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The bushfire disaster in Greece was predictable : Comments
By Roger Underwood, published 5/9/2007Land use changes in Greece have caused major bushfires this year and these same changes are the cause of fires in Australia.
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You may well be right about reduced losses of human life from bushfire since 1900, even though we lost 76 on Ash Wednesday. Stats alone do not give accurate picture of happenings. For example a relatively small fire that engulfs a holiday camp resulting in loss of life could give a false impression that the year was particularly bad for bushfires. If Ash Wednesday had occurred at the weekend the death toll could well have been in the hundreds.
The only way I know of measuring assetts is by valuation and I would seriously question the accuracy of any stats that showed any reduction in assetts lost since 1900.
Some people suggest that there are cycles. i.e. Really major catasrophies occur every 44 years and lessor incidents occur more frequently and so on. However unusual incidents as mentioned above can blow those theories away also.
The role of town planning was not mentioned by the author and frankly I think town planners have much to answer for, as there are many urban and rural developments that are truely abismal from a fire fighting point of view. Why would any planner approve the siting of an urban area adjacent to a large pine plantation to the west. This was Canberra and is incomprehensible to me.
But overall, I agree with the author that changed land management and usage is a big challenge to minimising bushfire losses.