Firestorm

Firestorm: Day 7

Wednesday- 23/10/13

Rain, beautiful rain. We had a very brief shower yesterday afternoon after the southerly came through, but last night a storm. A large weather system came up out of the Southern Ocean and hit South Australia on monday with very destructive winds. The Eyre Peninsular in particular was badly affected yesterday with one hundred odd kilometre hour winds ripping rooves off buildings . The system then turned into waves of thunderstorms across western NSW yesterday with the fear being more fires from the lightning strikes.

We had the thunderstorm late last night with the northern sky lit up continuously with flash after flash. Then the rain settled in for an hour or so. Not heavy, but enough to make everything fresh and beautiful this morning.

Now it is eerily quiet with a magnificent blue sky and light cumulous .cloud. The air is moist and still and all the birds are in full song.

The news is still full of warnings with the rain last night hampering the Grosse valley remote area crews from completing their fire break and back burns. The fear is the wind today will push the fire straight through the Grosse and down onto Springwood and Leura. All of these towns know the effects of fire with Leura having been completely burnt out in the 1950s. All schools and childcare centres have been closed and all retirement homes evacuated. It appears everything that could be done has been done.

Springwood was the home to the great Norman Lindsay, my namesake. A brilliant artist and a great writer who was completely unafraid to tell it how it was. I have visited his home a number of times and stood in awe of the works on display there.

We have another storm all over the radio this morning with our little Toy Town government of the Australian Capital Territory passing Same Sex Marriage Laws. The redneck reactionaries in government immediately declared they will challenge it in the High Court. Gutless wonders are too afraid to try and strike it down through the parliament because of the public backlash. For goodness cant we just let people love each other. Make Love Not War will always be my theme song.

It's mid morning and the wind has arrived, strong and blustery from the south west! There is slight hint of smoke when he wind drops or changes and comes from the north west but I can see clearly all the way to the north.

An hour later the wind is gusting to 70 kph and the tops of the trees bend a good 30 degrees. It is hot now but not the end days everyone feared. We had a worse fire day back in january when it hit 42 and the wind was the same. The whole of this area was on an evacuation order then. We packed up all the valuables and art work, the hard drives and documents but you have to make choices. Taking the irreplaceable is the starting point.

It's midday and amazingly the fires are still under control. Over two thousand fire fighters are on the fire ground and the Lithgow–Mt Victoria fire now has a 1500 km fire front. The closest one at Yerrinbool is completely under control but back burning continues just to make sure. Spot fires are rapidly being responded to and put out. Residents have either left already or are at home hosing down their properties.

Here it remains a windy yet beautiful spring day. I actually love hot weather. I took my two eldest with me on one of my Motherheart research trips out through the Simpson Desert, camping amid red sand dunes and playing with Hopping Mice. The night sky jet black and the  stars so bright it felt you could pluck one and use it to light the campsite. We reached the Coopers Creek in 46 degree heat and I loved it. Add wind though and that temperature will kill you. 

There have been no deaths directly in the fires. None. That is simply amazing and something our emergency services can be very, very proud of. It is only spring and the fire season has another six months to go. Hopefully no one will die in bush fires this year.