Ferny Creek is a suburb in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 33 km south-east of Melbourne's central business district, located within the Shire of Yarra Ranges local government area. Ferny Creek recorded a population of 1,524 at the 2021 census.
Upwey is a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, 33 kilometres (21 mi) east from Melbourne's central business district, located within the Shire of Yarra Ranges local government area. Upwey recorded a population of 6,818 at the 2021 census.
Gwelup is a suburb of Perth, the capital city of Western Australia 12 km north of Perth's central business district (CBD) along the Mitchell Freeway. Its local government area is the City of Stirling.
North Beach is a northern coastal suburb of Perth, the capital city of Western Australia 16 kilometres (10 mi) from Perth's central business district via Mitchell Freeway and Reid Highway. Its local government area is the City of Stirling.
The Field of Mars Reserve is a protected nature reserve located on the northern suburbs of Sydney, in the state of New South Wales, Australia. The 50 Hectare reserve is a remnant of bushland situated between the Lane Cove and Parramatta rivers within the suburb of East Ryde and near Gladesville, Hunters Hill and Ryde.
Watermans Bay is a northern coastal suburb of Perth, the capital city of Western Australia. Its local government area is the City of Stirling.
The geography of Sydney is characterised by its coastal location on a basin bordered by the Pacific Ocean to the east, the Blue Mountains to the west, the Hawkesbury River to the north and the Woronora Plateau to the south. Sydney lies on a submergent coastline on the east coast of New South Wales, where the ocean level has risen to flood deep river valleys (rias) carved in the Sydney sandstone. Port Jackson, better known as Sydney Harbour, is one such ria.
The 1994 eastern seaboard fires were significant Australian bushfires that occurred in New South Wales, Australia during the bushfire season of 1993–1994. Some 20,000 firefighters were deployed against some 800 fires throughout the state, and along the coast and ranges from Batemans Bay in the south to the Queensland border in the north, including populated areas of the city of Sydney, the Blue Mountains and the Central Coast. The fires caused mass evacuations of many thousands of people, claimed four lives, destroyed some 225 homes and burned out 800,000 hectares of bushland. The firefighting effort raised in response was one of the largest seen in Australian history.
Two Peoples Bay Nature Reserve is a protected area managed by the Department of Parks and Wildlife 35 kilometres (22 mi) east of Albany, Western Australia. The area is accessible by 2WD vehicles. The bay itself, including two small secluded beaches, faces due east and is protected from the Southern Ocean by a headland formed by the granite massif of Mount Gardner. The nature reserve was established in 1967 to protect the threatened noisy scrub-bird and its habitat. It is known for being the site of the discovery and naming of Gilbert's potoroo, but in 2015 a huge fire destroyed 90% of the tiny marsupial's habitat, as well as killing three-quarters of the remaining small population.
Anstey Hill Recreation Park is a 362-hectare (890-acre) protected area established in 1989 and located approximately 19 kilometres (12 mi) northeast of Adelaide, South Australia. The park is a significant reserve of bushland in the foothills of the Mount Lofty Ranges and is home to rare or vulnerable native plants and animals, and problematic invasive species. It is managed by the City of Tea Tree Gully, the Department of Environment, Water and Natural Resources and a volunteer group—The Friends of Anstey Hill. The park is designed for recreational walking and has no visitor facilities. It is managed in association with the regional planning initiative known as of Yurrebilla, the Greater Mount Lofty Parklands.
The Australian bushfire season ran from late December 2008 to April/May 2009. Above average rainfalls in December, particularly in Victoria, delayed the start of the season, but by January 2009, conditions throughout South eastern Australia worsened with the onset of one of the region's worst heat waves. On 7 February, extreme bushfire conditions precipitated major bushfires throughout Victoria, involving several large fire complexes, which continued to burn across the state for around one month. 173 people lost their lives in these fires and 414 were injured. 3,500+ buildings were destroyed, including 2,029 houses, and 7,562 people displaced.
The state of Victoria in Australia has had a long history of catastrophic bushfires, the most deadly of these, the Black Saturday bushfires of 2009 claiming 173 lives. Legislation, planning, management and suppression are the responsibilities of the Victorian State Government through its departments and agencies including the Country Fire Authority (CFA) and the Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning (DELWP).
A bushfire season occurred predominantly from June 2009 to May 2010. Increased attention has been given to this season as authorities and government attempt to preempt any future loss of life after the Black Saturday bushfires during the previous season, 2008–09. Long range weather observations predict very hot, dry and windy weather conditions during the summer months, leading to a high risk of bushfire occurrence.
During the summer of 2010–11, a relative lack of bushfires occurred along Eastern Australia due to a very strong La Niña effect, which instead contributed to severe flooding, in particular the 2010–11 Queensland floods and the 2011 Victorian floods. As a result of these weather patterns, most major fire events took place in Western Australia and South Australia. Some later significant fire activity occurred in Gippsland in eastern Victoria, an area which largely missed the rainfall that lead to the flooding in other parts of the state.
Bushfires were mostly active between September 2011 to March 2012 and caused most damage in the state of Western Australia, particularly in the South West. The state had been prepared and had expected an increased risk of bushfire following heavy spring rains as a result of a La Nina weather pattern.
The summer of 2012–13 had above average fire potential for most of the southern half of the continent from the east coast to the west. This is despite having extensive fire in parts of the country over the last 12 months. The reason for this prediction is the abundant grass growth spurred by two La Niña events over the last two years.
The most destructive bushfire season in terms of property loss since the 2008–09 Australian bushfire season, occurred in the summer of 2015–16, with the loss of 408 houses and at least 500 non-residential buildings as a result of wild fires between 1 June 2015 and 31 May 2016. The season also suffered the most human fatalities since the 2008–09 Australian bushfire season; 6 died in Western Australia, 2 in South Australia and 1 in New South Wales. 8 deaths were as a direct result of fire, and a volunteer firefighter died due to unrelated health complications while on duty.
The 2019–20 Australian bushfire season, or Black Summer, was one of the most intense and catastrophic fire seasons on record in Australia. It included a period of bushfires in many parts of Australia, which, due to its unusual intensity, size, duration, and uncontrollable dimension, was considered a megafire by media at the time. Exceptionally dry conditions, a lack of soil moisture, and early fires in Central Queensland led to an early start to the bushfire season, beginning in June 2019. Hundreds of fires burnt, mainly in the southeast of the country, until May 2020. The most severe fires peaked from December 2019 to January 2020.
The 2020–21 Australian bushfire season was the season of summer bushfires in Australia. Following the devastating 2019–20 bushfires in Australia, authorities were urged to prepare early for the 2020–21 Australian bushfire season. The bushfire outlook for July to September 2020 was predicting a normal fire potential in Queensland with a good grass growth in many areas giving an increased risk of grass fires, an above normal season in the Kimberley region of Western Australia as a result of good rains from tropical cyclones, a normal but earlier season in the Northern Territory, an above normal season on the south coast of New South Wales and normal seasons elsewhere.
The 2021–22 Australian bushfire season was the season of summer bushfires in Australia. The outlook for the season was below average in parts of Eastern Australia thanks to a La Niña, with elevated fire danger in Western Australia. Higher than normal winter rainfall has resulted in above average to average stream flows and soil moisture levels through much of eastern Australia. The outlook to the end of spring was also for above average falls over much of the country apart for Western Australia. The Australian Capital Territory, Victoria and southern New South Wales are expected to have a below normal fire potential as a result of vegetation still recovering from the 2020–21 Australian bushfire season. Areas of south eastern Queensland, northern New South Wales and northern Western Australia expect an above normal fire potential caused by crop and grass growth in these areas.
