Artemis Adare
Indeed a furious John Gledhill (Tasmania Fire Service Chief Officer) said “ And I don’t believe (Senator Betz) is right, because none of these fires emanated in national parks; both the Scamander–St. Marys fire and the Wielangta fire appear to have started on private land”. Mr Gledhill was, understandably, incredulous that pollies had taken advantage of the situation whilst his personnel were out in the field risking their lives.
SENATOR Eric Betz tells fibs — and the Prime Monster Mr Howard is more than happy to help promulgate the fibs.
Even Forestry Tasmania was not ashamed to get in on the action. However, this time, they have been caught red-handed (perhaps fire-engine red!).
Whilst most Tasmanians were horrified by the bushfire emergency along the East Coast and have reacted by pulling together to help their neighbours, Eric and company have simply seen an opportunity to score cheap political points by telling fibs.
Most reasonable people would have been gobsmacked when on Tuesday, at the height of the Scamander-St Helens emergency, Erica decided to engage in a bit of pre-election greenie bashing. Erica claimed that the bushfires were solely the responsibility of those evil conservationists who have maliciously “locked-up” vast tracks of land thus allowing the accumulation of fuel in the undergrowth. However, what’s that I see on my trusty telly and in the on-line Mercury pics — pinus radiata? Have greenies really been locking-up pine plantations Senator?
The claims were so ludicrous that they attracted mention in the national media — mainly focussed on the “controversy” of the statement. The only problem with Eric’s statement is that none of the fires (certainly the serious ones) occurred in National Parks or conservation areas. Clearly the heatwave across Tasmania has sent poor old Eric a bit troppo.
Indeed a furious John Gledhill (Tasmania Fire Service Chief Officer) said “ And I don’t believe (Senator Betz) is right, because none of these fires emanated in national parks; both the Scamander–St. Marys fire and the Wielangta fire appear to have started on private land”. Mr Gledhill was, understandably, incredulous that pollies had taken advantage of the situation whilst his personnel were out in the field risking their lives.
Nowhere to hide Erica
As TT readers are well-aware the cheap and ready access to satellite remote sensing via web databases now means that forestry fibbers no longer have anywhere to hide. Gone are the days when FT could light-up a regen burn and hope that no-one in Hobart or Launceston would notice. Now all citizens with access to the web can monitor forestry activities via a number of reliable satellite sites.
The two figures below and MODIS satellite images and cadastral overlays accessed via the CSIRO Sentinel database. They show two images of the St Helens-St Marys fires on the 14 December 2006 with red fires representing hotspots in the last 12 hours and yellow fires being hotspots in the last 24 hours. Both images clearly show two fire centres – one based along the Avenue River/old Upper Scamander Road in the north and the other being the Elephant Pass area in the south. None of these fires are in National Park (or anywhere near National Park!) and only one is within the Scamander Forest Reserve. Indeed all the fires are located either on private land (often private forest reserve) or State Forest – both of which are current, old or soon-to-be logging areas. Those who know the area well will also know that the area located north of Cornwall (north west of St Marys) and towards Mathina and beyond is predominantly State Forest logging area managed by Forestry Tasmania.
CSIRO Sentinel satellite images (MODIS) with cadastral overlays showing fire distributions in the past 24 hours for St Marys (14 December 2006). All of these fires are located on either private land or State Forest (open to logging).
Interfering with judicial processes
Apart from the obvious pre-election greenie bashing, it is now obvious that the silly comments from both Eric and the Prime Monster are also related to protecting the interests of their dear friends in Tasmania as the High Court prepares to hand down its decision next Tuesday (19 December) on the Wielangta Forest case (Brown versus Forestry Tasmania). One must seriously question the both the judgement and ethics of the Minister and Prime Minister in making such ludicrous comments on a matter which is before the courts.
However, for the record, we present below a CSIRO Sentinel MODIS image of the Wielangta area showing the Tasmanian coastline and Maria Island. The image with cadastral overlay was captured on 14 December 2006 and shows the distribution of fires in the past 24 hours. The two eastern-most fires are in the Sandspit Forest Reserve, however the active fire and all other fires are on the border of the Wielangta area near the town of Nugent and the Tea Tree Creek — mostly private land and State Forest (again!).
CSIRO Sentinel satellite image (MODIS) with cadastral overlay showing fire distributions in the past 24 hours near Wielangta and Maria Island (14 December 2006). Most of these fires are located outside the Wielangta Forest area.
In summary, Eric and his friends have been caught red-handed telling big fibs — designed to further both their own ideological cause. They have been caught-out by technology that is readily available to the masses — so it’s hard to argue that they themselves were unaware of the location details. This is particularly the case given that Eric’s own department partly funds the CSIRO Sentinel website as a resource for forestry fire management. Whilst we will be waiting for hell to freeze over before Eric and friends offers an apology, perhaps Eric can answer one question — why did so many of these deadly fires emanate from State Forest and Private Land currently under logging management?
For other citizens wanting to keep a daily check on Eric’s fibbing, the truth can be found on the both the NASA Modis site and the Sentinel site below:
http://sentinel.ga.gov.au/acres/sentinel/index.shtml
