Queensland bushfire season is far from over with no rain in sight
Queensland’s Acting Fire Commissioner has warned the state’s horror season is just getting started, with high temperatures and no prospect of rain for weeks or even months.
Crime & Justice
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QUEENSLAND’S horror bushfire crisis is far from over with authorities warning the dire weather conditions will continue for weeks and potentially months.
Acting Fire Commissioner Mike Wassing this afternoon said this was no ordinary bushfire season, with there being no outlook of rain.
Winds are expected to pick up again this weekend after a short lived reprieve yesterday and today with temperatures forecast to be between 5 to 8C degrees higher than average early next week.
“This is not an ordinary bushfire season,” Mr Wassing said.
“What we’re seeing is extraordinary dry conditions ... higher temperatures, this will continue for weeks and potentially months.
“There is no outlook of rain.”
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Taskforce Overcross is looking “very closely” at 22 fires across the state.
“13 have been obviously as a result of either a careless, deliberate, sometimes just reckless and accidental fires that have started,” Police Commissioner Katarina Carroll said.
“We have charged two adults and 13 juveniles have been dealt with as well.”
On Wednesday night a 14-year-old Peregian Springs boy and a 15-year-old Coolum Beach girl were charged with endangering particular property by fire.
The Sunshine Coast Daily reports that the mother of a Sunshine Coast teenager who’s been accused of lighting the devastating Peregian bushfire has hit back at commentators in defence of her son.
The unnamed teen is one of two juveniles charged with lighting the fire on Monday afternoon, after he allegedly admitted the act in a local social media chat room.
“I did a small one, stomped it out and it was over, then … did a big one,” he allegedly wrote.
The boy’s mother has since hit back at angry online comments targeting her son.
“You need to get your facts clear,” she posted online, according to 9 News.
“When a police report comes out, you’ll know.”
As part of new Taskforce Overcross, which will assess potentially suspicious fires, two children have been charged with endangering property at Glenden near Mackay, while another adult has been charged with seven counts of unauthorised lighting of fires in Dalby.
A child has been cautioned about an alleged arson in Woodridge in Brisbane’s south, while yet another has been referred to restorative justice on three counts of endangering property and one count of wilful damage at Pimpama.
Children have also been referred to restorative justice over fires at Ormeau, Torquay, Palm Beach, Deception Bay and Wavell Heights, while an adult was given a notice to appear in court following unauthorised lighting of fires in Rockhampton.
“In some cases, it’s just young kids lighting a fire for fun, that fire has got away and obviously impacted in some ways very badly,” Police Commissioner Carroll said.
“Others, kids have got together and purposefully lit fires and in other cases there have been obviously recidivist offenders around arson. “So all the circumstances are very varied … and the police have dealt with them appropriately,” Police Commissioner Carroll said.
Meanwhile Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk defended her trip to Switzerland for her Olympics missions, insisting she had to do her job.
“I had to do my job and as soon as I could leave, I left and came straight back and we have frontline emergency services personnel here just did an outstanding job,” she said on the Sunshine Coast this afternoon.
The Premier said she couldn’t have sent another minister because the invitation was “just to me”.
“When I left here I was thoroughly briefed ... I did not know that people were going to light illegal bushfires,” she said.
“We are going to see more and more of these natural disasters that are going to happen across our state, you only have to look at what happened last year when the conditions were catastrophic, we had cyclones and then we had a monsoonal event,” she said.
“I mean we have never had so many issues like this at any one time.
“Queensland is facing more and more of these issues and we are as prepared as we possible can be.”
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