In mid-2000,
Victorian foresters
were among Australia’s
forest fire specialists
sent to the US
to help fight several
huge wildfires.
Upon returning,
they talked about
huge forest fires,
despite huge fire
suppression efforts,
featuring large fleets
of aerial water-bombers.
Controlling large
US wildfires
was slow and
often thwarted
by over-zealous
fire-fighter safety
protocols.
Just 20 years later,
huge US-style fires
have become
a regular feature
of south-eastern
Australian summers.
Twenty years ago,
large forest fires
were not blamed
on climate change.
US wildfire analyst
Stephen Pyne was
attributing them
to the evolution
of an
aircraft-based
‘paramilitary
emergency
response
culture’.
Traditional
wildfire
mitigation
was balancing
off-season land
management
with in-season
fire suppression.
The shift was
to an approach
dominated by
the in-season
emergency
response, with
very expensive
water-bombing
aircraft massively
increasing the costs
of dealing with
US wildfires.
The aircraft-based
emergency response
was based on a need
to protect US suburbs
homes and towns
increasingly built
near flammable
forests.
Pyle contended
the new approach
was failing to improve
wildfire outcomes because:
-- It focused on
treating the symptoms
-- massive expenditure
on aircraft reduces the
budgetary resources
for off-season
fire mitigation
activities.
Such as fuel hazard reduction,
and maintaining forest access,
that is integral to quickly
containing fires while they
are small.
-- Aerial water-bombing
saves houses and other
community assets, but is
ineffective in controlling
most forest fires.
-- An over-reliance on
aerial water-bombing
was partly displacing
ground-based fire-fighting,
which is integral
to containing wildfires.
According to Pyle,
a focus on
aircraft-based
emergency response
leads to bigger fires,
and bigger fires
increase political
demands to expand
the fleet of fire-fighting
aircraft.
Nowhere in the world
has increasing the
numbers of fire-fighting
aircraft ever reduced
the incidence and extent
of large forest fires.
Australian forest fire
management has followed
the US example -- it committed
$20 million to lease
four very large air tankers
from North America
for the 2019-20 fire season.
Southern and
eastern Australia
are more frequently
experiencing
larger bushfires,
but the cause
is already known
from the many
formal public inquiries,
reviews and a royal
commission,
since 2003:
Inadequate levels
of land management
-- fuel-hazard reduction
and maintaining
forest access.
And allowing
national parks
to be "natural"
-- full of fuel for fires.
The public
commentary
surrounding the
2019-20 bushfires
has not considered
the effectiveness
of current forest
fire-fighting strategies.
The recent fires
were fought with
a national fleet
of 144 planes,
(versus only seven
planes contracted
for fire-fighting in Victoria
during the 1982-83 fires),
and yet 144 planes
did little to contain
the fire spread.
In the five years
prior to the
1982-83 season,
~1.3 million hectares
of forest was fuel reduced
and therefore able to assist
bushfire control.
In the five years
prior to the current
2019-20 season,
only about half as much
(~690,000 hectares)
had been fuel reduced.
Fuel reduction plays
an important role,
by facilitating
easier control
of the fires.
The upcoming Australian
Royal Commission report
is likely to be overwhelmed
by climate change concerns.
Perhaps even ignoring
effective land management
that enables quick control
of fires while they are small.
In the past,
fire-fighting
was primarily
ground-based
... and more effective.