-Caveat Lector-
http://www.guardian.co.uk/international/story/0,3604,627132,00.html
11.30am update
Thousands flee as bushfires rage
Staff and agencies
Thursday January 3, 2002
The Guardian
Fast-moving forest fires cut off two tiny Australian coastal villages
today after destroying as many as 20 houses in a third town nearby,
forcing thousands of evacuees to seek shelter on the beach.
More than 7,000 people, many of them summer holidaymakers, ran for
their lives last night when the inferno raced into Sussex Inlet, a
resort about 120 miles south of Sydney, police said.
On Thursday afternoon the blaze swept north, cutting off roads to the
nearby towns of Bendalong and Berringer Lake and trapping 2,000
people, said local rural fire service spokeswoman June Webster.
The blaze was one of more than 100, dubbed the "black Christmas fires", which have
brought havoc to Australia's most populous state, New South Wales, for 11 days,
blackening hundreds of thousands of acres of bush and farm
land.
No lives have been lost, but more than 160 houses have been destroyed to the north,
west and south of Sydney, a city of four million people.
Fires were also burning on scrubland in its northern suburbs, threatening hundreds
more homes. Insurance officials estimate damages at A$70m (£25m).
More than 20,000 firefighters are battling the flames, which stretch for a total of
more than 1,200 miles across the state.
Helicopters are dumping water on the fires, and in some places fire crews pumped water
from backyard swimming pools, or even used buckets.
"We were in the eye of the storm," said Julie Adler, who witnesses the fire at Sussex
Inlet. "We had fire all around us. It was absolutely horrendous."
Many people braved choking smoke and a fast-moving wall of fire as they drove out of
the resort. Firefighters, mostly volunteers, went from house to house saving lives and
property.
Cut off by 50ft flames that jumped roads, other people ran to the safety of the open
beach and community clubhouses.
More than 300 people slept in tents erected on a football field at a nearby navy base.
They stayed there as the immediate danger passed, too frightened to move amid fears
that erratic winds might whip up new spot fires.
Officials denied allegations that the blaze was the result of bungled backburning by
overworked and fatigued fire crews.
Later, the fire raced around Bendalong and Berringer Lake where residents also sought
safety on beaches.
Other big fires were reported in the Blue Mountains, 50 miles west of Sydney,
prompting many residents to leave their homes as a precaution.
At least half of the wildfires have been started deliberately. Police have arrested 21
arson suspects, including 14 juveniles aged between nine and 16 years, who have been
characterised as troublemakers bored during the c
urrent summer school holidays.
An outraged New South Wales government has promised to punish the offenders severely
for what the state premier, Bob Carr, said were acts of "madness and wickedness".
While adult offenders would face prison terms of up to 14 years, young firebugs would
be made to confront burn victims and families who lost homes, and work on
rehabilitation projects for scorched forests.
Today temperatures, that had climbed above 38C (100F) earlier in the week, dropped and
brought some relief. However, there was no sign of desperately needed rain, and
westerly winds roared in from Australia's arid outback
, fanning flames and scattering red-hot embers to start new blazes.
Thick smoke has shrouded Sydney for days. The magnitude of the crisis
has been highlighted by reports from New Zealand, 1,400 miles to the
east of mainland Australia, that ash blown high into the atmosphere
has produced dramatic crimson sunsets.
Guardian Unlimited © Guardian Newspapers Limited 2002
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The only real voyage of discovery consists not in seeking
new landscapes but in having new eyes. -Marcel Proust
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"Do not believe in anything simply because you have heard it. Do not believe
simply because it has been handed down for many generations. Do not
believe in anything simply because it is spoken and rumored by many. Do
not believe in anything simply because it is written in Holy Scriptures. Do not
believe in anything merely on the authority of Teachers, elders or wise men.
Believe only after careful observation and analysis, when you find that it
agrees with reason and is conducive to the good and benefit of one and all.
Then accept it and live up to it."
The Buddha on Belief, from the Kalama Sutta
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A merely fallen enemy may rise again, but the reconciled
one is truly vanquished. -Johann Christoph Schiller,
German Writer (1759-1805)
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It is preoccupation with possessions, more than anything else, that
prevents us from living freely and nobly. -Bertrand Russell
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"Everyone has the right...to seek, receive and impart
information and ideas through any media and regardless
of frontiers."
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
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"Always do sober what you said you'd do drunk. That will
teach you to keep your mouth shut."
--- Ernest Hemingway
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