The Northern end of the Snowy Mountains is again on fire as you all will no doubt be aware. It will be most obvious to our readers that SOS-NEWS has been relatively quiet on these supposedly lightening ignited infernos and there is a good reason for this. The reason has been, the information available to us, although it is pouring in from our plethora of sources and stoolies within and without the organisations, none of it makes sense and hence we have been unable to put it together in a format that we can understand and believe, let alone report it to you.

Initially there were two fires that were reported as being on the southern side of the Snowy Mountains Highway near the Rules Point intersection with the highway. Rules Point is in fact the junction of the Long Plain Rd and the Snowy Mountain Highway, or in historical terms, the end of the Broken Cart Stock Route where the stock used to be yarded for dispersal and collection at the beginning and end of the summer grazing on Long Plain each year .

These two fires are now spread across the southern end of the Long Plain terrain engulfing both sides of the Tangtangara Dam and appear to be shifting like the wind. Crew reports are disconcerting to say the least.

• Initially some Crews were left overnight without being fed.
• Fires were ignited on the edges or close to, tracks with no apparent reason discernable.
• Radio systems failed to deliver necessary updated information.
• Back-burns were ordered, started, and then ordering to be extinguished due to being ordered for the wrong place. Not only the wrong place, the fires were already outside the effective area of the ordered back-burn prior to a drip torch being lit and the dozer dropping a blade.
• Vast tracts of land seemed to be being burnt, well beyond the necessary, which on the surface appeared to be an agenda driven attempt from on high to eradicate Plains Grazing to both Brumby's and potential stock drought relief as there are no longer Native fauna left alive needing to be fed.
• Reports of Media people attempting to get into the area against the orders from authority to get to the truth they believed was being denied to them, with these media being located and escorted from the area.
• On one simple fire line, crews were obliged to use three different radio frequencies that were not compatible with each other.
• Volunteers returning from the fire ground displaying their absolute disgust, but declining to publicly be reported as to the reasons for their disgust due to personal vilification fears.
• National Parks & Wildlife Service believed to be the Incident Controllers still, even though this was declared a Section 44 fire days ago.
• Information Staff unable to provide any information with credibility due to failed communication links appears the source of their not knowing almost any concise and accurate details themselves, but doing their best to sound convincing and knowledgeable when questioned.

• We know that there is one of the most experienced aerial fire fighting companies with aircraft sitting on the ground because Koperberg couldn't handle a person that constantly proved him wrong and has grounded his operation service to the RFS (This enthralling story will be revealed next week).
• We know that the Barnett Rd, Boundary Rd, Bramina Rd and Broken Cart Stock Route has recently been seriously worked on to actually be fire trails.
• We believe this work was carried out very quietly, with no fan fare to the public being conducted by the NPWS and we also believe they used section 44 money paid to them to do so.
• We know that the NPWS refuse - from Debus, Corbyn & Fleming down - to allow drought relief stock grazing in our National Parks. We also know these same people with their radical Green cabal, wish to destroy all the Brumbies they can and this is not to turn them to glue, but shoot or poison them.
• We fear that the controlled burning which is taking place in the Tangtangara area is in fact a covert method of burning off as much of the Long Plain grazing as possible, thereby surreptitiously giving the NPWS and Radical Greens another reason to deny gazing drought relief and management processes as well as another reason to cull Brumby's. We know that Debnam has to come out loud and publicly to fortify his government's stance re the MOU Memorandum of Understanding that they have signed and quell people's fears of these mongrels that lurk in the backgrounds of our bureaucracies once and for all.

Greetings Mal,
Great work in the battle for common sense in the bush fire fiasco.

Comment.

Ron Ettery is spot on with his view of the prevailing insanity.

Insanity (It is not only insane to mess with fire while inexperienced but bloody dangerous) at all levels of government is now institutionalised brought about, and unfortunately not recognised as a result of being "without experience" and as a result taking advice from others also without experience, but with a university education. Academic theory should compliment the hands-on experience not replace it, but then if you have no actual hands-on experience how then would you know this, how, - by the use of common sense, but then again without experience one's common sense may not develop.

I am not so sure about the need for study agitated by David Packham. Anybody that has had some experience with bush fire fighting will have done the study "hands on" many times over.

If we need to study anything we need to study "how to first reduce the incidence of bushfire" and how to limit the possibility of a wild fire developing, but these two necessities are about prevention study not fire study. If ones home or person is burnt to a cinder it does not help much to know how hot the fire was.

Seems to me that

1. The best access possible to bush/forest areas is imperative.
2. Perimeter, well maintained firebreaks to bush/forest and grasslands.
3. Well maintained Fire trails (including perimeters) 25 meters wide with a 25 meter cleared and maintained area to both sides of the trail at regular intervals crisscrossing bush/forest/grassland.
4. Water storage for fire purposes (deep dams throughout bush and forest areas)
5. Regular burn off of potential fuel and a big hole in each area in which to bury anybody who says otherwise along with the politicians who fail to make all of the above five requirements reality.

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