Bushfire Season 2006/07

Available February 2007

Whelan, Kanowski, Gill and Andersen (2006) suggest that 'fires have played an important role in shaping Australia's environment, and particular fire regimes are necessary to maintain most Australian ecosystems and much of Australia's biodiversity. It is also the case that fires threaten lives and health, property, infrastructure and primary production systems. An individual fire, and a particular fire regime, can have both favourable and adverse effects on different sorts of assets across the landscape.' This statement provides an excellent framework to examine the fire season in Southeast Australia in the summer of 2006/07.

Natural Hazards is a unit that is taught across all year levels. The Bushfire season in Australia started early in the Spring/Summer period of 2006 and has been severe due to a number of factors. This unit examines bushfires in Australia and allows students to plot major bushfires during the season and add data to generate maps of their own. A number of excellent web sites are provided to access this data and the students are able to add images from satellites. This unit also uses Bureau of Meteorology data and maps to support the hypothesis that 2006/07 in Southeast Australia was going to be a severe bushfire season.

Major Bushfires Summer 2006/2007

Graph of Fuel Reduction 1995 - 2004
(Source: State of the Environment Report 2006)