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On |anuary 13,2016, a storm passing over the mountains ofThsmania hammered the Australian state with over a hundredlightning strikes occurring in a three- to four-hour period. Intheir wake over eighty small wildfires began to spread across

sections of this island's unique landscapes. Some of these firesextinguished themselves naturally, while others took hold andgrew to the sLZe of thousands of hectares. These Thsmaniafires were relatively unique -- due to the normal high levels ofrainfall this island experiences annually, fire events like this forThsmania are a rarrty and as such, deserve a closer look.

Tasmania lies 40 degrees south of the equator and is separatedfrom the southeastern coast of the Australian mainland by theBass Straight. It is an island resting in the Thsman Sea whichis often viewed as a pristine wilderness dotted with small laid-back towns whose economv relies heavilv on tourism. Thelt

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Thsmanian weather is renowned for changing several times in aduy. The dty continent of Antarctica is the next major landfallto the south and as such, Thsmania can experience cold winters.The island receives the second highest annual levels of rainfallsfor the nation. Seasonal heavy rainfall usually keeps wildfireshere from being much of a concern across this landscape's

unique vegetation types, and many plants and animals have

evolved uniquely to coexist in this environment overcountless

generations.

In the world's most southern regions, fossil evidence has been

found that suggests temperate rainforests were once widespread

in Australia, Antarctica, South America and New Zealandaround 45 million years ago. As the global climate warmedand became drier, these forests retreated back to small pockets

primarily today left in Thsmania and southeastern Australia.

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wet cool environment are what kept Tasmania's wildfire risks incheck and confined to their flames to lower areas of the islandwhich allowed the Antarctic relic vegetations species elsewhere

Cool temperate rainforests and relicvegetation species still exist here inremoter locations that date back

to the time whenAustralia was part ofthe super-continentof Gondwana. These

relics are called the

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The pockets of relic vegetation

species have survived independently inthe high country without evolving with fireand are badly impacted when fires do occur.Tasmania however is not a pristine island thatevolved without any wildfire as portrayed(often emotionally) by some. For thousands

of years native Australian Aboriginals calledTasmania their home, and across countless

generations they carried out their hunterand gather lifesryles of which using fire as a

method of farming played a key element.

The button grass plains,burning through the night.

to thrive.

Change is believed to be inthe alr, however, as a growingnumber ofscientists are pointingtheir fingers at Tasmanids

ecosystems as a new example ofglobal climate change in actiononce again. David Bowman,a professor of environmentalchange biology at the Universityof Thsmania, says "We are in a

new place. We just have to accept

that we've crossed a threshold, Isuspect. This is what climatechange looks likel' The climatescientist Will Steffen has also

linked these Thsmanian fires to

a new episode of climate change

by stating that over the last 30

years extreme fire weather inTasmania has increased. Thisincrease isnt believed to be a

climate shift as yet. But David

I Antarctic flora, and

I theyinclude thevarious

lf native pines, cushionplants, the southern

beech (Nothofugor) and thedeciduous beech.

The Thsmanian Aboriginals deeply valued fire, so much so in Lindenmayer' a professor at Australian National university

factthatduringtheirbtodyconquestbyEuropeans,thesmoke * t:?lott and conservation biology' has published climate

from the fires that their remnanf groups felt necessary to keep T"dt$q estimates that could represent itself with an increase

burning is what was used to hunt them down. Rain and the in drylightning strikes'

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This rise in dry lightning activity has already been observed

in recent decades in Thsmania, and this summer (|anuary2AL6) the dry lightning combined with the unusual droughtexperienced this summer, has created a situation where coolrainforest sections ofthe island, which under normal conditionsserve as a barrier to stop wildfire growth, here have dried outto allow their vegetation to carry fires across them up into thehighly sensitive Antarctic relic species pockets protected as

World Heritage Areas (WHA). Lightning fires started by downstrikes occurred during the event in the WHAs too, and they,

together with the other large wildfires produced during that

|anuary 2016 storm, grew to become a serious threat to thesurvival of these ancient relics growing in their final holdoutpocket areas.

In |anuary when these fires spread out from the places wheresuper-heated lightning bolts had touched down to ignite themoff, they collided with vegetation already stressed by droughtconditions and their flames carried easily and swiftly. Some ofthe fires spread out to consume more than others, and in all,

they would finally burn over 100,000 hectares of vegetation, ofwhich 14,000 hectares would include the relic species pockets

of the World Heritage Areas (WHA).

The effected locations of Thsmania were large areas of theTarkine, the Mersey Valley and February Plains withinthe Walls of ferusalem and Cradle Mountain - Lake St ClairNational Parks, and the Central Plateau. Southwest NationalPark also experienced the flames as well, and Tasmanids world-famous Overland Track was closed for more than a week.

This small state's firefighting resources were not accustomed

to dealing with such an overwhelming scale of wildfires, in

relation to their number of personnel and resources, and

they concentrated their effiorts first on protecting Thsmanias

urban interface structures and infrastructure. Their focus

during the early phases of the fires was in protecting life andproperty triage, while other larger wildfires ran across large

areas of the more mountainous and forested remote northwestand up onto the island's high central plateau regions. Milderweather in the second week ofthe event, as usual, finally slowed

the progression of many fires. To gain the upper hand withthese improved conditions, an Australian Federal interstate

firefighting response was organuzed to go in and "black linel'or secure the countless kilometers of the individual fires. Thistactic was deployed to prevent the continuation offire spreading

into more hectares of drought stressed lands, especially in the

WHA, and limiting the risk of new future fire runs.

In Australia the majority of the firefighting orientation is

towards truck-based urban interface fire efforts. However"across the ditchl' as Aussies and Kiwis call the Pacific Ocean

between them, many states and New Zealartd now have'

specialist-based teams who have been trained to go into the

forests to meet wildfires beyond the safety of their fire hoses.

These crews have been named Remote Area Teams, and

while a number of them are paid stafl large numbers of these

crews serve as unpaid volunteers motivated to protect theircommunities. During the Federal response to these fires, bothtypes of these crews along with the New Zealartders, were

requested to assist Tasmania; as well as were other fire specialist

in logistics and aviation. Thsmanids fire support of 2016 then

became an interstate disaster assistance response effort, where

fellow Australians and New Zealartders came down and across

to help out their mates.

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from mainlandAustralia and Tasmania.

Matesmanship, or stepping up to looking out for each other, is

an important part of both Australian and New ZealNtd culture.

Under the cap of a Federal response during this event across

Tasmania, matesmanship was in action on all levels. After theinitial dangerous runs of the fires had subsided, the priorityshifted to work together to save what was left of the island's

highly valued WHA unique vegetation pockets.

The Remote Area Teams assisting were trained to work withhelicopters to be deployed into remote locations either bywinch, hover exit or landirg. On the ground these crews use

hand tools, leaf blowers and chainsaws to construct firelineor "blackline" and mop up with pumps and fire hose or bydirecting in water drops from helicopter buckets. These

Thsmanian fires became the perfect opportunrty for these

teams to successfully showcase their unique bush skills while

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completing their important missions.

As a member of one of these specializedcrews, the assignment

for my team was to drive up into the dirt roads of the island's

mountainous sub-alpine zane, and from there, leave ourvehicles behind on the roadside and enter the thick forest toclimb up into high slopes of broken-slippery shale on our huntto extinguish any remaining hot spots. We passed along ourway, 100 year old burnt out ferns, thickets of blackened brush,mazes of fallen dead and down vegetation, all scattered outbeneath massive moss-covered and towering Blue and Swamp

Gum treesi' some as wide as a small car.

Careful as we went, not to trip or slip, while we crossed over

the unstable slide areas. Slides which in places, had been leftgreatly destabihzed by flames, that earlier had consumed theblankets of light green moss that had long bound their fields ofbroken pieces together.

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%An exampleof helicoptersupport on theTasmania fires.Maps: NationalAerial Firefighting Centre.

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Up along the ridgelines far above those slopes, where we also

searched, we found ourselves working our way through moreheavy ju.kpotted fuel loadings of partially burnt old loggingdebris while seeking out and destroying other smokinghot areas left near the fire's burnt edge which, if remaininguntended, could cause the fire to restart and run again.

The high plateaus of the WHAs, however, offered muchdifferent experiences to other crews assigned to fly in byhelicopters up there. These crews found themselves runningpumps and using hoses and hand tools -- all in a struggle todig out and flood with water the pockets of drought-dried andburning peat,hidden beneath burnt black open relic grasslands,all the while being carefulto keep from stepping onand killing anyrnore of thefragile colonies of highlyendangered cushion plants,

h.ky enough to haveescaped fire's flames andheat.

Out on the firelines ofThsmania we discoveredthat if you were h.ky itwas possible to see smallkangaroos or wallabieshopping around, or even toget a glimpse of Thsmania's

famous small ThsmaniaDevil scavengers goingabout their business, orspiny backed echidnas,

adapted to this island's

cooler environments bytransforming large numbers

of their spikes into hairs to provide warmth. You wont be

able to see the equ"tty famous Thsmanian Tiger here anymore(though recently one has been reported spotted on themainland in Gippsland Victoria, believed to be a descendant

of a pair released long ago before its species was considered tohave become extinct).

Unique birds were also to be seen out on the fire ground,such as wedge tail eagles soaring above with their mightywingspans or the colorful Tiue, Swift and Orange-belliedparrots chirping around in the limbs over your head. In theblack on the ground we also spotted tiny green Forty-spottedPardalotes which look like small finches, popping around inthe dust in search of insects which may have survived the fires.

Snakes, however, are what firefighters had to keep an eye outfor, and Thsmania is home to three native species; each ofwhich carries venom dangerous to humans, as do several localspecies of spiders and scorpions. Tasmania's snake species

share many of the same variations of patterns and colors, butthey can be identified by the structures of their heads. TheTiger snake is by far the most famous species and is usuallyconsidered timid, normally retreating at the approach of ahuman. Theyare abeautiful, highlytoxic, and interesting snake,

which despite its name, may be found without any striping.Firefighters were instructed if they were bitten by *y of theThsmanian snakes, their best chance of survival was to bandage

the bitten extremlty using a compression bandage up to thelpoph node, immobfize the limb, stay still and call for help.

If the snake did inject toxin during its bite, then likely only the

timely delivery of anti-venom, the compression bandage andimmobilization would be of help to the firefighter. As such, in

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Australia you'll find that snakes are respected like wildfires,and life is often adapted, where possible, to exist with both.

What's the predicted outcome for those fragile Tasmania

vegetations pockets once the flames from this event have

cooled and the normal rains have returned to their mountainslopes again? A government inquest is already being calledfor by environmentalist and politicians to find blame. Moremoney will then be provided in the future for local firefightingefforts, some restructuring will take place, and in the end,

perhaps more firefighters will be trained up to work remotelyto extinguish future fires that future lightning storms willbring to their island's shores.

I am proud to say that I took part in these efforts and was

very impressed to have witnessed first hand such passion

displayed. Manypeople chipped in to worktogether, especi*lly

on a voluntary basis, to help protect Tasmania's unique

environment as mates, and for the Australian wilderness.This fairly complex Interstate emergency response in returnoffers Tasmania a fighting chance on the ground to helppreserve its very special, important, and rare wilderness areas.

On March 9, the premier of Tasmania, Will Hodgman,announced a major research and analysis projectregarding fires in Tasmania. As the release states,

The Tasmanian Government will invest in a researchproject to examine the impact of climate change on thewilderness, and strengthen our fire-fighting techniquesin our Wilderness areas.Tasmania has faced one of theworst fire seasons in recent years. The response from ouremergency seruices was immediate and the magnitudewas without precedent, and they deserve our praise.

Not a single life or properly was lost, and only about1.3 per cent of our Wilderness World Heritage Area was

affected. This is despite more than 300 fires, more than120,000 hectares burned and a record 15 total fire bandays, five more than any previous year.While we can

never fire-proof Tasmania, given wildfires are a naturalpaft of the Australian environment, we can work tomitigate the risks, just as our $28.5 million fuel-reductionprogram is doing.

http :/ / prem ier-dev.d pac.tas. gov. au/ rel eases/resea rch-p roj e ct-to-p rote ct-wi I d e rn ess-a re as .

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