TheBanyanTree: The edge of the inferno

[Robin Tennant-Wood]

It was the eerie quiet that was unsettling. In 2003 when bushfires ripped
through Canberra, destroying 500 homes and taking four human lives, the
noise is what I remember most clearly: sirens, helicopters, traffic, wind
and the distant roar of the firestorm as it consumed several suburbs on one
side of the city while we anxiously watched for any signs of a wind change
that would send it towards us. But this time an unnatural silence pervaded.

Our country road is not exactly busy, but during a normal day there’s
always a few timber jinkers from the pine plantations and state forest
logging coups to the south; stock trucks taking cattle or sheep to the sale
yards; local utes and farm vehicles. During the school holidays, as it is
now, there is generally a steady stream of campers to and from the
campground in the national park on the other side of the road. Tuesday,
though, there was nothing. National park campgrounds throughout the state
were closed, a total fire ban in place and all logging and forestry
operations suspended. The tiniest spark from machinery, a carelessly tossed
cigarette butt or an unattended camp stove could have sparked an inferno.
There were no trucks, no campers and everyone who lives locally was staying
home. Waiting and watching.

We’d made our preparations, as best we could, the day before. Because we’re
still in the process of building, there are piles of timber and other
materials close to the yurt. We shifted what we could as far away from the
house as possible and restacked it. Our brushcutter had died
unceremoniously a few days earlier so Roger borrowed one from the
neighbour, and I cut down the grass around the immediate vicinity of the
house. Of course, these preparations should have been made well before the
fire season but two cool, damp summers in a row have lulled most of us out
of our usual summer fire alertness. Finally, in the dying light on Monday
evening, we filled two 1000 litre tanks from the dam and brought the little
firefighting pump up to the tank nearest the house. It was dark before we
came inside. A quick discussion over dinner finalised our step-by-step plan
of action – and survival – should there be an emergency situation.

Tuesday’s forecast was for temperatures around 43C (that’s about 110F) and
winds from the west and north-west. The fire danger warning for our region
was set to the highest classification: Catastrophic. By mid-morning our
outside thermometer was already reading 37 and the wind was starting to
gust strongly. The Rural Fire Service (RFS) website crashed by lunchtime
and a Google mirror site was quickly put up to take some of the pressure.

The Yarrabin fire, some 80kms to the south of us had been burning out of
control for about two days and the hot wind, now constant and gusting to
100kms per hour, was fanning it. Evacuations were ordered for that area.
Then came the chilling message from the RFS on Twitter: “Residents in the
Kybean Valley it is too late to leave. Take cover immediately. Protect
yourself from radiant heat. Fire impacting NOW.” This was the first of many
such tweets during the day as more fires took hold across the state. A
smudge of brown on the southern horizon clearly indicated the location of
the Yarrabin fire. By mid-afternoon there was a corresponding smudge to the
north where the Sand Hills fire was well on its way to burning through 1400
hectares of bush and farmland. On the other side of Canberra a major
emergency was unfolding with a fire out of control on both sides of the
highway between Sydney and Melbourne. Already there were reports of major
stock losses and with each RFS update new fires were being reported.

We watched and waited.  The temperature peaked at our place at 38. Hot,
certainly, but not the 43 we had feared. The wind, though, was fierce.
Straight from the core of the heatwave that is still monstering the centre
of the continent, it was like sticking your head in a fan-forced oven. I
stood at the kitchen window and watched my parched vegetable garden being
blown flat. A cool south-easterly change was forecast for late afternoon.
It was just a matter of waiting and hoping that no fires would start in our
district. It’s about 20 years since the last bad fires in this valley and
old-time locals shake their heads in resignation and say things like,
“we’re overdue a big one”, and “just a matter of time”. As I watched the
bush around us bowing with the gusts of hot wind and scanned the skies for
signs of smoke I was put in mind of the line from Dante’s *Inferno*: “Do
not be afraid; our fate Cannot be taken from us; it is a gift.” This I know
to be true, but just the same I’d prefer it if my gift doesn’t come with
roaring flames, choking smoke and flying embers thanks very much.

The wind started to drop around 6.00pm and by 7.00 had swung, as predicted,
to the south-east. The temperature dropped and we opened the house up to
get the cooler air inside. By this time there were over 140 fires burning
across the state, 40 of them out of control. The Kings Highway between
Braidwood and Canberra was closed due to the Sand Hills fire, the Princes
Highway down the coast was closed with an out-of-control fire that was
forcing evacuations from a coastal town packed with holidaymakers. The
Yarrabin fire had burnt over 4,500 hectares. In the four days since then it
has more than doubled that size and is now heading towards a national park.

At about 10.00pm I went outside to savour the cool evening air. There was
no moon and still no traffic. The Milky Way stretched from horizon to
horizon. The bush was strangely silent. No frogsong from the dam, no *boo-book,
boo-book *from the southern boobook owls calling across the ridges, no
familiar wombat snuffling down by the creek. From Dante’s *Inferno* again
came a line: “From there we came outside and saw the stars”. We had avoided
the inferno this time. Through the silence the stars were almost deafening.

As I write we are again under a heightened fire alert. The fire danger
warning has been taken down a notch from Catastrophic to Extreme, the
temperature at Innisfree is hovering steadily around 35-37 and again we
have a gusty nor-westerly wind. The majority of fires in the state have
been brought under control after a few days of cooler weather and thanks to
the massive efforts of the army of volunteer firefighters of the RFS.
Remarkably, and to the credit of the RFS and the awareness of people in
fire-prone areas, no lives have been lost to bushfire so far this summer.

But it’s much like standing on the edge of the abyss and staring into the *
Inferno*. Those of us who have vivid memories of Canberra in 2003, or the
Victorian fires in 2009 that reduced two entire towns to ash and claimed
almost 200 human lives shiver in horror that it should happen again. But it
will. We know now that climate change is here and we are seeing a new
reality. We also know that we can do something to slow, if not stop, the
onset of this reality. It will take collective will and courage, but, if
we're to avoid the inferno we have no choice. To give the final word to
Dante: “The hottest places in hell are reserved for those who, in times of
great moral crisis, maintain their neutrality.