As Australians tracked from afar the devastation of the Los Angeles Palisades fires in January 2025 – including loss of life, 1,000s of lost homes, billions of dollars in damage – they quickly turned to the question ‘Could this happen to us?
David Bowman, a professor of Pyrogeography and Fire Science at the University of Tasmania says in short – yes. For the case of LA, a myriad of factors including intense winds, high fuel loads, and extremely dry lands combined to overwhelm the capacity to suppress the fire. Being driven into an urban area “house-to-house ignition” was witnessed as homes became the fuel.
In this article Professor Bowman discusses how ready Australia is for an event like this and what needs to happen to increase urban resilience and preparedness. With global warming affecting climatic conditions and making bushfire here in Australia more frequent and severe, Professor Bowman argues that we need to act now – it is no longer a matter of can this happen? It is a case of when.
Read the full article here: https://theconversation.com/la-is-on-fire-how-will-australia-cope-when-bushfires-hit-sydney-melbourne-or-another-major-city-246967
This article was written by Campbell Goff, the Healthy Ecosystems Project Officer with the Nature Conservation Council of NSW’s Bushfire Program.
Image: Palisades fire taken by Jessica Christian on Unsplash
