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This fire season is the worst ever seen in Australia....and perhaps the scariest thing about this is that global warming will lead to even higher summer temperatures, worse droughts, and longer and more intense fires in Australia in coming years.

give it a break . Global warming has zip to do with the current fires, it is all about bad forest and crop management issues as is shown but all of the existing data. The continent is subject to periods of heat and drought over the last several centuries but somehow you want everyone here to believe this time it is different. That without providing any data to support your argument.

You claim to be a scientist. I laugh. I doubt very much that is the case.

rockdoc123 wrote:You seemingly don’t understand what is being said. Attention to prescribed burns eliminates fuel, hence as the prescribed burn area increases the area of wildfire decreases, as you would expect because there is less fuel. The whole point of what is being said is people can’t do prescribed burns now because they are legislated by the government against it. Last year a farmer was fined $50,000 AUS for trying to dig out the roots of a tree on his land that was still smoldering. One farmer was famously filmed showing how his land had been untouched by the fires whereas all of his neighbors are decimated because he told the government to take a hike and went out and back burned his lot of all the excess fuel anyway. He has since been arrested. If the government let farmers manage their lands you could easily see large areas of controlled burning. The point being it is all about land management, not climate change.

That may be true. It doesn't obviate the fact that the fires are burning in 'wild' unmanaged lands. It doesn't obviate the fact that nature has it's own way of dealing with climate change called 'desertification'.

That may be true. It doesn't obviate the fact that the fires are burning in 'wild' unmanaged lands. It doesn't obviate the fact that nature has it's own way of dealing with climate change called 'desertification'

Look where the fires are, they are centered around populated areas, large tracks of farm land, sheep stations etc. and towns. These are areas where landowners are precluded these days from conducting controlled burns (the way they managed the land for hundreds of years). Areas out in the middle of the outback are not seeing these large fires, mainly because they are not subject to limitations on fire and the burned areas act as back burns, limiting the amount of fuel available. And what freaking planet are you living on where you think Australia is being "desertified"? The vast majority of Australia (around 75%) has always been classified as a desert. The areas around the coast that are variably categorized as savanna, rain forest, and Meditteranean climate zone have always been there, are not going anywhere given rainfall is generally increasing through time.

In California, people have built homes in the hills. Clearly, UNMANAGED land surrounds their homes. Is this different in Australia? I doubt it. And they will burn. In Australia, no trees, no homes, is more typical, because no water

it is all about land management, not climate change.

Your bizarre denial of the fact that Australia has become significantly hotter in the last century renders your posts nonsensical. Back here in the real world the data clearly shows Australia has warmed over the last century, making bushfires more common and more intense and making the bush fire season much longer. Additional warming will inevitably make the bush fire problem even worse.


Of course climate change is part of the problem in Australia.....the climate is getting hotter, mate. Thats just reality.

Cheers!

Australian climate alarmism is as old as European “discovery” of the continent. Watch Tony Heller’s video of Australian alarmism going back to 1700’s, there’s really next to nothing new about the current wildfires. These fires will burn out and the media stoked fire junkies will go into hibernation until the next cycle kicks off, Western Canada>California>Brazil>Australia

https://youtu.be/jW2yZsLHF_w

in California, people have built homes in the hills. Clearly, UNMANAGED land surrounds their homes. Is this different in Australia? I doubt it. And they will burn. In Australia, no trees, no homes, is more typical, because no water

why do you bother to comment when you can't be bothered to familiarize yourself with what is actually happening down there? Up thread I've posted an article that speaks to the manner in which the Aboriginals and the European immigrants managed bush fires and they continued to do that up until the last decade when they were not allowed to do that by law. The Aussies realized they live in a land that has always had fires and hence they needed to manage the fuel situation...this is not something new, common knowledge and common practice in Australia until it was legislated against.

As to California, well there is nothing keeping them from knocking down trees around their homes to build fire breaks (something that the National Forestry Service recommends), or building their roofs and homes from fire-resistant materials. They don't do this either because they think it is better to be in amongst the trees or they are just too lazy. The Smoky the Bear policy which saw all small fires put out immediately also resulted in an enormous amount of forest floor fuel from dead trees. Historically that fuel was eliminated over time by natural fires that were small mainly because they died out from lack of fuel before they could reach tree crowns. Now with all that extra fuel you have a situation where climax fires are quite common, as long as there is fuel they will keep burning and that is exacerbated by the Santa Anna winds.

Both California and Australia suffer from an excess fuel problem. The Aussies know how to deal with it but are kept from doing so by government regulations. The Californians seem to ignore the problem (that they could mitigate) with a view that the government will look out for them.

Of course climate change is part of the problem in Australia.....the climate is getting hotter, mate. Thats just reality.

A statement like this is meaningless without some data to demonstrate that 1. fires in Australia are a result of a hotter climate, 2. fires in Australia are increasing in areas where temperatures are increasing 3. droughts are increasing resulting in fires. None of that can be demonstrated and in fact the exact opposite is the case. Fires have always happened in Australia, the largest ones at a time when climate change was not an issue and the absolute largest one at a time when precipitation was above normal and temperatures were below normal. The map I posted earlier shows where the heating trend has occurred in Australia and for the large part it is nowhere near where the fires are. Instead, large fire areas occur in places like Cairns which have seen almost negligible warming over the past 50 years according to BoM data. Droughts are not increasing in Australia in fact in many of the areas which have horrendous fires currently the pan evaporation which is measured regularly by the BoM has been increasing (the opposite of what would happen in drought conditions).
The classic example of a disconnect between climate change and Australia bushfire occurs when you look at the 1974 - 1975 summer. The worst bushfire in 30 years occurred burning over 117 MMha of land (about 15% of Australia land area). At that time all of Australia and the areas where the fires were in particular had been subject to above normal precipitation and below normal temperatures. For Australia as a whole the rainfall anomaly was 215 (well above the average) and the temperature anomaly was -1.72 (below the average). The exact opposite situation to what you would need to claim fires were a result of climate change.

But your 'data" consists of a map that talks about future projections based on models. If you were, in fact, a "scientist" you would be interested in the actual data.

rockdoc123 wrote:As to California, well there is nothing keeping them from knocking down trees around their homes to build fire breaks (something that the National Forestry Service recommends), or building their roofs and homes from fire-resistant materials. They don't do this either because they think it is better to be in amongst the trees or they are just too lazy.

Interesting: If you look at the pictures of Paradise burned, you will see the trees standing and the homes devastated.

the Paradise fire was a different beast according to the Forestry officials. The fire was a forest fire originally but once it entered the townsite of Paradise where houses and buildings were very closely packed it became a structure to structure fire exacerbated by strong winds which send embers from house to house and amongst dead groundcover (lots of leaves on the ground at that time apparently). The fire spread so fast due to the immense amount of structure fuel that it ended up being a ground fire not rising into the tree crowns surrounding the town. So the problem here was again fuel....with the exception the fuel was the homes and there was not enough space between them and they did not have fireproofing. This is pretty much the same thing that happened in the Okanagan area a few years previous where a new community built right up against forests on the east side of the lake was built quite dense with no fire proofing. People never learn.

The problem was dry conditions and wind, both (possibly XX, certainly) climate related.

Well, geography was important as well. A site that appears nice for habitation, may have other factors not so favorable.

I've only been in California forty years and at different locations. Last summer, I didn't setup my patio furniture all summer long. I don't see any official recognition of an unusual wind season, but I've typically had a patio with umbrellas set out all spring, summer and autumn (we really do have just two seasons). Why no official recognition is possibly wind direction, though.

The problem was dry conditions and wind, both (possibly XX, certainly) climate related.

By “climate related” if you mean related to climate change I would heartily disagree. The climate always has some contribution but it can be natural climate patterns such as the PDO, ENSO etc that have impacts and not necessarily man made CO2.

Cliff Mass a professor of atmospheric sciences at Washington State University has a good discussion on this

https://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2018/11/ ... actor.html

In summary, if one analyzes the situation, it is evident that global warming had little to do with the Camp Fire.

As I will discuss in a future blog, the Paradise area was a ticking time bomb. There was a huge influx of population into a wildland area, which had burned many times in the past. Previously logging and fires had left a conduit of highly flammable grass and bushes, through which fire could move rapidly. Flammable, non-native invasive grasses had spread through the region. Homes were not built to withstand fire and roadways were inadequate for evacuation. Powerlines started the fires and were not de-energized even though strong winds were skillfully forecast. Warnings to the population were inadequate. The list is long. And global warming should not be on the list if we are to focus on the real problems.

As to changes in the wind patterns Mass suggests this isn't the case for the Diablo winds which were responsible for the Paradise fire and research looking at the Santa Ana's also show no pattern in recent history

Abatzoglou, J, and Barbero, R. 2013. Diagnosing Santa Ana winds in Southern California with Synoptic-Scale Analysis. Weather and Forecasting, V 28. Pp 704- 710. DOI: 10.1175/WAF-D-13-00002.1

....global warming should not be on the list if we are to focus on the real problems.

Right-O. Hotter and hotter temperatures and longer fire seasons and record droughts and huge stands of dead or dried out trees and dried out soils should just be ignored so the climate denialists can live in a fantasy world where global warming isn't occurring.

Scientific studies that correctly predicted global warming would cause massive forest fires in Australia a decade ago should just be ignored because they were too accurate.

And all the weather stations should be closed because the thermometers and rain gauges are recording the effects of global warming and we must ignore reality at all costs.

And lets shut down the universities and the scientific research institutes while we're at it, because those scientists there keep finding evidence of global warming, and the climate denialist nut jobs don't like that.


How climate denialists deal with scientific data showing global warming is occurring

Cheers!

Right-O. Hotter and hotter temperatures and longer fire seasons and record droughts and huge stands of dead or dried out trees and dried out soils should just be ignored so the climate denialists can live in a fantasy world where global warming isn't occurring.

Hotter and hotter temperatures? Maybe you should look at the Cairns region in NE Australia where the fires are presently out of control.
Innisfail temperature



Innisfail precipitation



Palmerville temperature



Palmerville precipitation



These are two stations with long records and what is very obvious is there is no long term increase in temperature and there is no long term change in precipitation. And as to dead trees and grass....that is exactly the issue. Australia is a country where ground cover dries out quickly and in order to keep fires from being a problem it requires fire management by way of controlled burns. This has not been happening due to government regulations as of late and hence the very large fuel issue which normally would have been controlled. This is a country that has seen large fires throughout recorded history and the issues today are little different than they were decades ago other than near population centres.

And all the weather stations should be closed because the thermometers and rain gauges are recording the effects of global warming and we must ignore reality at all costs.

Unlike you I am actually looking at that data and it is telling the opposite tale to which you want everyone to believe. Are there some stations that have seen warming, yes but there are others that have not and the fires are just as bad there. In fact the worst fires back in 74-75 were at a period were temperatures in Australia were below average. This means there is no one to one correlation. Likewise the same for rain….lots of places in Australia currently under fire where there is no long term change in precipitation and again the fires in 74-75 were during a period where Australia precipitation was well above average. Again no one to one correlation. So it appears you are the one ignoring reality….mainly because you can’t actually be bothered to look at the data…much easier to just cry “global warming” whenever anything goes wrong and the rest of the religious followers will chant along with you unquestioningly.

And lets shut down the universities and the scientific research institutes while we're at it, because those scientists there keep finding evidence of global warming, and the climate denialist nut jobs don't like that.

God you really don't have a clue do you? Just spin the argument in a different direction the minute you have no facts to back up your arguments. Anywhere here in anything I have said did I say that the world was not warming in general? Anywhere? No, I did not. What I said was that not everything of a disastrous nature is due to climate change which is a fact that the IPCC has stated and any reputable climate scientist would attest to. In fact, the article I linked to above is from a well know climate scientist from a university who is on record as saying he believes man has had some influence on temperatures but as he points out the evidence is that Aussie fires have very little if anything to do with climate change and are all to do with forest management issues. He isn't the only climate scientist of note who is saying this. Wake up and do a bit of research. You claim to be a "scientist", act like one.

Australia's Bureau of Meteorology has just tabulated their climate data, and they confirm that 2019 was the country's warmest year on record, with temperatures running 1.52°C above average, and high daily temperatures running 2.09°C above average.

2019 was also Australia's driest year on record.

In 2019 much of Australia was officially in drought, with drought severity being especially great in New South Wales and other areas where fire activity had been especially severe.

The Forest Fire Index---a numerical evaluation of wild fire danger --- was the highest ever recorded.

There was a significant heatwave in December when the wild fires really took off.

All of these factors are consistent with the observed long term pattern of Australia warming along with the rest of the global climate and creating conditions conducive to drought, heatwaves, and a longer and more intense fire season then usual.

bom.gov.au/climate/current/annual/aus/2019


Forest fires exacerbated by extreme heat and drought in New South Wales, Australia

OK, climate deniers...you may now resume your data-free bloviating.

Cheers!

Australia's Bureau of Meteorology has just tabulated their climate data, and they confirm that 2019 was the country's warmest year on record, with temperatures running 1.52°C above average, and high daily temperatures running 2.09°C above average.

Nice weather report. However for this to be climate over all of Australia you need to be able to show a long term trend ....everywhere. As I've shown above there are large areas where the fires which have not seen significant warming and there is no trend in precipitation. As to drought...2016 saw most of Australia with greater than average precipitation, 2017 saw more than half of Australia with greater than normal precipitation. There have been years of significant drought (eg: 1972) which were followed by years (1973-1974) where the entire continent saw greater than normal precipitation. In 1982 New South Wales saw some of the worst drought and that was immediately followed by 2 years of greater than normal precipitation. In 1924 NW Australia saw some of its worst drought and two years later it saw some of the largest rainfall. As I said previously there is not an overall pattern in rainfall hence not an overall pattern in drought. This was shown previously from a number of areas in Australia


As to temperature, it is generally rising all over Australia (when you add everything together) but the greatest rise has been in central Australia (an area not currently plagued by a large number of fires) and the lowest rise has been along the coast in Queensland and NSW and area which has seen extensive fires. I posted this above but apparently I have to do it again:


No one is suggesting Australia on average has not warmed....what is being noted and based on data from BoM is that the major warming is in areas which are not currently seeing fires of significance. The areas where the fires have been the worst are in areas where temperatures have either warmed slightly or even cooled (eg: area around Brisbane). There are obviously small areas where high warming has correlated with extensive fires but there are more areas where it has not which basically falsifies any correlation.

Dire predictions from bush fire front lines
The Bureau of Meteorology increased the fire risk level for the Greater Sydney region to “catastrophic” for Saturday, which is the highest fire danger level. In Penrith, which is about 30 miles west of downtown Sydney, the high temperature is forecast to reach 116.6 degrees (47 Celsius). Penrith is between the Wattle Creek Blaze and the massive Gospers Mountain Fire, which is 1,109,503 acres in size and burning out of control, according to the New South Wales Rural Fire Service. The Gospers Mountain blaze is being called a “mega fire” because of its size.

So, Sidney, which is located in the cooler trend area ALSO has just suffered extreme heat waves. So, whose lying, you or the statistics?

So, Sidney, which is located in the cooler trend area ALSO has just suffered extreme heat waves. So, whose lying, you or the statistics?

don't be an ass. The trends are measured based on the 1981 - 2010 climatology. If there is a recent heatwave and it is in an area that has seen overall cooling or less warming then it is an anomaly not a trend. This is the same BS that you panic artists keep calling out folks for when they point to cold temperatures somewhere....it is weather, not climate. Grow up.

rockdoc123 wrote:

So, Sidney, which is located in the cooler trend area ALSO has just suffered extreme heat waves. So, whose lying, you or the statistics?

don't be an ass. The trends are measured based on the 1981 - 2010 climatology. If there is a recent heatwave and it is in an area that has seen overall cooling or less warming then it is an anomaly not a trend. This is the same BS that you panic artists keep calling out folks for when they point to cold temperatures somewhere....it is weather, not climate. Grow up.

It may not be an anomaly. A particular region can have extremes in both directions. It's weather stupid, not climate

It may not be an anomaly. A particular region can have extremes in both directions. It's weather stupid, not climate

you were first arguing the wildfires in Australia were due to climate change, now your saying it isn't climate change it's weather. Make up your mind.

A very concise summary:

Climate Change Increases the Risk of Wildfires
https://tyndall.ac.uk/reports/climate-change-increases-risk-wildfires

Human-induced climate change promotes the conditions on which wildfires depend, enhancing their likelihood and challenging suppression efforts. Human-induced warming has already led to a global increase in the frequency and severity of fire weather, increasing the risks of wildfire. This signal has emerged from natural variability in many regions, including the western US and Canada, southern Europe, Scandinavia and Amazonia. Human-induced warming is also increasing fire risks in other regions, including Siberia and Australia. Nonetheless, wildfire activity is determined by a range of other factors includ- ing land management and ignition sources, and on the global-scale most datasets indicate a reduction in burned area in recent years, chiefly due to clearing of natural land for agriculture.

That's stupid that it's either weather or climate change: They're both two sides of the same coin.