Media portrayal of the NSW and Queensland bushfires as “catastrophic” erroneously implies that they are unprecedented, whereas droughts make bushfires inevitable in Australia’s highly flammable eucalypt forests. Certainly, threats to life and property have increased as more people build a “house among the gum trees”, but that’s more the reason to manage fuel loads around settlements and towns. Contrary to claims by the Greens and environment ideologues that this season’s fires are the result of human-caused climate change, the Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) warned in September that a severe drought was likely, due to a 40-degree warming of the atmosphere…
