New online - March 2021

The latest CRC research, including new final project reports and journal articles, is now available on the website. Read all the details in the March summary below.

CRC final reports

The final project report for the Coupled fire-atmosphere modelling project has been written by Dr Mika Peace, Dr Jeff Kepert, Harvey Ye and Jesse Greenslade from the Bureau of Meteorology. The project aimed to improve understanding of fire and atmosphere interactions and feedback processes through running the coupled fire-atmosphere model ACCESS-Fire. ACCESS-Fire is an important research tool and has the potential to be a critical operational tool. It will assist in informing fire management decisions as increasingly hazardous scenarios are faced in a changing climate. Further deliverables from the project include the preparation of meteorological and simulation case studies of significant fire events as publications, installation and testing of the ACCESS-Fire coupled model on the National Computing Infrastructure; and preparation of training material to support operational implementation of research findings. The project has demonstrably achieved the objective of building and sharing national capability in fire research and has provided fire and meteorology expertise during high impact events in support of end-users inside their operational centres.

The Impact-based forecasting for the coastal zone: East Coast Lows project has been completed and the final project report has been written by Dr Harald Richter (Bureau of Meteorology), Craig Arthur (Geoscience Australia), David Wilke (Bureau of Meteorology), Mark Dunford (Geoscience Australia), Martin Wehner (Geoscience Australia) and Beth Ebert (Bureau of Meteorology). The project demonstrated a pilot capability to deliver wind and rain impact forecasts for residential housing from an ensemble of weather prediction models runs. The project focused on the wind and rainfall impact from the 20-22 April 2015 East Coast Low in New South Wales. Through the utilisation of Geoscience Australia’s HazImp software, the research team developed and tested a workflow that integrated the numerical weather forecasts, vulnerability relationships and exposure data at the community level. The project set up the end-to-end workflow from wind and rain hazard to spatial impact. These spatial impact outputs were delivered into the Visual Weather system at the Bureau of Meteorology, foreshadowing the possibility of easily achievable future visualisation to operational meteorologists.

The Optimisation of fuel reduction burning regimes project has been completed and the final project report written by A/Prof Tina Bell (University of Sydney), Prof Mark Adams (Swinburne University), Dr Mathias Neumann (Swinburne University), Danica Parnell (University of Sydney), Dr David Pepper (University of Sydney) and Dr Malcolm Possell (University of Sydney). The body of research detailed in this report represents a concerted effort to understand the effect of prescribed burning on water quantity and carbon losses and gains in forested ecosystems in south eastern Australia. The research team collected empirical data from over 100 sampling sites treated with a recent prescribed burn, selected to accommodate as much site variability as possible and to take full advantage of prescribed burn plans. Data collected from the field was used in a variety of modelling assignments to capture the effect of prescribed burning on changes in water availability and transformation of carbon pools. Using a mixture of models and empirical sampling and analysis, the research showed that there are few risks to long-term carbon and water cycles when prescribed burning is conducted on cycles of 10 or so years.

With the Diversity and inclusion: building strength and capability project now complete, the final report is available online, written by Victoria University’s Celeste Young, Prof Roger Jones, Dr Fiona McDonald and Prof Bruce Rasmussen. The three-year project worked with those in the emergency management sector engaged in diversity and inclusion practice to develop an evidence-based framework capable of supporting more effective management and measurement of diversity and inclusion. This project has experienced a high level of uptake and use during its three-year term and training in the use of the framework is underway. This has been aided by the sector’s focus on progressing the diversity and inclusion agenda, and the work of peak agencies and end-user organisations to develop programs and leadership. It has also contributed to the repositioning of the diversity and inclusion agenda as a risk-based business imperative, and has developed and provided materials to support the integration of diversity and inclusion into resilience, risk and workforce planning frameworks.

The Hazards, culture and Indigenous communities project has been completed and Dr Jessica Weir (Western Sydney University), Dr Timothy Neale (Deakin University) and Dr Will Smith (Deakin University) have written the final project report. This project considered the challenges and opportunities arising out of engagements between Indigenous peoples and natural hazard and land management government agencies in southern Australia. The majority of this activity has focused on cultural burning. The research team undertook qualitative research, primarily through forming partnerships with key practitioners working in this space and undertaking research activities that iteratively learnt from these partnerships. The shared motivations held by some Indigenous and non-Indigenous individuals to form collaborative partnerships are challenged by their operating context, including a lack of trust, bureaucratic constraints, tokenism, racism, and a lack of resources. This project finds that the sector needs to move beyond statements of support to develop specific policies and programs that demonstrably grow opportunities for Indigenous engagement and partnership, and provides suggestions as to what these policies may be.

Prof Mehmet Ulubasoglu from Deakin University has written the final project report for the Optimising post-disaster recovery interventions in Australia project. This project has estimated the impact of four natural hazards in recent Australian history on income of individuals residing in disaster-hit areas. By defining individuals’ ability to return to their pre-disaster income levels as economic resilience, the research team focused on the following case studies: the 2009 Victorian Black Saturday bushfires, the 2009 Toodyay bushfires, 2013’s Tropical Cyclone Oswald in Queensland, and the 2010-11 Queensland floods. Through real-life case studies, this research helps illustrate how these events—of different types, localities, and scales—impact and ripple through communities and the broader economy over time. The research found that the extent of the economic impact of disasters on individuals’ income depends on the type, intensity, and location of the disaster. The project has produced four research reports pertaining to each case study, along with four policy briefs that summarised each report. The project also produced demographic profiling analyses for each disaster analysed. The findings from these four case studies were disseminated to a national audience through a webinar in August 2020.

CRC reports

The Diversity and inclusion: building strength and capability project team from Victoria University has identified the need for emergency management organisations to develop a greater understanding of the communities they serve, and have produced two new reports to help cater to this need.

Dr Fiona McDonald has written the report, Young people and the emergency services: working towards inclusive partnerships, which begins with an overview of what is important to young people, their areas of interest, and motivation to engage in their community. Communicating effectively and through their popular social media mediums is vital, and this report provides an overview of how to engage with this age group online. The report also provides strategies of how to find ways to work together, and the skills, attributes and capabilities young people bring to organisations.

Daniel Ooi and Celeste Young have written a report on Building inclusive partnerships with culturally and linguistically diverse (CALD) communities, with the purpose of providing basic guidance for emergency services practitioners to support the building of respectful and inclusive partnerships with culturally and linguistically diverse communities.

Journal articles

Relating to the Fire surveillance and hazard mapping project is research by RMIT University’s Daisy San Martin Saldias, Dr Karin Reinke, Dr Blythe McLennan and Luke Wallace, published in Landscape Research. The influence of satellite imagery on landscape perception aims to examine how people’s perceptions of landscapes are changing when our experiences increasingly occur in digital space, altering the perception paradigm from one where individuals analyse direct objects to one where indirect objects are key in the formation of their perceptions. The results indicate that satellite imagery is influencing how individuals perceive land use and land cover patterns within their direct surroundings.

Published in the journal Fire is the paper High-resolution estimates of fire severity - an evaluation of UAS image and LiDAR mapping approaches on a sedgeland forest boundary in Tasmania, Australia written by associate student Sam Hillman (RMIT University), Dr Bryan Hally, Luke Wallace, Dr Darren Turner (University of Tasmania), Prof Arko Lucieer (University of Tasmania), Dr Karin Reinke (RMIT University) and Prof Simon Jones (RMIT University). Drawing on research from Sam’s PhD project, The utility of point clouds to estimate fuel hazards, the paper conducts a comparison of metrics derived from unmanned aerial systems, Light Detecting and Ranging (LiDAR) point clouds and unmanned aerial systems image based products to classify fire severity. The results indicate that unmanned aerial systems, strcuture from motion and LiDAR point clouds can be used to assess fire severity at very high spatial resolutions.

Development of fragility functions for rigid-frame bridges subjected to tsunami-induced hydrodynamic forces was written by completed PhD student Dr Ismail Qeshta (RMIT University), Dr Javad Hashemi (Swinburne University), Dr Reza Hashemi (University of Rhode Island), Prof Rebecca Gravina (RMIT University) and Prof Sujeeva Setunge (RMIT University), and published in Structure and Infrastructure Engineering. Relating to Dr Qeshta’s PhD project, Fragility and resilience of bridge structures subjected to extreme wave-induced loads, the paper presents a framework for developing fragility functions of coastal rigid-frame bridges, and bridges with strong pier-to-deck connectivity, undergoing tsunami-induced hydrodynamic loads. The assessment highlights that Fibre reinforced polymers-jacketing is an effective method in reducing the risk of failure of the rigid-frame bridges.

Two new journal articles relating to the National mental health and wellbeing study of police and emergency services project have been published two journals.

Mental health and wellbeing of Australian police and emergency services employees, published in the Archives of Environmental & Occupational Health, was written by Michael Kyron (University of Western Australia), Wavne Rikkers (University of Western Australia), Jennifer Bartlett (University of Western Australia), Emma Renehan (Beyond Blue), Katherine Hafekost (University of Western Australia), Michael Baigent (Beyond Blue), Rebecca Cunneen (University of Western Australia) and David Lawrence (University of Western Australia). The paper details the findings from Answering the Call, the Australian National Police and Emergency Services Mental Health and Wellbeing Study that surveyed 14,868 Australian ambulance, fire and rescue, police, and state emergency service employees about their mental wellbeing. The findings highlight the risk of mental health conditions associated with work in the emergency services sector.

The article Sexual orientation and prevalence of mental health difficulties among emergency services employees was written by Michael Kyron, Peter McEvoy (Curtin University), Dylan Gilbey (Telethon Kids Institute), Ashleigh Lin (Telethon Kids Institute), Catherine Mazza (Deakin University), Wavne Rikkers, Jennifer Bartlett and David Lawrence (University of Western Australia), and published in the Journal of Affective Disorders. The paper explores the extent to which sexual orientation is associated with higher rates of mental health issues among emergency personnel.