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WORLDWIDE FOREST/BIODIVERSITY CAMPAIGN NEWS

Australian Bush Fires an Ecological Disaster

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Forest Networking a Project of Ecological Enterprises

http://forests.org/

12/9/97

OVERVIEW, SOURCE & COMMENTARY by EE

The eco-times, they are a-changing as forest habitat fragmentation,

suppression of fires in areas that naturally burned, global warming

and other ecological changes combine to produce major bush fires.

Following is Agence France-Presse coverage of the blazes raging in

Australia.

g.b.

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RELAYED TEXT STARTS HERE:

Title: Australian bushfires an ecological disaster, say fire

authorities

Source: Agence France-Presse

Status: Copyrighted 1997, contact source for reprint permissions

Date: Sunday, December 7, 1997

SYDNEY, Dec 5 (AFP) - Firefighters battled Friday to contain a

bushfire they said had become one of Australia's worst ecological

disasters as rain and cooler weather raised hopes of relief in the

eastern seaboard.

Hundreds of koala bears and endangered creatures are believed to

have been wiped out by the fire which has destroyed half of the

500,000 hectare (1.24 million acres) Pilliga forest and nature

reserve near the township of Connabarabran in northwest New South

Wales.

But as firefighters worked to complete a 90-kilometre (56-mile)

containment line to save the remaining 250,000 hectares threatened

by expected rising temperatures and lightning storms, rain started

falling.

"The rain could have a significant impact, but the situation is

still very serious because there could also be lightning that could

spark more fire," a spokesman for the Rural Fire Service (RFS)

said.

RFS Commissioner Phil Koperberg said earlier the Pilliga bushfire

could become the biggest in the state's recorded history and was

already regarded as "an ecological and financial disaster."

More than 6,000 firefighters backed up by aerial water bombers were

still battling 157 fires -- some deliberately lit -- throughout the

state by Friday afternoon when the rain brought what Koperberg

described as "a wonderful bonus."

"With every hour of this sort of weather that goes by, more

containment can be done," he told reporters here.

Most of the roads and major highways closed by the bushfires in which

two firemen were killed, 12 homes destroyed and thousands of people

evacuated earlier in the week had re-opened by Friday.

However, roads affected by the Pilliga fire remained closed, with a

New South Wales National Parks and Wildlife Service spokesman

describing the inferno as an "environmental catastrophe" for the

forest's rare and endangered species.

The area is home to numerous rare and endangered species like the

brush-tailed rock wallaby, the rufous bettong wallaby, the black

striped wallaby, the glossy black cockatoo and a rodent known as the

Pilliga mouse which is unique to the area.

It also had the largest example of dry sclerophyll forests in

Australia and was home to 500 plant species, many of them rare and

threatened.

The spokesman said 80 percent of the Pilliga nature reserve within the

forest had been destroyed, adding: "This fire is an environmental

catastrophe for the animals, especially the endangered species."

State Forest research division scientist Rod Cavanagh said the

Australian Koala Foundation had been monitoring 100 koala bear sites

in the forest, of which 35 were known to have been in the part that

was burnt out.

"Half the forest has gone, but not half the koalas, although there

would probably have been hundreds of koalas affected, which is still

disastrous," he said.

The Rural Fire Service said police had been asked to investigate some

of the fires on suspicion they had been deliberately lit.

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