Category Archives: Fire Management

Kalimna fire

The Department of Environment, Land, Water and Fire completed its management burn at Kalimna Park on April 23. The treatment area is shown on the map below.   Representatives of FOBIF and the Friends of Kalimna Park have examined the … Continue reading

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Fire review: it’s time to accept the obvious and the logical

As we reported last week, the State Government has asked the Inspector-General for Emergency Management (IGEM) to conduct a review of performance targets for the future bushfire fuel management program on public land. The review will ‘examine a risk-based approach to … Continue reading

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Fire stoushes: do we need them?

Readers of the Midland Express on Tuesday February 17 will have noticed a letter from the Shadow Minister for the Environment, Brad Battin, as follows: ******* ‘The 2009 Royal Commission into Black Saturday recommended the State Government adopt a five … Continue reading

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Fire review, but the old order remains for now

The Labor Government is persisting with Coalition policy on fire in the short term. This is confirmed in a statement released yesterday, announcing an independent review of the fuel reduction program. The statement, from the Environment Minister’s office, goes partly … Continue reading

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Hawkeye program wraps up

The Hawkeye fire research program, established as a response to recommendation 57 of the Bushfires Royal Commission, has now come to an end. It will now ‘transition’ into research programs run by DEPI. It’s not exactly clear what this transition … Continue reading

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We were wrong!

…And we’re quite relieved that we were. Our report last week about the burning of boronias in the Fryerstown Block 5 management burn has been corrected by Castlemaine Field Naturalists, who have pointed out that the burned area is a … Continue reading

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Burning boronias

Last week DEPI conducted a management burn in the area designated Fryerstown Block 5, a 44 hectare roughly triangular block between the Campbells Creek Irishtown Road and the Chewton-Vaughan road [see map below]. The fire was designated Asset Protection: the … Continue reading

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Risky business

Strategic bushfire management plan: West Central bushfire risk landscape. DEPI 2014 This document has been anticipated with some interest—as have its companions, the plans for the East Central and Barwon Otways districts. It was launched at last Friday’s Creswick conference … Continue reading

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Act first, think later

A conference on bushfire management reform held at Creswick on October 10 served to highlight some of the complexities in fire management, and to underline the difference between Government policy and the views of conservationists. The difference centres around whether … Continue reading

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Fire operations: some answers

FOBIF has received a response to its submission on the Fire Operations Plan from Andrew Koren, DEPI program manager for planned burning in this region. In brief, DEPI has responded to our concerns with the following points: 1. The Government … Continue reading

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