold & snow we've been getting down where you need it!

 

[Friday]

So far one state, New South Wales has lost 2.7 million hectares or 6,671,845 acres and it's still out of control and jumping containment lines. It's impossible to imagine that big.

I used a satellite.

Daytime

Where all that smoke is coming from

The 2012 bushfires in the west

(NASA’s Black Marble free high res download, those lights aren’t from cities! Almost no one lives in that region. Can’t even imagine that scope translated onto NSW. But it probably would be, if it weren’t for thousands fighting it.)

 

[mumstheword]

It's really smokey, here, tonight. Apparently, rain is forecast, for Christmas day. If it's enough to put the fires out, it will be the best present.

 

[blackemerald1]

Fresh personnel from Canada arrived in Sydney, New South Wales this evening. They were on the news as they waited to pick up their gear. Getting asked dumb questions like, 'why are you here?'

These are professional fire-fighting people, though not ground crews.

Bless them for giving up their winter & probably down time to come and give us a hand.

 

[Sideways]

As at a couple of days ago, over 5 million hectares of Australia has burned in this bushfire season, which we're only halfway through. Size-wise, that's the whole of Belgium, with Luxemburg thrown in.

Included in that are human fatalities, thousands of people have now lost their homes, and it's estimated that millions of native animals and livestock have perished. Hundreds of blazes continue to burn in every mainland state.

It's hard to fathom that kind of scale. Certainly, having lived in a number of different states, and having relatives spread right down the east coast, I've got friends and family who have been (and currently are) directly effected by the fires, and I imagine that's true for many of our Australian members.

So, thoughts continue to be with those effected by the fires, those who are sheltering away from home, those who have lost livestock (can't watch those parts of the news - utterly heartbreaking), those who are living day to day wondering which way the wind will turn, when the heatwave will finally end, when the air will become breathable again, when some kind of normality returns.

 

[Freida]

This is just unreal. I can't imagine what the people there are going through. I don't even now what to say.

 

[Muttly]

Yes, my thoughts are also with all the Aussies impacted by this. A couple summers ago it was especially bad in my area. While I was far enough from the fires that my house wasn't in danger, the smoke made being outside very difficult. I know that the impacts for folks can be huge

 

[LuckiLee]

Devastating! I hear rain is in the forecast. I hope it helps!

 

[VioletButterfly]

I'm continuing to pray for an end to the fires, for those in harm's way, and for those who are working so hard to curb them. Sending ???.

 

[blackemerald1]

Well today is turning out to be exactly what the authorities feared.

A strong wind has kicked up and along with incredibly hot temperatures has combined to make the danger from fire as predicted.

We have at least four States with bushfire threat & ongoing.

We've just experienced our hottest ever on record day in many places.

Smoke is creating a ongoing health hazard for many people and has blacked out our Capital - Canberra, and is impacting our cities. Health warnings have been broadcasted.

Many fires are out of control and it is estimated that some will burn for months. The terrain that they are burning in is mostly inaccessible. But that doesn't mean they are any less dangerous.

Fire-fighting is primarily to protect life and then property.

Many thousands of men and women are fighting to these fires. Some have been fighting fires since September.

We have firefighters and assets coming in from overseas like the USA and Canada.

The reports of deaths are slowly coming onto the main media channels but it is currently not possible to ascertain how many people have died at this time.

The Australian Government has called out the Australian Defence Force Reserve to assist firefighters who are now reaching exhaustion levels.

The Navy has already been called in to assist and we now have I think, four ships bringing supplies and evacuating trapped people along the eastern coast of Australia in NSW and Victoria.

Helicopters are evacuating people where the wind and smoke allows them to do so.

We have significant infrastructure assets under threat and being defended. Many communities have been evacuated, roads, highways etc closed. A state of emergency has been declared. A state of disaster for some Victorian communities has been declared.

Large areas of the mountains and high country and eastern seaboard are under emergency fire threat.
Tasmania and South Australia also have fire emergencies. I believe Western Australia is facing catastrophic fire conditions too.

The highway between eastern Australia and Western Australia, (Adelaide to Perth) has been blocked and there are people, trucks and transports blocked on either side. This will create food shortages in Western Australian.

Of course the usual services that normally use the roads all along the south & east coast of Australia have been stopped. The roads are blocked and too hazardous.

Many communities are running out of water, food and have had no electricity for several days. They are trapped in their communities by blocked roads and fire threat.

Communication has been disrupted in a lot of communities and satellite phones have been dropped into those communities to give them updates of the current threat assessments.

Many people are evacuating into designated safe refuge areas and these have reached overflow capacity.

So I don't think it would be overstating this situation to say this whole situation is extremely serious.

There is no significant rain forecast and it would indeed need to be sustained and significant rain to put these fires out. We are in our summer season and except for Northern Australia, rain is not usually expected.

So that's a small update.

 

[Freida]

wow.
there are no words
I'm so sorry :hug:

 

[mumstheword]

It's awful and catastrophic.

It's smokey here, again, too.

Our fire is still going.

The damage, and ongoing horror of it (our country's bushfire season), is beyond belief.

Everyone needs ro prepare for whatever extreme weather they already experience, getting more extreme.