Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Fires in Australia

Indeed

I would advise caution interpreting this “photo” - Peter is on the mark here

Yes I was sent it in the belief it was a genuine NASA photograph so sorry for any misleading on this situation.

I've been thinking....

from all that has been said here and others have written it seems to me that the brush fires in Australia and California are almost entirely of our own making, due to politically motivated eco-fiddling.

Peter G explained how that Aboriginal "fire stick farming" actually altered the Australian landscape and mentioned that traces of ash layers in Lake sediments can be dated back to the before the arrival of western settlers in the region. When early explorers moved out from Sydney they referred to the forest as open forest, This is thought to have meant large but spaced trees with grass or undergrowth separating them. The Aboriginals periodically burned the build up of fire dangerous undergrowth in seasons when it was safe to do so. This also encouraged fresh grass growth to feed the kangaroos that can breed prolifically in good seasons.


Reflecting on all this I have come to believe that Ms G Thunberg and her supporters, including Extinction Rebellion, know exactly how to drastically reduce the CO2 emissions caused by the humans on this planet. They do indeed, have the solution to global warming.

Unfortunately putting their solution into place at a rate capable of achieving rapid results would destroy the human society they believe they can save. How is this?

To cut CO2 emissions as they propose would require draconian enforcement as humans are generally incapable of damaging their individual lifestyle and quality of life in the name of social betterment, so would not buy into it voluntarily. The cuts in the use of fossil fuels they demand would all but eliminate heavy industry, including the generation of electricity, the production of metals and chemicals (pharmaceuticals) and much food. It would make human travel by air, sea, road and rail and the shipment of cargo by the same means impossible.

The result would be the economies of Russia, China, India and much of South Asia and South America would stall and western society would go into meltdown, together probably triggering global conflict.

The naivety of the proponents of this solution beggars belief, yet the media and left wing governments or opposition parties claim to be committed to make it all happen, but are incapable of explaining in detail just how it would happen. Worse, they deny the knowledge and experience of the first settlers, who worked in harmony with the land.

My considered opinion is that without a radical adjustment of the approach to environmental management, moving away from the science logic of the academics, who know the numbers for everything, but understand little we cannot make change. Instead we need to accept we have made a mess and start to clear it up using "working with nature", understanding why the ancients did what they did and building on it. It is worth note that here south of Salisbury the water meadows each side of the river Avon, between Salisbury and Downton and then between Fordingbridge and Ringwood, and which were laid out between 1665 and 1690, and according to some, based on drainage set out by the Romans, have consistently ensured that none of the towns flood. No expensive modern flood remediation work has been needed, although about 15 years ago there was a flood in Downton, due mostly to lack of maintenance of the locks and gates. It is mainly as a consequence of land ownership stability that they remain unchanged, despite recent attempts by developers to build on the land.

This is an interesting paper on the way it all happened, so long ago.
https://bahs.org.uk/AGHR/ARTICLES/51n2a3.pdf
The meadows still flood, but not in quite the same controlled manner

Rant over....

All civilisations crumble, and so will this one.

No one will willingly recalibrate their lifestyle, and no country will unilaterally de-industrialise.

Every solution proposed simply changes the global impact, and none more so by the production and disposal of batteries.

Most of us here will be gone in 30 years so we won't see the gradual changes develop, but quite honestly, if we don't stop commercial flying and world wide transhipment by diesel container ships (and cruise ships), world travel will decline, because there will be fewer places worth visiting.

Electric cars? Isn't this a drop in the ocean????

It's time to show active support .

My local Rural Fire Service will be holding its first volunteer training session at its magnificently named "Wallaby Joe" facility.
Training starts at 6.30pm tonight.

I will be there....

Good article and a nice "Rant"

Garry that is great. As I said to one neighbour who asked why I bothered joining the local volunteer fire unit, well if my house is on fire and your house is on fire and I am the only person with a fire hose which house do you think will be put out first? I was joking but seriously if people don't volunteer for these things they can't really complain if their own house does get burnt down.

The ACT has a thing called Community Fire Units CFU that I joined about 10 years ago, hopefully I never need to use my training but it is handy to have the experience. So far the only real action I have seen is standing with a fire hose filling up small 4WD tankers for the fire brigade that went up the hill to the fire, not really exciting but the fire bridge said it certainly helped put out the fire quicker. Pretty boring after a while but safer than being where the fire was and sometimes I prefer boring.

Each CFU has about 20 members and allocated to an area. For some reason they don't want us to go to other areas, we will only get called up if there is a fire in our area. I guess the good thing is I know where each hydrant is, how many hoses to join together to get behind the houses in each street within the area and what are some safe escape paths out if I have to save myself.

Each month we go around and clean out hydrants, if people have buried them under shrubs ask them politely to expose the hydrant, put notes on peoples cars if they park over a hydrant, when testing each hydrant we give the gardens nearby a nice water which in this drought makes people happy. I have also cleared some common areas that I thought were a fire hazard.

We have a petrol pump that we can put in a pond or swimming pool to suck out water that we test every couple of months. What gets me is for some reason no one older than me or younger than me know how to start it, I guess the older can't remember what a choke is and the younger have never seen one. Plus they stuff around on half throttle once it does start and the water they have primed it with runs out and it never starts sucking. I doubt we will ever have to use it for real as there is enough hydrants for us to reach into the bush behind all the houses - but if so I hope I am there if we do as generally I get it going and sucking pretty quickly.

https://twitter.com/HappyHarryMedia/status/1212740948813324288?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1212740948813324288&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.danisch.de%2Fblog%2F2020%2F01%2F07%2Fueber-desinformation-kontinent-vandalismus-und-die-fucking-wombats%2F

It’s still quite relevant though Richard. It’s made up of composite satellite photos and whilst it looks like much of Australia is burning, it does show the extent of the fires that have happened and those that still burn. Quite horrifying just how much has been affected.