Climate Change Cause of 2009 Victorian Bushfires
Environment Group Says Further Firestorms Likely Due to Emissions
Feb 20, 2009
Coinciding with one of the southeastern Australian state of Victoria's worst-ever heatwaves, in February 2009, firefighters battled firestorms throughout parts of country Victoria - blazes that have left 209 dead and thousands of houses destroyed in one of the darkest days in the country's history. Some hamlets, such as the delightful town of Marysville in the mountain region of the state, well-known to Victorians as a honeymoon resort, have been completely obliterated from the map.
Critics have decried everything from the way the firefighters were deployed against the fires, to environmental policies which prevented necessary burning off of dead vegetation, to the crippling drought which has gripped the state and lack of government guidance on the tried and true "leave early or stay" policy advised by the government's firefighting authorities.
Climate change changing Australia's Weather
Now the respected non-partisan organization The Climate Institute has delivered a report which contends that the underlying cause of the severe bushfires is human-induced climate change and say that Australians should be prepared for extended bushfire seasons and drier weather as temperatures rise.
In a Feb. 20, 2009 address to the Melbourne Future Leaders conference on the subject of the Victorian bushfires The Climate Institute's CEO John Connor told the audience that his organization had commissioned a recent Bushfire Report.
"Climate change is having an impact on bushfire severity," said Connor quoting from the 2007 report. "Longer fire seasons, more extreme days and greater extremes of bushfire conditions….there will be times when no force known to mankind can suppress these bushfires...we have to dramatically increase our preparedness for these fires, fires that are establishing a new frame of reference for firefighters and our communities."
2007 Report and the 2009 Blazes
Connor said the 2007 report proved prophetic in addressing the dangers of the 2009 fires.
"The report's message was global warming, even if only partly addressed, will significantly increase the number and intensity of the fires of this new frame of reference – the fires of climate change," he said.
Speaking the next day on Australian national radio Connor said tragic events such as the recent bushfires will continue to occur on an increasing scale until the world cooperates to cut greenhouse emissions.
Climate Change - New Frame of Reference
He said the study conducted with the CRC for bushfires, the Commonwealth, Scientific and Industrial Research Organization (CSIRO) and the Bureau of Meteorology "projected that we'd have an increase in the severe fire weather conditions and actually created two extra categories from the ones that people are familiar with, of very extreme and catastrophic."
"...what we're seeing in these fire weather days now are off the chart of the experience of firefighters. They're calling for a new frame of reference and that's really what we're facing nowadays," he said.
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