LIVING DANGEROUSLY: Bush fringe properties in the suburb of Tolmans Hill.
It could happen to us
MARK WORLEY
February 15, 2009 12:00am
FIREFIGHTERS are preparing "attack plans" to help save Hobart's tree-rimmed suburbs from the threat of bushfires.
As Victoria continues to burn in the wake of last week's devastating fires, the Tasmania Fire Service says the prospect of a major bushfire threatening Hobart is real.
And they say the "urban interface", where new suburban areas encroach into bushland, are directly in the firing line.
Hobart's fringe suburbs have been hit regularly by fires over the past decade, but no lives and just a handful of houses have been lost.
But local mayors say it is only a matter of time before a firestorm hits the city on a scale not witnessed since the 1967 Black Tuesday fires.
To help prepare for the threat, firefighters are developing fire management plans for all of the suburbs on the urban fringe around Hobart.
Deputy regional fire chief Chris Arnol said comprehensive plans covering about 40 different suburban areas were being devised and would be fully operational within two years.
He said the plans would cover all of the areas threatened by bushfire, including western shore suburbs like Mt Nelson, Tolmans Hill, Fern Tree and Taroona, and Eastern Shore suburbs like Mt Rumney, Geilston Bay, Mornington and Rosny - among a long list of others.
"If the people living around Hobart want assurances that what happened in Victoria won't happen here, then they simply won't get them from us," Mr Arnol said.
"The threat is as real as it has ever been.
"We want to compile all of the information we have about the areas around Hobart's fringes - things like access routes, water supplies and what direction fires have threatened from in the past.
"That way, when a fire threatens a specific area, we will be ready to respond with the right resources and the right plan to control it.
"For example, with a suburb like Tolmans Hill we know that the most likely fire threat will come from the area around the Waterworks Reserve.
"In saying that, about 10 years ago another fire came in from the Mt Nelson side of the suburb, so we would look to prepare ourselves with a plan which would account for both threats."
Mr Arnol said the urban interface nationally had doubled in size over the past 20 years.
"People want to live in the green areas," he said. "But what they are going to have to realise is that if you want to live in utopia then you have to be prepared for that one day of hell when a fire comes through."
Mr Arnol said the Tasmania Fire Service was trying to get all 29 local government areas to impose one set of fire safety requirements for new building developments in fire-prone areas.
At present, each council's planning officers use their own systems to assess fire safety issues for developers.
Last week, the Speaker of Tasmania's House of Assembly, Michael Polley, said there should be stricter regulations relating to trees and fire breaks around houses.
He also said new homes in fire-prone areas should provide for safety bunkers.
But Housing Industry Association executive director Stuart Clues said it was not the time to be creating fire safety policies for new houses.
"We would be looking for a considered and consistent approach to be applied as authorities gain a better picture about what went wrong in Victoria," Mr Clues said.
"We don't support knee-jerk reactions, like the call to install bunkers, or mandating that every man and his dog needs a sprinkler system.
"We are in a rental crisis and we are trying to get first-home owner families into new homes.
"It would not be fair to quickly put in place a mandate where people have to spend $20,000 or $30,000 to put in fire-prevention measures."
Hobart Lord Mayor Rob Valentine said there were very few blocks of land left within the city's limits that weren't verging on the bush.
He said the Hobart City Council maintained fire management plans, which were implemented by a bushland fire officer.
The management plans include: maintenance and upgrading of more than 60km of fire trails, maintenance of more than 95 firebreaks throughout the city's bush fringe, scheduling and overseeing management burns, and reporting to the Tasmania Fire Service.
Ald Valentine said council fire hazard officers had conducted about 825 inspections and served more than 150 hazard abatement notices to ratepayers who had fire hazards on their property this summer.
Clarence Mayor Jock Campbell said the major fire in the Meehan Range State Recreational Reserve which threatened homes in October 2006 should have served as a wake-up call to residents and authorities.
But he said Parks and Wildlife was reluctant to do management burns in the area and ground litter was building back up to unacceptable levels.
"The biggest threat to us on the Eastern Shore is inaction by Parks and Wildlife when it comes to management burns," Ald Campbell said.
"We really need to see some sensible, controlled burns in the Meehan Range area . . . to take care of the ground litter, which has built back up to where we were before the 2006 fire.
"It is not a matter of if, it is a matter of when the next big fire comes through."
Glenorchy Mayor Adriana Taylor said the devastation witnessed in Victoria would ensure the council revisited fire management practices.
"We think we are doing everything we possibly can to abate the fire threat," Ald Taylor said.
"But as we are currently reviewing our planning regulations, I think fire safety is something that will need to be talked about." |
微信扫一扫
提升卡
置顶卡
变色卡
抢沙发
