Bush Fires in Australia

Northern Advocate, 12 January 1939, Page 6

Bush Fires in Australia

THE latest news of the Australian bush fires, with their heavy and tragic deathroll, is painful to, read. There is something particularly shocking in the thought of people being trapped in a sea of flame, realising that they are beyond possibility of rescue, and that sooner or later the flames must engulf them. , New Zealand, fortunately, has been spared many such horrors, though in earlier times, when large areas of bush were being burned off, the fires occasionally got out of hand causing widespread damage and occasional deaths.; One such fire occurred about 50 years ago in the newly-opened districts of Eltham and Stratford, in Taranaki. All this country, now fertile dairying land, was once clothed in a mantle of forest. It had been felled, but mbst of the fallen timber remained unburned, when a small fire got out of hand near Kaponga, and speedily swept eastward on an afternoon of terror when dozens of settlers lost their homesteads, stock and fences, though fortunately no lives were lost. Tragic though it seemed at the time, this fire was a blessing in disguise as it swept the country clean of fallen timber, leaving a carpet of ash which fertilised the country and yielded that rich growth of grass which gave Taranaki a flying start as a dairying province. Many years later occurred the Raetihi bush fires, in 1918, when a high wind caused fires over a large area. There were several deaths and some harrowing experiences, and a pall of smoke hung for many hours over the greater part of the Wellington Province.

But New Zealand history contains no parallel to this week’s tragic fires in Victoria, where flames are raging in an ‘area of hilly country 300 miles long. Even now it is impossible to say what the death roll will be, though it has already reached painful dimensions. To add to Australia’s grief the drought, which is^ the ,root cause of the hush fires, is causing serious loss in rural industries and many farmers will have a very bad season.