Wildfires

Chile: 200 homes destroyed as wildfires tear through Valparaiso on Christmas Eve

Helen Regan
CNN
Wed, 25 Dec 2019 20:07 UTC

Comment: Again!? Valparaiso has been hit by major wildfires for the fourth time in just 5 years...

Houses burn during a forest fire at the Rocuant hill in Valparaiso, Chile, on December 24, 2019.

At least 200 homes have been destroyed after forest fires swept through a residential area in the Chilean port city of Valparaiso on Christmas Eve.

Hundreds of firefighters struggled to control the fast-moving blaze, which continued into Christmas Day and was made worse by dry weather and strong winds. Military units and helicopters were deployed to help battle the flames and residents were evacuated to shelters. The government regional leader of Valparaiso Jorge Martinez Duran said in a news conference on Wednesday that it is believed the fires were started intentionally.

Chilean Interior Minister Gonzalo Blumel said in a post on Twitter that authorities were working to investigate and "there will be no impunity" for those found responsible. Images show dozens of houses completely destroyed by the flames and residents tried to salvage any belongings.

Comment: Jan 2017: Huge wildfire burns 100 homes in Valparaiso, Chile

Mar 2015: Thousands evacuated due to raging forest fire near Valparaiso, Chile

Apr 2014: Update: Final toll from devastating Valparaiso fire in Chile: 12 dead - 3,000 homes razed - 8,000 people homeless

2 firefighters die as wildfires in Australia rage on - death toll rises to 8

Al Jazeera
Fri, 20 Dec 2019 13:14 UTC

Firefighters, many of them volunteers, are battling around 100 fires that have encircled Sydney amid drought and record-high temperatures

© Mick Tsikas/AAP
Firefighters, many of them volunteers, are battling around 100 fires that have encircled Sydney amid drought and record-high temperatures

The deaths of the two volunteer firefighters brings toll from the bushfires that have ravaged east for weeks to eight.

Two volunteer firefighters died while battling blazes around Sydney, authorities said on Friday, forcing Australia's Prime Minister Scott Morrison to cut short a holiday in Hawaii that had fuelled public anger at the government's response to the crisis.

Australia has been fighting bushfires across much of its east coast for weeks, leaving eight people dead, more than 700 homes destroyed and nearly 1.2 million hectares (3 million acres) of bushland burned.

Australia's raging bushfires intensify: Sydney engulfed in 'extremely' hazardous smoke

Sputnik
Tue, 10 Dec 2019 21:56 UTC

© AP Photo / Rick Rycroft
Thick smoke from wildfires shroud the Opera House in Sydney, Australia, Tuesday, Dec. 10, 2019. Hot dry conditions have brought an early start to the fire season.

The air quality in Sydney, Australia, continued to deteriorate severely Tuesday as about 100 bushfires burned in New South Wales and strong, north winds sent more smoke into the city.

According to a report by AP, the air pollution in some parts of the city was 11 times worse than a 200 reading on the Air Quality Index, the threshold considered "hazardous," due to fine particulate matter being released by the burning fires. Fine particulate matter consists of microscopic solids and liquid droplets in the air that can be inhaled and even absorbed by the bloodstream.

Comment: Australia bushfires merge to form 'mega fire' north of Sydney

Australia bushfires merge to form 'mega fire' north of Sydney

Al Jazeera
Fri, 06 Dec 2019 20:10 UTC

Several Australian bushfires have combined to form a "mega fire" that is burning out of control across a swath of land north of Sydney, authorities said, warning they cannot contain the blaze.

New South Wales Rural Fire Service Deputy Commissioner Rob Rogers on Friday said "there are probably more than eight fires in all" that have merged to form what has been dubbed a "mega fire" in an area of the national park forest.

The blaze was burning across 300,000 hectares (740,000 acres) - with a front roughly 60km (37 miles) wide - within an hour's drive of Australia's largest city, which was again subsumed in a soup of toxic smoke.

"There is just fire that whole way," said Rogers, who added that firefighters could do little more than get any residents out, protect property and hope for an end to fire-friendly dry and windy conditions.

Santa Barbara fire burns 4,200 acres, threatens thousands of homes

Carla Herreria
HuffPost
Wed, 27 Nov 2019 06:13 UTC

© Noah Berger/AP
A helicopter drops water on the Cave Fire burning in the Los Padres National Forest above Santa Barbara, Calif., on Tuesday.

A brush fire that broke out in Santa Barbara County, California, on Monday had grown to over 4,200 acres by late Tuesday morning after winds fueled the flames throughout the night.

The Cave Fire, as it has been named, started out in the Los Padres National Forest and swept over parts of Highway 154 near Santa Barbara's city limits, forcing officials to shut down the highway until further notice.

Firefighters were unable to contain the blaze as of Tuesday afternoon, officials said at an afternoon press conference.

Thousands of people had to evacuate their homes just days before the Thanksgiving holiday.

An incoming winter storm, expected to hit this part of Southern California late Tuesday night and last to Thursday, may help firefighters rein in the blaze.

Too much fuel causes extreme bush fires, not climate change

Jo Nova
Joannenova.com.au
Wed, 06 Mar 2019 17:50 UTC

Flames bear down on Harrington, some 335kms northeast of Sydney, 8 Nov 2019

What was Australia's Environment Minister thinking?

Melissa Price succumbs to pagan witchcraft:

"There's no doubt that there's many people who have suffered over this summer. We talk about the Victorian bushfires; (in) my home state of Western Australia we've also got fires there," [Melissa Price] told Sky News this morning. "There's no doubt that climate change is having an impact on us. There's no denying that."

Let's look at her home state. After 67 years of fire management in the giant, hot, dry state of WA, the trend is clear — the more prescribed area we burn, the less wildfire does. In the graph below the prescribed burns declined for forty years and wildfires increased for thirty. After the Dwellingup Fire in 1961 the state ramped up the preventative burns, and reduced wildfires.

As the BushFireFront team say:

"We can't control the weather but we can control the fuel loads"

Tough call — what do we do, redesign our energy system, pay billions, change our cars, our houses and our light globes in the hope that bush fires will be nicer, or do we just go back to doing what we used to do that worked?

Comment: 'Uncharted territory': Out-of-control bushfires rage across Australia's eastern regions

Meanwhile Sydney is facing a 'catastrophic' threat as the Australian state declares a wildfire emergency.

NSW Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said 'It's going to be a long, difficult fire season,' adding about a million hectares of land had already been scorched in the biggest firefront ever recorded in Australia.

'Uncharted territory': Out-of-control bushfires rage across Australia's eastern regions

Deutsche Welle
Fri, 08 Nov 2019 11:12 UTC

Flames bear down on Harrington, some 335kms northeast of Sydney, 8 Nov 2019

Australia's east is being ravaged by a record number of intense bushfires in a dramatic start to the country's fire season, with scientists warning of worse to come.

More than 100 blazes were registered in the states of Queensland and New South Wales on Friday, with 17 fires in the latter state being described at one point as out of control and dangerous amid high temperatures and gusty winds.

"We are in uncharted territory," New South Wales Rural Fire Service Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons told public broadcaster ABC. "We have never seen this many fires concurrently at emergency warning level."

Comment: Poor koalas. Humans too: 3 dead and 4 missing so far. November is Australia's 'May', so their summer hasn't even officially begun, yet the sky looks like this:

Hundreds of koalas feared dead as lightning sparks wildfire in Australia

Emily Mee
Sky News
Wed, 30 Oct 2019 13:40 UTC

© Rob Griffith/AP
Conservationists fear hundreds of koalas have perished in wildfires that have razed prime habitat on Australia’s east coast.

Hundreds of koalas are feared dead after wildfires ravaged Australia's east coast.

Some 2,000 hectares of land were burned through in the blaze, around two-thirds of which was koala habitat.

The fire was started by a lightning strike on Friday near Port Macquarie, New South Wales.

Sue Ashton, who runs Port Macquarie Koala Hospital, said there was little optimism about the consequences of the fire.

"If we look at a 50% survival rate, that's around 350 koalas and that's absolutely devastating," she said.

"We're hoping it's not as bad as that, but because of the intensity of the fire and the way koalas behave during fire, we're not holding out too much hope."

She said the search for survivors would begin on Thursday.

Bushfires continue to rage in New South Wales and Queensland, Australia

Luke Costin and Natalie Bochenski, AAP
news.com.au
Sun, 27 Oct 2019 18:06 UTC

© Nathan Edwards
Firefighters battle an out of control bushfire on the Lakes Way, Darawank, near Forster on the NSW mid north coast.

At least one home has been lost after multiple bushfires threatened towns on the New South Wales mid-north coast.

The bushfire is easing NSW but it could be a torrid day in Queensland which is still seeing torrid conditions.

One blaze west of Tuncurry, near Forster, jumped a river on Saturday and began spotting across the township that is home to 6000 people.

Less than 10 kilometres further north, another blaze led to emergency warnings for Hallidays Point and Darawank.

Both fires were being fanned north overnight.

3 die in Mexico's Baja California wildfires

New York Post
Fri, 25 Oct 2019 18:07 UTC

A wildfire burns yesterday in Tijuana

Mexican authorities say three people have died in wind-whipped wildfires in the northwestern state of Baja California.

Mexico's civil defense agency said Friday that fires near Tecate, near Tijuana and between the coastal towns of Rosarito and Ensenada had forced 1,645 people to evacuate their homes.

One of the fires closed the coastal highway north of Ensenada for several hours. Another, near Tecate, burned more than 35,000 acres (about 14,200 hectares).