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 1,730 sq km of TAS incinerated as bushfires worsen
Wed 30 Jan 2019
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 Intense fires are burning deeply into Tasmania's Southwest National Park. In this view of hotspots from NASA's Terra and Aqua satellites at 15.00 EDT today, Lake Pedder is in the top left corner while the brown-grey rocky peaks of the Western Arthur Ranges run WNW to ESE from the centre left of the image. On the right, the fires burning in the area west of Huonville dominate the scene. Incident Alert. |
Many tragedies are unfolding in the tense fire situation in TAS on Wednesday night 30th where over 500 firefighters confront nearly 1,500km of fire fronts. At 18.00 EDT, 12 fires were at emergency level and another 12 at watch and act. Three of the emergency level fires are on the Central Plateau and the other nine in the Huonville area in the south of the state and to its west.
Six houses have been lost, three on Tuesday 29th in the Glen Huon area 10km W of Huonville. Many main roads have been closed at various times including the Lyell Highway, Highland Lakes Road, Huon Highway, Strathgordon Road and others in the south, centre and west of the state. Power has been cut in bushfire areas for safety reasons and water use restricted to be available for those fighting fires.
A cool but virtually rainless change began making its way across the island during the afternoon, swinging the wind from NNW to W, after which the wind became lighter but erratic. This was being watched nervously, as such a wind change can rapidly turn smaller fire fronts into much longer ones pushing in an entirely new direction as described in this ABC Explainer. So far, no news on this.
The main fires are burning west of Huonville along Riveaux Road, which extends to the edge of the Tasmanian Wilderness World Heritage Area. Andrew McGuiness of the Tasmanian Fire Service told ABC News that the Riveaux Road fire had started "creeping around the outskirts" of Federation Peak. "Highly likely what's happening there is that fires are taking runs through gullies and valleys ... and then they're running into wet forest and then sort of poking around in that wet forest. It doesn't look like it's taken a run through Federation Peak at the moment, but it's certainly threatening that area." This informative ABC article carries a dramatic photo looking across the Federation Peak area to the Riveaux Road fire.
The most lasting impact of these fires will be damage caused to the fragile Alpine vegetation and valley rainforests in the Heritage Area. These are ecosystems unused to fires and for the most part unable to recover from them. This is a precious area, home among other things to the recently discovered tallest living hardwood tree in the world, second only to the softwood sequoias of California. It is the world's tallest flowering plant. Hotspot imagery indicates fires are already burning up the valleys leading into the Western and Eastern Arthurs and spotting along valleys south towards Federation Peak and Precipitous Bluff near the South Coast. These are areas well known to bushwalkers, including myself, who will be anxiously watching the efforts being made to control them by water bombing aircraft. Most things can be replaced. Lives, and this unique environment, cannot.
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