Disaster reduction forum and research into floods, sea level rise and fire thunderstorms

The first edition of Fire Australia for 2018 is now available, featuring research on predicting fire thunderstorms, catastrophic flood planning and the future impacts of rising sea levels on coastal communities. 

The International Day for Disaster Reduction saw nearly 50 emergency management practitioners and researchers gather in Sydney to reflect on how communities are reducing their exposure to disasters. Helping schools to examine their robustness to emergency planning and developing recovery strategies were on the agenda at the forum which began in 1989. Read the article here, and watch all the highlights from the forum here.

Following Hurricane Harvey which hit Houston in August 2017, CRC researchers have examined the possibility of similar flooding occurring to cities like Sydney. The team from the Catastrophic and cascading events: planning and capability project learnt that while Sydney could be at risk, it has been some time between large floods in, with communities becoming largely apathetic towards the risk. It is, however, inevitable that they will return. The risk is serious, requiring both prudent flood risk management by governments and action by individuals to ensure household and business preparedness.

Coastal infrastructure will be at threat by rising sea levels at the end of the century, unless action is taken sooner. PhD student Timothy Ramm has been investigating the impact that inundation and erosion will have on communities. In this article he asks if your community can cope with rising tides? 

Global monitoring of the atmosphere began in 1978 but since then, 58 pyro-cumulonimbus’, or ‘pyro-Cbs’ have been detected. This is a type of fire thunderstorm which occurs when a fire forms ‘deep flaming’ under an unstable atmosphere. Researchers are investigating the instability surrounding these conditions and how emergency services can predict them before it’s too late. Rick McRae from the ACT Emergency Services Agency outlines the developed a process model called blow up fire model, which asks fire behaviour analysts to answer a series of questions which allows teams to anticipate and prepare for these extreme fire behaviour conditions.

A new national fire weather learning and training resource has been created in consultation with researchers to strengthen leadership and learning. The evidence-based, Emergency Management Professionalisation Scheme by AFAC gives candidates an indication of their incident management capabilities and challenges them to critically review their performance. Find out the role the research played and how incident managers are benefiting.

Fire Australia is a joint publication of the Bushfire and Natural Hazards CRC, AFAC and the Fire Protection Association Australia. Find this and previous editions of Fire Australia at www.bnhcrc.com.au/news/fire-australia.