Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby tastrax » Thu 31 Jan, 2019 2:00 pm

czechingoutofhere wrote:You guys are pretty amazing at recognising the landscapes here. Is that the Needles on the right and Tim Shea on the left? The Sentinels and FIRMS maps show hotspots there that have crossed the Gordon River Road.


Yep - thats exactly where it is - Google Earth looking towards Maydena

GE_TimShea.PNG
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby north-north-west » Thu 31 Jan, 2019 3:18 pm

tastrax wrote:
Paul wrote:The LIST fire history of the past 5 years, is extremely light on for the current fire locations.
It therefore appears to me that fuel reduction burns in the current fire locations has not been occuring to any significant extent.

Paul.


Here is a case where a fuel reduction burn from 2017/2018 was not enough to pull up a wildfire

AnneFRBurn.PNG


Yep. It hadn't reached that point when I drove out, but that area around Harlequin Shore had obviously been burnt fairly recently and this fire just went right over the top of it.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby potato » Thu 31 Jan, 2019 3:29 pm

north-north-west wrote:Yep. It hadn't reached that point when I drove out, but that area around Harlequin Shore had obviously been burnt fairly recently and this fire just went right over the top of it.


That burn was only a few years ago but its well documented that fires will do that.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby blakey_ » Thu 31 Jan, 2019 4:05 pm

tastrax wrote:You certainly can, but in the last couple of days I think LISTMAP has been under quite a heavy load so that may be the reason layers are not showing up - I have noted it failing with bookmarks on a few occasions lately. Also if you are 'logged in" then the recipient of the bookmark will only see public layers (or those they have permissions to see)

Page 23 - http://listdata.thelist.tas.gov.au/publ ... aphelp.pdf


Ah, I stand corrected. I didn't have the 'open bookmarks' icon showing up, but now that I click on the blank the bookmark list appears:
Image
(but the bookmark isn't loading layers correctly currently for me either)

Thanks for the info!
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby north-north-west » Fri 01 Feb, 2019 6:22 am

And the storm on Wednesday night has started at least one new one - just NE of Sculptured Mountain. The Serpentine Shore fire has hit over the top of Greycap and is burning up spurs very close to the tops of Cleft and Murphys.
Southern edge of Gell River has jumped the road, burnt most of the Needles and is heading for Mueller. So far the big one is sidling south around Bobs and sparing the King Billy forests and the summit cushion plants.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Overlandman » Sat 02 Feb, 2019 9:13 am

Whatever, Wherever, Whenever
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby TasTygerGrl » Sun 03 Feb, 2019 7:25 pm

I’m hoping tas fire put a call out for help to flog this dam fire to dormancy as I’m finding it really hard watching this beast eat all my favourite places :cry:

Give me a wet Broom and I will thrash that dam smouldering beastie in submission, oh&s be dammed :D
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Warin » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 11:22 am

Nice article in the Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... augh-at-us

these fires signal a terrifying new reality, as disturbing and ultimately almost certainly as tragic as the coral reef bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Gimped » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 11:35 am

Warin wrote:Nice article in the Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... augh-at-us

these fires signal a terrifying new reality, as disturbing and ultimately almost certainly as tragic as the coral reef bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef.


For how many 100's of years have we been having fires in Tasmania, and just now the fires are due to climate change?
Hmmm
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Mark F » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 11:47 am

Gimped wrote:
Warin wrote:Nice article in the Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... augh-at-us

these fires signal a terrifying new reality, as disturbing and ultimately almost certainly as tragic as the coral reef bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef.


For how many 100's of years have we been having fires in Tasmania, and just now the fires are due to climate change?
Hmmm


It is not the fire itself but the increase in frequency and intensity of fire due to climate change. All else being equal the increase in temperature increases evaporation and so makes for a drier landscape more capable of supporting larger and more intense fires and over a longer "fire season". In the past these fires would still have occurred but the damper soils and vegetation would have limited their intensity and spread.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Son of a Beach » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 12:30 pm

In a discussion with a former professor of forestry, he mentioned that the worst fires are usually in areas with high average rainfalls. These areas generate a lot of fuel, so if they do get unusually dry periods - enough for the fuel to dry out, then they have the potential to fuel greater fires.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby tastrax » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 12:42 pm

Cheers - Phil

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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby potato » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 1:13 pm

Son of a Beach wrote:In a discussion with a former professor of forestry, he mentioned that the worst fires are usually in areas with high average rainfalls. These areas generate a lot of fuel, so if they do get unusually dry periods - enough for the fuel to dry out, then they have the potential to fuel greater fires.


The accumulation of vegetation litter is landscape specific. To generalise in such as a way is very unscientific as it disregards factors such as vegetation type and decomposition. Decomposition is often overlooked by those who would make such comments as high rainfall forests tend (a sensible generalisation) to get higher rates of decomposition therefore lower litter accumulations.

I tend not to use fuel or hazard in these discussions. It's similar to calling feral horses their emotive name - brumbies.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Nuts » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 1:28 pm

tastrax wrote:Some more interesting reading...

https://firecentre.org.au/an-americans- ... sie-fires/



I followed this to a discussion of California's record spend on 'hazard reduction' including mechanical reduction and burn-offs.
Their state budget, just for hazard reduction, was several hundred million $.. and some measures are pretty extreme eg.groomed /thinned zones and dozer-ed firebreaks.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Thornbill » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 1:37 pm

Gimped wrote: For how many 100's of years have we been having fires in Tasmania, and just now the fires are due to climate change?
Hmmm


You might find some insights here: http://acecrc.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Report_CFT_Future-Fire-Technical-Report_2015_web.pdf
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Son of a Beach » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 1:51 pm

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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby mikeb » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 7:53 pm

Warin wrote:Nice article in the Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... augh-at-us

these fires signal a terrifying new reality, as disturbing and ultimately almost certainly as tragic as the coral reef bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef.


Powerful - made me cry to think that Tassie’s wilderness in doomed sooner or later due to climate change.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Grindelwalddave » Tue 05 Feb, 2019 9:03 pm

Gimped wrote:
Warin wrote:Nice article in the Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... augh-at-us

these fires signal a terrifying new reality, as disturbing and ultimately almost certainly as tragic as the coral reef bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef.


For how many 100's of years have we been having fires in Tasmania, and just now the fires are due to climate change?
Hmmm


Launceston Jan 2019 average temp 27.3 (record) long term average 24.5 Days over 30: 8 days, long term average days over 30: 2 days
Hobart Jan 2019 average temp 25.9 (record) long term average 21.7 Days over 30: 7 days, long term average days over 30: 2 days
Wynyard Jan 2019 average temp 24.3 (record) long term average 21.6 Days over 30: 2 days, long term average days over 30: 0.5 days
Ouse Jan 2019 average temp 28.4 (record) long term average 25.5 Days over 30: 14 days, long term average days over 30: 6.3 days
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby potato » Wed 06 Feb, 2019 7:46 am

Grindelwalddave wrote:
Gimped wrote:
Warin wrote:Nice article in the Guardian

https://www.theguardian.com/environment ... augh-at-us

these fires signal a terrifying new reality, as disturbing and ultimately almost certainly as tragic as the coral reef bleaching of the Great Barrier Reef.


For how many 100's of years have we been having fires in Tasmania, and just now the fires are due to climate change?
Hmmm


Launceston Jan 2019 average temp 27.3 (record) long term average 24.5 Days over 30: 8 days, long term average days over 30: 2 days
Hobart Jan 2019 average temp 25.9 (record) long term average 21.7 Days over 30: 7 days, long term average days over 30: 2 days
Wynyard Jan 2019 average temp 24.3 (record) long term average 21.6 Days over 30: 2 days, long term average days over 30: 0.5 days
Ouse Jan 2019 average temp 28.4 (record) long term average 25.5 Days over 30: 14 days, long term average days over 30: 6.3 days


Yes, the conditions have certainly improved for fires.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby mikeb » Wed 06 Feb, 2019 9:25 am

Useful collation of burnt areas and hotspots on this mapping site:
https://ewen.carto.com/viz/2f45bbfa-eae ... 36dMwU08cs
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby mikeb » Thu 07 Feb, 2019 4:53 am

*&%$#! hell - looks like the central Westrrn Arthur’s are in the firing line...
https://sentinel.ga.gov.au/#/
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Nuts » Thu 07 Feb, 2019 5:37 am

25mm at Scotts Peak

Screen Shot 2019-02-07 at 6.26.02 am.png
Screen Shot 2019-02-07 at 6.26.02 am.png (74.87 KiB) Viewed 20349 times
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby RicktheHuman » Thu 07 Feb, 2019 6:39 am

Nuts wrote:25mm at Scotts Peak


Finally! :D
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Orion » Thu 07 Feb, 2019 7:29 am

Nuts wrote:25mm at Scotts Peak


My rain dance is working!
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby philm » Thu 07 Feb, 2019 8:27 am

Excellent news and hopefully more on the way the next few days
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Warin » Thu 07 Feb, 2019 9:13 am

philm wrote:Excellent news and hopefully more on the way the next few days


Fingers crossed for some gentle falls.
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby mikeb » Fri 08 Feb, 2019 7:28 am

Thornbill wrote:
Gimped wrote: For how many 100's of years have we been having fires in Tasmania, and just now the fires are due to climate change?
Hmmm


You might find some insights here: http://acecrc.org.au/wp-content/uploads/2015/12/Report_CFT_Future-Fire-Technical-Report_2015_web.pdf


And here:
https://theconversation.com/dry-lightni ... ain-111264
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby danman » Sat 09 Feb, 2019 3:13 pm

Nuts wrote:25mm at Scotts Peak

Screen Shot 2019-02-07 at 6.26.02 am.png


70mm over the last 4 days here in strahan

anything from 40-100mm over the next few days predicted as well, hopefully some good falls making it to the SW and Central Plateau :)
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby mikeb » Sun 10 Feb, 2019 9:50 am

Lots of rain in SW and Central Plateau - just where it’s needed. As a result no hotspots since Wednesday:
https://ewen.carto.com/viz/2f45bbfa-eae ... 36dMwU08cs
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Re: Gell River Fire - Lake Rhona Region

Postby Grindelwalddave » Sun 10 Feb, 2019 11:43 am

Looking at the map MikeB even though some significant areas of the Tassie landscape have been affected, some very iconic areas could have been lost had the rain not come when it did and due the superb work of our firefighters. Also there was commentary on social media that the decline in forestry activity was to blame for these fires. Plenty of cleared coupes plantation and otherwise in the Riveaux Road fire.
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