Grisly body search continues as death toll rises
ABC Online, Australia - 7 hours ago
Authorities are expecting to find more bodies as the devastating bushfires continue to rage across Victoria. The death toll has risen rapidly through the ...
Corporate Australia raises millions for bushfire victims
Sydney Morning Herald, Australia - 3 hours ago
COMMONWEALTH BANK: $1m (pledged Sunday), plus $100 for every run scored and $5000 for each six during Tuesday's one-day international between Australia and ...
Communities 'less prepared for fire'
The Australian, Australia - 4 hours ago
Article from: Australian AP COMMUNITIES on the outskirts of cities like Melbourne are less prepared to deal with bushfires than in the past, an expert says. ...
Obama offers US help to fight Vic fires
Ninemsn, Australia - 57 minutes ago
US President Barack Obama has telephoned Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd to offer his condolences over bushfires that have left at least 173 dead. ...
Bushfire arson mass murder, says Rudd
Financial Times, UK - 2 hours ago
By Peter Smith in Sydney Australia's prime minister yesterday accused arsonists behind many of the 400 fires that have torched large parts of the southern ...
Crews scramble to contain bushfire crisis
The Canberra Times, Australia - 1 hour ago
At least 173 people are dead and 25 blazes are still burning as fire crews scramble to contain Victoria's bushfire crisis. More than 750 properties have ...
Victorian resellers chip in to help bushfire victims
ARNnet, Australia - 1 hour ago
Victorian resellers are doing their bit to help victims of the fatal bushfires that have taken lives and destroyed homes across the state. ...
AFL targets $1m for bushfire relief
AFL, Australia - 53 minutes ago
By Jennifer Witham 1:53 PM Tue 10 February, 2009 THE AFL is confident it will raise over $1 million for the Victorian government's Bushfire Relief Fund this ...
Pacific closely watching Victorian fires
Radio Australia, Australia - 2 hours ago
There's been a strong response in the Pacific to the natural disaster unfolding in Australia. Since Saturday the state of Victoria has been hit by bushfires ...
Inquiry ordered into Victoria bushfires, hunt for arsonists begins
NEWS.com.au, Australia - 12 hours ago
AUTHORITIES fear the numbers of deaths from the Black Saturday bushfires could spiral to 230, as John Brumby called a royal commission into the devastating ...
Bushfire disaster probe 'could take a year'
ABC Online, Australia - 2 hours ago
Well-earned break: CFA firefighter Andrew Watson spends time with his five-year-old daughter Elana at fire-ravaged Kinglake. ...
AFL kicking goals for bushfire appeal
ABC Online, Australia - 1 hour ago
Friday's preseason AFL match between Essendon and the Western Bulldogs has been switched from Darwin to Docklands to help raise money for the victims of ...
Parliament again holds business in wake of bushfires
ABC Online, Australia - 2 hours ago
By Online parliamentary correspondent Emma Rodgers Question Time in both Houses of Parliament has again been cancelled today as a mark of respect to those ...
WA firefighting team heading to Victoria
ABC Online, Australia - 5 hours ago
A team from WA will soon arrive to help exhausted firefighters in Victoria. (AFP: William West) Twenty two firefighters will leave Perth today to help their ...
Sporting community unites to aid bushfire victims
ABC Online, Australia - 6 hours ago
Australia's sporting codes and personalities are uniting to help raise much-needed funds for the victims of Victoria's devastating bushfires. ...
US fire experts set to join Vic crews
ABC Online, Australia - 5 hours ago
By North America correspondent Michael Rowland The United States is preparing to send firefighting experts to help the effort in Victoria, where at least ...
Australia digs deep for bushfire victims
ABC Online, Australia - 6 hours ago
Relief effort: Bushfire victims look for new clothes at the Whittlesea Community Activity Centre north of Melbourne. (AAP: Julian Smith) Around the country ...
Obama offers help to battle bushfires
The Canberra Times, Australia - 50 minutes ago
In the wake of the devastating fires in Victoria, President Barack Obama has called Prime Minister, Kevin Rudd to offer US assistance and prayers for the ...
Communities pull together as bushfires continue to rage
ABC Online, Australia - 12 hours ago
Authorities in Victoria are warning communities to be vigilant as the deadly bushfires continue to burn across the state. The death toll has risen rapidly ...
Australia resumes search for fire victims
BBC News, UK - 6 hours ago
The number of deaths from bushfires that have already claimed 170 lives in the Australian state of Victoria is likely to rise, officials have warned. ...
Victoria one of the most bushfire prone regions in the world
Radio Australia, Australia - 2 hours ago
The bushfires in the Australian state of Victoria are the most deadly bushfires in Australian history. They are much worse than other fires that have left ...
Blazes across Victoria as bushfire disaster toll rises
The Age, Australia - 8 hours ago
At least 173 people are dead and 24 blazes remain out of control as Victoria's bushfire crisis enters its fourth day. The death toll from the bushfires is ...
Google News Tuesday 10 February 2009 3.09 pm.
The disaster came virtually out of the blue, with the final death toll from the firs in Victoria looking like it will go over 200. Everyone is shocked.
There is little other conversation, if you can call it that, exchanges of sympathy or shock. On the front page, the bodies of four children being removed from a house. Every time you turn on the TV, tearful, distressed people. Everywhere there is disaster. Even our smooth talking politicians appear shocked, loss for words. Except words like hell on earth, living hell, beyond belief, just unbelievable, beyond words, beyond description, the arsonists labelled mass murderers.
His own pleasure in lighting fires as a child pales into a dreary quirk, at least, if only by luck, no houses were burnt, no one died. Just threats, lots of them, in a threatening world. Everything else but their suffering seems trivial now. We will send our pointless sympathies on radio. The times will go on and he has to turn the television off. There is only so much pain you can bear, other people's pain. In this world, now, where all this pain is delivered directly into our lounge rooms. They embrace each other at the gathering points, shedding tears. The cameras record everything.
Far away, but intimate, everyone mists up. Rural people. Nice houses. Picturesque villages in that deeply forested state. They embrace and they shed tears and the camera never flinches. There are flashes of desolated villages. The people are asked questions and they turn away in tears, or blurt out stories in distress. Everyone, we are told, knew someone who has gone, in these tightly knit villages. I lost two kids, mate, one bloke says, before he, too, turned away from the inexorable eye. Bleak vistas of burnt out forests. Home after home burnt to the ground. Skeletons of houses against charred earth. I've never seen anything like it and never want to see anything like it again, says one reporter, normally smug in their well salaried, interesting jobs. Beyond words, everyone says, beyond words, burnt out frames, x-rayed trees on burnt soil, shocked faces, a shocking event. All we can do is watch, powerless, in this strange time when their pain is our pain, when every last detail is brought to us through instantaneous media.
THE BIGGER STORY:
http://www.news.com.au/heraldsun/story/0,21985,25033489-5005961,00.html
WHOLE towns have been declared crime scenes as the toll from Victoria's worst natural disaster leapt to 166.
But Premier John Brumby says the Victoria fires emergency will get worse before it gets any better.
"We've still got fires that are not contained," he said.
"There is a huge effort to get them under control.
"Tragically, we will have more deaths later this week."
There are fears the tragedy will have claimed more than 200 lives by the time police complete their searches of towns wiped out by the blazes.
The bushfire death toll has now reached 166 dead, a police spokeswoman confirmed about 1am this morning as police try to account for the people who perished in the fires.
Authorities say they are shocked by the sudden leap in numbers as more discoveries come to light, with early indications that the numbers leapt amid the discovery of clusters of bodies.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,25024272-5006785,00.html
THE Australian army will be brought in to help in the worst bushfires in Victoria's history.
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd offered army troops to help firefighters control 26 fires around the state that have claimed at least 26 lives, injured hundreds and destroyed hundreds of properties, Premier John Brumby said.
"The army will become involved, I spoke to the prime minister in the early hours of this morning when I was in Bendigo," Mr Brumby said.
"He's obviously triggered the disaster arrangements, so all of the cash payments are flowing through to families and they commence immediately.
"There will also be recovery arrangements put in place. I this morning advised the prime minister we'll accept his offer in terms of the defence forces.
"They'll be providing logistics and support. That will tend to be in terms of fuel, logistic support, dozers, some personnel and they will help control what is a very difficult situation.
Mr Brumby warned the number of dead would rise.
"There are some very active fire scenes, police are not able to get into areas but as the day unfolds the news will get worse," he said.
"As we go through the day the number of fatalities will increase and the number of injuries likewise."
He also warned Victorians to brace themselves for dangerous bushfires to continue raging this week.
"A lot of Victorians think that because the weather has changed and it's cool, the fires are out, they're not," Mr Brumby said.
"It's not over yet, not until we get rain will we get on top of this, and there's no substantial rain forecast over the next few days.
"Authorities don't want sightseers out there, there are many roads blocked, if people don't need to travel and don't need to be in these areas, they shouldn't be.
"We have still got powerlines, trees falling across roads, still very active and live fire fronts."
Mr Brumby said he believed emergency services were as well prepared as they could have been on Saturday, but while the worst fire day in the state's history had been predicted the horrific result still came as a surprise.
"Everyone warned on Friday it would be a horrific day, but it was more horrific than the experts predicted, the temperatures of 46-48 degrees and strong northerlies," an emotional Mr Brumby said.
http://www.smh.com.au/national/leaders-rethink-survival-strategy-20090209-82bk.html
THE escalating toll from the devastating bushfires has forced a review of the policy of allowing people to defend their own homes, but the country's peak body of fire and emergency authorities appealed that no changes be made "on the run".
"We want to make sure that every single issue, every single factor, everything in relation to the horrific weekend, to the horrific fires on Saturday, is investigated and uncovered," the Victorian Premier, John Brumby, said in announcing a royal commission into the bushfires that have claimed at least 135 lives.
The policy of "leave early or stay and defend property" would come under scrutiny, Mr Brumby said.
"It's served us well for 20 years or more," he told radio 3AW. "It's not true to say that of the fire on Saturday. There were many people who had done all of the preparations, had the best fire plans in the world and tragically it didn't save them."
But the chief executive of the Australasian Fire Authorities Council, Naomi Brown, said it would be dangerous to confuse the public when years of research and experience showed that people should either prepare properly and stay on their properties or leave well before a fire's likely arrival.
The council represents 29 Australian and New Zealand fire and emergency authorities, and "stay or go" has been its position for three years.
Ms Brown said if the need for change emerged, the council would do everything in its power to communicate advice effectively to the public before the next bushfire season.
The former Victorian police ministers Andre Haermeyer and Pat McNamara dismissed forced evacuations as an alternative to "stay and fight".
Mr Haermeyer said many of the people killed in the bushfires were as prepared as they could have been.
"Whatever is necessary to examine will be examined so that the lessons can be learned and we can put in place for the community all of the policies, the resources, the stocks that we need to make sure that we never see this again," he said.
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story
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A demonstration in Sydney, NSW, Australia.
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