Thread: Queensland bushfires.

Originally Posted by LRJim

Driving through long grass with a hot car is deliberate enough for me, plus it goes lightning strikes then arson followed closely by cigarette butts. Don't know what small percentage your looking at

Yer right yer know James, especially with hot CAT converters. The awful Eyre Peninsular fire of a few years ago was started like this while still on the side of the road.

Locally, from my experience, the most common origin is lightning by far. Used to be a number started by deliberate torching of stolen cars, but this seems not to happen locally anymore.

Some have been started by agricultural operations, most commonly slashing, but also harvesters, rarely other machinery, and also by agricultural and RFS deliberate burns getting away. In the same category probably would be welding or cutting outside on a bad day. One of the fires I attended was started that way by ARTC.

I know of one local fire that started by the bottom of a broken bottle acting as a lens.

A very few have started by the roadside, possibly cigarette or cat converter, but not really known. None of these had any indication of being deliberate.

I know of no local fires started by campfires, but one was started by ashes emptied from a kitchen stove.