All 2019/20 bushfire comments here.

**PhilipA** · 31st January 2020, 02:56 PM

And Bob, unwitting arsonists lit this one.

Regards PhilipA

**4bee** · 31st January 2020, 03:12 PM

Unwitting & arsonists in the same sentence Philip? Can they be both?

**4bee** · 31st January 2020, 03:26 PM

Originally Posted by Fatso

Because chocolate milk comes chocolate cows , and every thing else grows at woollies .

.

And Malted, and Coffee Milk, & Strawberry?

I have heard of a Cow called Strawberry but certainly not the others.

**PhilipA** · 31st January 2020, 08:18 PM

Unwitting & arsonists in the same sentence Philip? Can they be both?

Of course they can.
Bloke with welder outside.
Helicopter with landing light.
cigarette out of car window.
Kid with magnifying glass.
Regards PhilipA

DiscoMick · 31st January 2020, 08:41 PM

Climate change = extreme drought = high fuel load = accidental arson.

**Eevo** · 31st January 2020, 08:59 PM

fires have been happening for hundreds of years but this year its due to climate change....

**350RRC** · 31st January 2020, 09:09 PM

Originally Posted by PhilipA

Of course they can.
Bloke with welder outside.
Helicopter with landing light.
cigarette out of car window.
Kid with magnifying glass.
Regards PhilipA

In each of these cases it has to be quite dry for a fire to take hold.

DL

**Old Farang** · 31st January 2020, 09:23 PM

Originally Posted by PhilipA

Of course they can.
Bloke with welder outside.
Helicopter with landing light.
cigarette out of car window.
Kid with magnifying glass.
Regards PhilipA

Land Rovers driving through spinifex. Tractors with down swept exhaust pipes. Combine harvesters, leading to them being banned on high fire risk days.
And as for helicopters; small mustering types have a very low exhaust which can also cause a fire if landing in long grass or scrub.

**trout1105** · 31st January 2020, 09:39 PM

Originally Posted by PhilipA

Of course they can.
Bloke with welder outside.
Helicopter with landing light.
cigarette out of car window.
Kid with magnifying glass.
Regards PhilipA

Don't forget the idiots that don't put out their camp fire when they have finished with it and the dopey governments and councils that allow people to light these fires in the first place.

**JDNSW** · 1st February 2020, 05:50 AM

Arson = " The malicious setting fire to property"

I do not see how accidental and malicious can describe the same act.

In my view, human caused fires can be divided into several categories:-

1. Arson - deliberately lit and intended to cause damage

2. Careless a) deliberately lit, but not intended to spread b) Did not intend to start a fire but should have known that action was likely to.

3. Accidental - fire started by human activity that would not normally start a fire.

Of these, 1 will always be criminal. In periods of fire ban, 2a and specific types of 2b will usually be criminal.

Type 3 covers a wide range of causes from the BMW police car that stopped in long grass after pulling over a motorist, to a fire I know started by a broken bottle, to trees falling on power lines, to the fires started on the Eyre Hwy by a flat tyre.

But any of these could lead to civil court action!

Despite the above, in my experience, most fires, including the biggest one this summer (Gospers Mtn) are started by lightning.

And the issue this summer has been not so much the number of fires starting, as the conditions in which they started - several years of almost the worst drought on record, with a summer of record temperatures and abnormally strong winds. While this particular fire season cannot be directly linked to climate change, this sort of thing being more common is exactly the scenario predicted for climate change a decade or more ago.

Probably a bit premature to call it "the new normal", but although this is possible, we won't know whether it is for another decade or two.

Thread: All 2019/20 bushfire comments here.

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