There are entire towns that are crime scenes. Towns are gone or have only a few buildings left ie: Marysville, Flowerdale and Kinglake.

It's just unfathomable the amount of damage.


Australian bushfires kill 131, dozens more missing


By Simone Giuliani, ReutersFebruary 9, 2009

Weary firefighters and rescuers pulled the remains of dozens of people from charred buildings on Monday as the death toll rose to 131 from Australia's deadliest bushfires.

"Everybody's gone. Everybody's gone. Everybody. Their houses are gone. They're all dead in the houses there. Everybody's dead," cried Christopher Harvey, a survivor from Kinglake where most people were killed, as he walked through the town.

Police believe some of the fires, which razed rural towns near the country's second biggest city, Melbourne, were deliberately lit and declared one devastated town a crime scene.

"There are no words to describe it other than mass murder," Prime Minister Kevin Rudd told local television.

"These numbers (dead) are numbing ... and I fear they will rise further," he added.

The bushfires are the country's worst natural disaster in more than a century, and will put pressure on Rudd to deliver a broad new climate policy.

One massive bushfire tore through several towns in the southern state of Victoria on Saturday night, destroying everything in its path. Many people died in cars trying to flee and others were killed huddled in their homes, yet some escaped by jumping in swimming pools or farm reservoirs.

The inferno was as tall as a four-storey building at one stage and was sparking spot fires 40 km (25 miles) ahead of itself as the strong winds blew hot embers in its path.

"It's going to look like Hiroshima, I tell you. It's going to look like a nuclear bomb. There are animals dead all over the road," said Harvey.

More than 750 houses were destroyed and some 78 people, with serious burns and injuries, are in hospital.

Many patients had burns to more than 30 percent of their bodies and some injuries were worse than the Bali bombings in 2002, said one doctor at a hospital emergency department.

CLIMATE CHANGE POLICY

Wildfires are a natural annual event in Australia, but this year a combination of scorching weather, drought and tinder-dry bush has created prime conditions.

The fires, and major floods in the Queensland in the north, will put pressure on Rudd who is due to deliver a new climate policy in May. Green politicians are citing the extreme weather to back a tougher climate policy.

Scientists say Australia, with its harsh environment, is set to be one of the nations most affected nations by climate change.

"Continued increases in greenhouse gases will lead to further warming and drier conditions in southern Australia, so the (fire) risks are likely to slightly worsen," said Kevin Hennessy at the Commonwealth Scientific & Industrial Research Center (CSIRO).

The Victorian bushfire tragedy is the worst natural disaster in Australia in 110 years. In 1899, Cyclone Mahina struck Australia's northern Cape York, killing more than 400.

PLEAS FOR MISSING

Thousands of firefighters continued on Monday to battle the fire and scores of other blazes across the southern state of Victoria, as well as fires in neighboring New South Wales state.

While cooler, less windy, conditions helped firefighters, 10 major fires remained out of control in Victoria. But the week-long heatwave that triggered the bushfire inferno was over.

The fires burned out more than 330,000 ha (815,000 acres) of mostly bushland in Victoria, but a number of vineyards in the Yarra Valley were also destroyed. The Insurance Council of Australia said it was too early to estimate the bill.

The small town of Marysville was sealed off by police as forensic scientists searched through the rubble for evidence about the cause of the fire which destroyed many of its homes.

As dawn broke in the town of Whittlesea, near Kinglake where most people died, shocked residents wandered the streets, some crying, searching for loved ones still missing.

"The last anyone saw of them, the kids were running in the house, they were blocked in the house," cried Sam Gents who had not heard from his wife Tina and three young children, aged 6, 13 and 15, since an inferno swept through Kinglake.

"If they let me up the mountain I know where to go (to try and find them)," Gents sobbed. Authorities sealed off Kinglake as bodies were still being recovered.

Handwritten notes pinned to a board in the Whittlesea evacuation center told the same sad story, with desperate pleas from people for their missing family and friends to contact them.

Rudd said it would take years to rebuild the devastated towns and has announced a A$10 million ($6.8 million) aid package. He has also called in the army to help erect emergency shelter.

The previous worst bushfire tragedy in Australia was in 1983 when 75 people were killed.

© Copyright (c) The Montreal Gazette

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MY WOMBATS ARE ON FIRE!

They're gone, Allen.

And sorry to correct you Karma, but there are more towns gone than those three, or parts of towns, the fires in the south east took 21 lives.

I also wanted to update how many homes were lost... 1786 homes after using defence force imaging, they realised it is much much higher than the 800 or so first thought.... 7000 people displaced..

181 dead, confirmed and 80 still missing , perhaps their bodies will never be found, forensics and fire experts are saying the blazes and fire balls were so intense they surpass crematorium heat....

it's gone Allen....

if someone wants to do something.... donate to the www.redcross.org.au -Victorian Bushfire Victims appeal..

One person has been charged over last saturdays fires, one person is helping police with their inquiries in regards to Thursdays fires, and police are narrowing down the other suspects...

One man was released yesterday with no charges laid...




One has to stick with facts here.... and not get lost in the blame game...

Native and domestic animals are either gone, or injured.... people's farms, livestock, and businesses gone, their homes and all their history, gone...friends, neighbours, husbands, wives, sons, daughters, gone...

Millions of hectares of native bushland , gone...

how it happened and who did it, can come later....

these people and animals need support, not indignation right now.

And in the North of the country,.......... land mass equivalent to the size of the state of South Australia is flooded....that's Queensland at the moment, it's our worst flood in european settler history...
people of Normanton, have been cut off for over six weeks, and are down to three days water drinking supply... sounds insane when it is flooded, but their drinking water is contaminated... their airstrip is flooded and chopper drops commence today...



I did want to say, in just 7 days over $100 million AU has been raised for the Bushfire, and flood Victims, by the redcross Appeal, and a benefit concert...

that's a massive effort, for a little population of 30 million...it does not include government assistance at this stage, only corporate and aussie and o/s people's donations...

There are stories of mateship, of strangers giving away all sorts, and offering homes, accomodation, food, whatever is needed...of firefighters who lost their own homes, but saved other' property..

We'll be ok..we just need the rain in the south, and the dry in the North, opposite to what we have now...

I will foster some Aussie Animals! Too bad i can't help other than that

omg this is horrible but good to see humanity is still around in a time of great need.prayers and lite to all the victims,human and animal.