Category Archives: Victoria

Australian bushfire crisis: authorities plead for last-ditch evacuation, with terrible conditions ahead

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Firefighters warn they may have to abandon homes, and even whole towns, as bushfire crisis threatens to overwhelm resources in New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia

Australian authorities have made a final plea for people to flee bushfire-affected areas in three states before the onset of extreme conditions so dangerous that firefighters may be unable to defend entire towns.

On Friday, authorities in New South Wales urged people still in a 14,000 square kilometre area of the state’s south coast, and in other high risk areas in the Snowy Valley, to leave overnight.

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NSW, Victoria fires live: Australia bushfires cause tens of thousands to flee in mass evacuation – latest updates

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Victorian premier Daniel Andrews declares state of disaster for East Gippsland, urging people to flee bushfire zones, while Scott Morrison is abused by fire victims in Cobargo. Follow today’s live news and latest updates

Pity the poor #Australians, their country ablaze, and their rotten @ScottMorrisonMP saying, “This is not the time to talk about Climate Change. We have to grow our economy.” What an idiot. What good is an economy in an uninhabitable country? Lead, you fuckwit!!

Greg Mullins says he has never seen a bushfire situation this serious. He was in Batemans Bay on New Year’s Eve in charge of an RFS crew and, “I’m still shocked.”

This is what 29 other fire and emergency chiefs, former chiefs, and I, tried to warn the prime minister about back in April and May. And we weren’t listened to.

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Australia bushfires: tens of thousands stranded while attempting to flee

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Visitors who were told to evacuate a vast area along the NSW south coast before even worse fire conditions return stuck for hours in gridlocked traffic

Tens of thousands of people remained stranded on Thursday evening while attempting to flee bushfire-ravaged areas of the south-east Australian coast – having earlier been urged to leave before the return of extreme and dangerous weather conditions.

The mass evacuation of communities in New South Wales and Victoria is among the largest ever emergency movements of people in Australia. The numbers fleeing the bushfire crisis remain unclear, but are expected to compare to the 60,000 people who were flown out of Darwin after Cyclone Tracy in 1974.

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Australia fires live: tourists near NSW and Victoria bushfires told to leave – latest

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At least nine people have died since Christmas Day, and the RFS is urging people to evacuate the New South Wales South Coast before dangerous conditions on the weekend. Follow the live news and latest updates today

Yesterday, residents in the isolated community of Cann River were expressing concern about food shortages and other supply issues. Some told media they felt they were being forgotten.

The town is along the Princes Highway between Orbost and Mallacoota and has been cut off due to the fires.

But Constance adds, “once this (the fires) all goes, please come back”.

Tourism is crucial to communities on the south coast, which rely on the extra business during the holiday period.

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Australia bushfires: PM’s climate stance criticised as thousands flee blazes

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Scott Morrison’s government under pressure as fires feared to have killed 17 people

Navy ships and army aircraft have been dispatched to help fight devastating bushfires on Australia’s south-east coast that are feared to have killed at least 17 people, amid a spiralling debate over the government’s stance on the climate emergency.

Thousands of people have fled apocalyptic scenes, abandoning their homes and huddling on beaches to escape raging columns of flame and smoke that have plunged whole towns into darkness and destroyed more than 4m hectares of land.

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Three more deaths confirmed in Australia bushfires and hundreds of homes destroyed – as it happened

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East Gippsland fires claim homes in Buchan, Sarsfield and Mallacoota, and 176 properties lost on New South Wales south coast. Follow live news and latest updates
• Are you affected by the bushfires?
• How big are the fires burning in eastern Australia? Interactive map

We are ending this blog for today.

While fires continued to burn today they were not as catastrophic as Tuesday. Instead, we learned a lot about the absolute devastation wrought along the NSW south coast and Victoria’s East Gippsland region.

Related: Australia fires: nine dead and hundreds of properties destroyed, with worse to come

Yep - locals on the ground told @abccanberra Drive this evening that about 50 of 60 homes in North Rosedale are gone. About a third of the homes in South Rosedale. Unconfirmed, but solid local sources. One of the prettiest, loveliest places on earth. So very, very horrible. https://t.co/fL5qn0dKFV

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Australia fires live: two dead in Cobargo as NSW and Victoria face bushfires threat – latest updates

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Conditions worsen with more than 4,000 on the beach at Mallacoota in Victoria after a devastating day yesterday and the death of a firefighter in New South Wales. Follow live news and latest updates

The federal government has agreed to supply military vessels to Victoria for evacuations in coastal communities where people are trapped.

I’ve spoken with @ScottMorrisonMP & authorised #ADF to deploy extra assets to the Victorian fires: 3 helicopters & 1 aircraft will fly to East Sale; HMAS Choules & MV Sycamore will sail to East Gippsland. A Joint Task Force has been stood up with Army personnel & Liason Officers

#BREAKING: Naval vessels, military helicopters and fixed wing aircraft are being prepared for bushfire evacuations in Victoria, at the request of the State Government #auspol

“We’ve got fires burning from the Queensland border all the way down to the Victorian border, across the great dividing range,” says Fitzsimmons.

There have ben multiple challenges, he says, noting that today conditions didn’t allow for the flying of some aerial support craft.

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Australia fires: one firefighter killed as bushfires rip through four states

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There are fears that many houses may have been lost on a horrific day in Victoria and Tasmania, with more extreme weather forecast for New Year’s Eve

One firefighter has died and multiple properties are feared lost after terrifying bushfires driven by extreme weather conditions swept across four Australian states on Monday.

The volunteer firefighter from the New South Wales Rural Fire Service died when a truck rolled near Jingellic, about 70km east of Albury, on the border with Victoria. The RFS said two trucks, including the one in which the firefighter died, had been overturned by high winds. Two others suffered burns in the crash.

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Victoria bushfires: thousands told to evacuate vast East Gippsland fire threat zone

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Visitors and residents told to ‘get out of’ an area half the size of Belgium immediately, in the face of historic fire threat day on Monday

Victorian authorities have told thousands of visitors and residents in East Gippsland – an area half the size of Belgium – to leave immediately in the face of a looming bushfire threat.

Emergency management commissioner Andrew Crisp issued the order on Sunday ahead of what the Bureau of Meteorology has called one of the “significant fire weather days in Victoria’s history”.

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As the long bushfire battle goes on in northern NSW, a brief respite for Christmas lunch

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Two hundred people gather in Wytaliba, where rain has brought relief, but also more concern for the long-term effects of the fires

In the northern New South Wales town of Wytaliba, one of the areas hardest hit by bushfires that have killed nine people, destroyed a thousand homes and burned 5m hectares of Australia in the past three months, a small team has cooked Christmas lunch for 200 people.

Everyone is invited, from the dozens who lost their homes, to the volunteer firefighters, to the Canadian firefighting contingent who have been working to relieve local crews.

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Yes, Australia has always had bushfires: but 2019 is like nothing we’ve seen before

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Record low rainfall has contributed to a continent-scale emergency that has burned through more than 5m hectares and alarmed scientists, doctors and firefighters

As the area burned across Australia this fire season pushes beyond five million hectares, an area larger than many countries, stories of destruction have become depressingly familiar.

At the time of writing, nine people have been killed. Balmoral, in the New South Wales southern highlands, is the latest community affected in a state where up to 1,000 homes have been destroyed. A third of the vineyard area and dozens of homes were razed in the Adelaide Hills. It is too early for a thorough examination of the impact on wildlife, including the many threatened species in the fires’ path.

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Australian bushfires: the story so far in each state

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Bushfires have burned 4m hectares and left nine people dead, and fire authorities say they ‘haven’t seen a season like it’

More than four million hectares of Australia have burned and nine people have died since September in an “unprecedented” start to the summer fire season.

Guardian Australia spoke to fire authorities in every state about what they expect to happen next.

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Australia fires live: NSW and SA count cost of bushfires after Balmoral and Cudlee Creek devastation – latest

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Cudlee Creek fire revealed to have destroyed 86 homes in South Australia while 100 more estimated lost in New South Wales as residents wait to discover extent of devastation from weekend’s fires. Follow the latest news and updates

SA Premier and Governor tour the fireground in Woodside in Adelaide Hills #safires @abcadelaide @CFSAlerts pic.twitter.com/VRfRvWLdny

Many more homes could have been lost in the NSW town of Balmoral on Saturday when the RFS firefighting crew ran out of water.

Guardian Australia’s Helen Davidson reports flames began reaching 200m above the treetops and the town, which is on tank water, simply did not have enough to meet demand.

We were desperately trying to get more water into us, desperately calling for more to come in. A member from another brigade spoke to his boss about getting another truck into us really quick. That company saved a lot of homes.

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Australia fires: NSW devastation laid bare as 72 homes destroyed in SA bushfires

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Australian PM Scott Morrison says government won’t change its climate change policy as New South Wales premier says ‘not much left’ of town of Balmoral

The devastation from Australia’s bushfire crisis became clearer on Sunday, as the South Australian premier said 72 homes had been destroyed and his New South Wales counterpart revealed there was “not much left” of the town of Balmoral, south-west of Sydney.

It is feared the figures for homes lost may get much worse as authorities continue to assess the damage from Saturday, and with dozens of fires still active.

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NSW fires: Tahmoor coalmine evacuated as Green Wattle Creek blaze rages – as it happened

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All of New South Wales, South Australia, large parts of Queensland, and northern Victoria were under a total fire ban on Thursday amid extreme weather

We will leave our live coverage of the bushfire crisis here for tonight.

This is what happened today:

What a difference a day makes. These photos are from Lithgow.

Yesterday:

At my place yesterday or thereabouts. #NSWfires pic.twitter.com/eGmWFHI9k3

At my place right now. #NSWfires pic.twitter.com/OWLqefZ05T

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Australia fires: weather bureau says Tuesday was nation’s hottest day on record – live

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BoM data says Tuesday’s 40.9C was the hottest average maximum across the whole country ever recorded, as extreme heat moves across South Australia to Melbourne, Victoria and Sydney, NSW, and bushfires continued. This blog is now closed

It is still unpleasantly warm here in Melbourne, and across much of southern Australia east of the Nullarbor. Fire activity is predicted to increase tomorrow and on Friday.

Here is a roundup of where things stand:

As of Wednesday afternoon there were about 70 bushfires burning across Queensland.

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Water wars: will politics destroy the Murray-Darling Basin plan – and the river system itself?

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Drought is not the only threat to the river system: the plan to save it is in doubt as states spar over the best way forward

The millennium drought led to the realisation Australia’s major river system would die unless there was united action to save it; the latest drought is threatening to undo the Murray-Darling Basin plan.

The basin states – Queensland, New South Wales, Victoria and South Australia – as well as the federal government, are due to meet on Tuesday in Brisbane amid threats from the NSW Nationals that it will walk away from the plan unless major changes are made.

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Lawyer X: Victoria’s top policeman claims he only learned extent of informing in 2011

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Graham Ashton tells royal commission he knew gangland lawyer Nicola Gobbo was a police informer before he joined the force

Victoria’s top policeman knew gangland lawyer Nicola Gobbo was a police informer before he joined the force, but said he did not know the extent of her duplicity until years later.

Chief commissioner Graham Ashton was giving evidence on Monday at the royal commission into Victoria police’s use of informants.

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Australia fires: heatwave forecast amid calls for emergency meeting

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Conditions ease but Labor urges emergency Coag meeting before extreme heat in NSW and Victoria

Firefighters have taken advantage of less extreme conditions to try to contain blazes burning across New South Wales ahead of worsening conditions and soaring temperatures expected on Tuesday.

More than 100 fires were still burning across NSW on Sunday, including the massive Gospers Mountain blaze, which is expected to burn for weeks.

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Frustrating cities: behind Australia’s urban design fails

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Sydney’s pedestrian bottlenecks, Brisbane’s barren streetscapes and Perth’s freeway fiascos: cities across the country are making classic mistakes

In every city there are places where the road should be just a bit wider, where the bus stop would be better a few metres down or, perhaps, a multi-lane highway simply should not exist.

Bad urban design is a barrier to what should be the smooth flow of life in cities. It ruins commutes and can make daily life unnecessarily difficult for the disabled or elderly.

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