Bush and Forest Fires in Australia: 22 February 1999

Bush and Forest Fires in Australia

22 February 1999

Several active fire signals and smoke plumes over northeastern Australia are recorded by OSEI with the NOAA AVHRR Sensor on 19 February 1999.

NOAA image of the vegetation fires in the Northeastern Australia 19 February 1999
(Source: NOAA http://www.osei.noaa.gov/)

According to the news a bushfire destroyed 13 000 hectares of pasture land in the Crookwell area in New South Wales. The gouvernor of New South Wales, Bob Carr, declared on Thursday the state of emergency  for the area, 175 Kilometer southwest of Sydney. More than 400 fire fighters were dispatched to the fire. The fire started on Wednesday and was favoured by dry conditions and strong winds. It was feared that the flames will reach the  Abercrombie national park. According to the latest news the fire is at the moment contained.

The Australian Bureau of Meteorology issued high fire danger for Western Australia and over the Alice Springs region, high to very high for South Australia (extreme for Northeast Pastoral) and high to very high fire danger in New South Wales   and Victoria.  For the up-to-date fire weather information of the Australian Bureau of Meteorology refer to http://www.bom.gov.au/weather/.

The Department of Natural Resources and Environment in Victoria reports for 22 February 1999 three controlled fires. For detailed information on the current status refer to http://www.nre.vic.gov.au/fires/index.htm. This website also contains long-term fire statistical data.

Further links for information on Australian Fire Management Agencies:

http://www.ausfire.com/
The home page of the Australasian Fire Authorities Council coordinates the diverse range of activities of the different australian agencies concerned about fire

http://msowww.anu.edu.au/~barling/firebreak/firebreak.html
The firebreak newsletter provides a very extensive homepage with information about fire fighting in Australia, downloadable java scripts for calculating fire weather and various links to related sites

The Department of Natural Resources and Environment in Victoria offers a very comprehensive web site with information on fire management. In their web site   current reports are provided with statistics on the fire season. Extensive background information is included along with several links to related web sites.

Satellite Remote Sensing Services Department of Land Administration (DOLA)
http://www.rss.dola.wa.gov.au/apps/firewatch.html
The Satellite Remote Sensing Services (SRSS) of the Department of Land Administration provides near real time hot spot detection and burned scar mapping for western Australia. In the Firewatch project the SRSS detects hotspots throughout Western Australia using the thermal channel of the NOAA AVHRR sensor on a daily basis.

For more informations on Australia go to the IFFN country files.

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