F for

F for Fire, Floods

its hard to go past F in Australia without mentioning two words that strike fear into the hearts of the most stalwart Aussie.

Fire & Flood

This summer and Autumn have been two of the worst seasons we have had for a long time.

Firstly we seemed to have heatwave after heatwave. Sydney recorded the hottest summers' day ever on the coast at 45.8 degrees celcius.

Coupled with lack of  rain, the heat sparked hundreds (yes that's right, this isnt a typo,100's) of bushfires over the states of Tasmania, Victoria, New South Wales and Queensland. At one stage my state of NSW had over 500 fires burning.

We have fire danger warnings here that were created because we had some terrible fires in Victoria (known as the black Saturday fires) in 2009 where 173 people were killed and 414 people were injured. That day the winds were recorded at storm force, the temperatures were at 46.3 degrees and there had been little or no rain for years.

There were over 400 fires in Victoria that day all being fed by dry bush and grasslands. There were firebrigades from all over Australia on hand to help fight the fires along with helicopters and water bombers.

The usual warnings back then were to 'flee or stay and fight'. A lot of people in the areas that were most threatened had some experience with fire before and decided to stay and fight. The consequences were catastrophic.

Well, this summer was even worse that 2009, we had hourly updates on the fire warnings over every media available. Ranging from Low, high, very high, severe, extreme & catastrophic. (although I dont remember it ever being below severe)  It reached catastrophic several times over the summer this year, most of us have family and or friends in the areas that were affected and the whole country seemed like it was on the edge of its seat hoping and praying for a southerly change in the weather that would bring rain.

The fires take a massive toll on the wildlife, the farm animals, crops, natural bushland, property and human life. Not many of us can watch something as big as this and not be affected.

There are some low life scum who, when they hear that the fire warnings are high, deliberately light fires – other fires are started by dry electrical storms, broken glass, a carelessly tossed cigarette butt or more rarely but not completely unheard of – spontaneous combustion, just from the intense heat.

THEN – our prayers were answered … rain.

Well not just rain – tropical cyclones, 9 so far. Can you believe it?? one minute we are toasting our butts, getting our shoes stuck in the melting asphalt and collecting dehydrated pensioners from the streets and the next we are tying everything down, boarding up windows and filling sandbags to stop the water entering out houses. It's still stinking hot mind you, now we have humidity to add to the mix.

Poor old Queensland copped it again. 3 years of floods in a row and as I write this (13^th March) they are still up to their ankles in water.

Northern New South Wales also copped a beating and again the cost to the wildlife, the farm animals, crops, natural bushland, property and human life is enormous.

It is weird sitting watching the nightly news at home while the windows are being lashed by rain and thunder is rolling overhead and on the tv bushfires are ravaging a community less than a days drive from here.

But, 'we shall overcome' as the anthem says. Even though she treats us mean, we are still keen.

Already there are trees budding, marsupials breeding, people cleaning and building. We talk about the Aussie spirit here a lot, a good example is the attitude of most of the Aussie public towards those who have been wiped out either by fire, flood or both. City folk doing it tough give money to help out,  others volunteer to go into the 'zones' to work at cleaning or clearing, food, blankets and clothing appear as if by magic at the respite centres. Even the heartless banks do their bit by setting up relief funds and contributing funds.

Sometimes I wonder why we all stay here, it can be harsh, not so much in the cities although anyone living in Brisbane may disagree.

If you get a chance read a poem called My Country by Dorothea MacKellar. Link below

she explains our feelings about the place better than I can.

http://www.dorotheamackellar.com.au/archive/mycountry.htm