Fires

[Lynn Eades]

Just to give some perspective, It was reported last week that there were over 200 fires burning in Australia, caused by lightning.

[motto]

Perhaps we should try and get Kevin to change his last name Jan?
Seriously though, from the photographs the Jimmy seems to have survived the fire remarkably well.
Years ago I remember looking at a CCKW that had been through a fire which had caused the chassis to sag and the thing that stunned me was that the rear springs were also sagged and curved upwards at the ends. It's hard to imagine the intensity of fire needed to do that.
I also heard a story about a fellow out Whittlesea way that lost a collection of Jaguars in the Black Saturday fires of 2009. At least one of the cars had the aluminium engine melted away leaving the crankshaft still in situ.
No doubt there are many similar stories.

David

[Private_collector]

Guys, I don't know how you southern folk manage to get up after something like these fires.

The love of the land must be strong.

[Ryan]

Stay safe those mlu'ers that live in Gippsland, looking bad over that way.

I still say the RAAF should have a dedicated fire bombing sqn. Instead of giving away our hercs to indonesia and such, they could still have an important role nationally.

[Marc Montgomery]

just looked up the zigzag railway (burnt last year?).. amazing -and sad- to think that looters came in afterward..

It so sad to think of all the history (and hard work) gone in the burnt vehicles. I mean who cares if a 2010 or so honda or toyota burns...but original Jags, and all the WW2 stuff.. tragic.. once its gone...its gone forever

We in N Am hear so little of these major fires...the news being more concerned with
politicians antics on the national scene, and locally, fires, car accidents and robberies..and sadly most people if they bother to listen to any news, tend to listen to local news.

Of course Canada has hundreds (literally) of fires, many of them massive, across the boreal forest, but as these tend to be more northerly, there are very very few communities, and generally result in much less infrastructure and personal loss.

With global warming, these fires are only going to get worse in the years ahead (as told to me personally by scientists and climatologists)

[motto]

Fifteen homes have been destroyed in the last 24 hours. The Mickleham fire has travelled over 40 km in the same time despite the cool change yesterday afternoon.
Hard to believe that people only 20 km away have faced and are facing disaster while we had a quiet, comfortable night.
There but for the grace of God.

David

Latest update, at least 20 homes gone.

[Keith Webb]

We were watching the Warrandyte fire from the paddock behind our place, could see the water bombers in action.

[maple_leaf_eh]

Originally Posted by Marc Montgomery

...
Of course Canada has hundreds (literally) of fires, many of them massive, across the boreal forest, but as these tend to be more northerly, there are very very few communities, and generally result in much less infrastructure and personal loss.
...

Wildfires are attacked immediately when they are encountered. The idea is to keep the burns supervised, but not to extinguish them completely. The forests need fire to regenerate. Fires are a provincial responsibity (as are forests). There are no-notice attack crews on standby throughout the summer, sitting with their kit loaded on contracted helicopters. The water bombers and spotter planes are on call if these hard-a$$ guys decide they can't steer it satisfactorily. Someone mentioned the big Martin Mars waterbombers on Vancouver Island in another thread.

There are behaviour and predictive models that use weather, soil moisture, forest floor compostion, slope and past burn history to predict where things will likely get more interesting. One big difference between US and Canadian firefighting doctrine is, the Americans dig huge firebreaks and let things burn down, while Canadians use hoses and pumps to extinguish the flames.