Bushfires in Australia are common and frequent events that have played a major role in shaping the continent over millions of years. Eastern Australia is one of the world’s most fire-prone areas, and its main eucalyptus forests have developed to survive and even benefit from bushfires. However, these fires can cause serious damage to property and result in the loss of human and animal lives. Since 1851, bushfires in Australia have killed about 800 people and billions of animals.
The most severe fires often occur when there are extremely high temperatures, very low moisture in the air, and strong winds. These conditions allow fires to spread quickly. Some of the most destructive fires in history include: Black Saturday in 2009 in Victoria (173 people killed, 2,000 homes destroyed); Ash Wednesday in 1983 in Victoria and South Australia (75 people killed, nearly 1,900 homes lost); Black Friday in 1939 in Victoria (71 people killed, 650 homes destroyed); Black Tuesday in 1967 in Tasmania (62 people killed, nearly 1,300 homes lost); and the Gippsland fires and Black Sunday in 1926 in Victoria (60 people killed over two months). Other major fires include the 1851 Black Thursday bushfires, the 2006 December bushfires, the 1974–75 fires that burned 15% of Australia, and the 2019–20 bushfires. It is estimated that the 2019–2020 bushfires caused the deaths of at least 33 people and over 3 billion animals.
Over the past 6,000 years, Australia has gradually become drier, creating an environment that is naturally prone to fire. This has led to many plant and animal species developing special traits to survive fires. Some plants rely on bushfires to reproduce. Aboriginal Australians used fire to clear grasslands for hunting and to create paths through thick vegetation. European settlers also adapted to using fire for farming and managing forests since the 19th century.
History
Fire plays a major role in the Australian environment, as noted by Tim Flannery in The Future Eaters. Some plants have developed ways to survive or even need bushfires to grow. For example, they may have special shoots that grow after a fire, fire-resistant seeds, or flammable oils in their leaves that help spread fire. Early European explorers, such as Abel Janszoon Tasman in 1642 and Captain James Cook in 1770, recorded seeing smoke from bushfires and signs of burned land.
Bushfires were caused by both natural events and human activity. Aboriginal people used fire for many purposes, such as burning grasslands to encourage plant growth, making it easier to hunt animals, and clearing land to grow edible plants. This practice, called fire-stick farming, was used for thousands of years in central Australia. Flannery explains that Aboriginal fire use was so common that early European explorers often mentioned it. However, when Europeans took control of fire management, problems arose. Fire suppression became the main approach, leading to changes in traditional burning practices. A 2001 study found that stopping traditional burning and allowing logging without control increased the risk of large wildfires, especially during dry seasons. A 2017 study suggested that European settlers removing mature trees may have caused more shrubs to grow, which can fuel fires. Additionally, gamba grass, introduced to Australia in 1942, now grows widely and can make bushfires more intense.
European settlers were unprepared for Australia’s hot, dry climate and frequent bushfires. The 1851 Victorian bushfires, known as the Black Thursday fires, burned over five million hectares, killed 12 people, and destroyed over one million sheep and cattle. Smoke from the fires reached Tasmania. Later, in 1898, the Red Tuesday fires burned 260,000 hectares and killed 12 people. A map from the 19th century shows over 7,000 bushfires reported in Australian newspapers.
Large bushfires continued into the 20th century. As more people moved into bushland areas, fires caused more deaths and property damage. In 1925–26, the Black Sunday fires in Victoria killed 31 people. The 1939 Black Friday fires were among the worst in Australian history. They burned urban areas near Sydney, Melbourne, and Canberra, with ash falling as far as New Zealand. These fires killed 71 people, destroyed 650 homes, and occurred during extreme heat, with temperatures reaching over 45°C in some places.
The Black Friday fires burned nearly 2 million hectares in Victoria, destroyed entire towns, and wiped out thousands of animals. A Royal Commission was later formed to investigate the fires, leading to new fire management practices, such as planned burning. In 1967, Tasmania experienced its most destructive fire season, with 80 fires burning across the southeast due to dry conditions and strong winds.
Factors and causes
Although there is no agreement, many bushfires in Australia are believed to be directly caused by people. For example, between 1997 and 2009, in south-eastern Australia, 47% of fires with known causes were accidental, such as from cigarettes, escaped burn-offs, campfires, or sparks from equipment or power lines. Forty percent were deliberately started, and 13% were caused by lightning. The cause of the remaining fires was unknown. The number of people living in an area was the main reason for the total number of fires starting in different regions.
In recent years, many major bushfires have started in remote areas due to dry lightning. Some reports suggest that a changing climate may also be making the 2019–2020 fires more intense. Hotter and drier conditions are causing fire seasons to last longer and be more dangerous. During droughts, there is more fuel for wildfires than usual, and bushfires can become megafires. These large fires create their own weather and spread fire further.
Strong winds help fires spread quickly by carrying burning embers into the air. This is called spotting and can start new fires up to 40 kilometers (25 miles) away from the main fire.
In New South Wales, dry winds similar to Föhn winds from the Great Dividing Range quickly raise air temperatures and reduce moisture in the air. This happens because the mountains block damp air and allow drier air to sink and heat up due to adiabatic compression.
Large wildfires can create their own winds, called fire whirls. Fire whirls are like tornadoes and form from spinning air caused by the fire's heat. These whirls can throw burning logs and debris far distances.
In the Northern Territory, some birds, such as black kites, whistling kites, and brown falcons, can spread fires. These birds pick up burning twigs, fly to unburned areas, and drop them to start new fires. This behavior helps them find prey fleeing the fires, such as small mammals, birds, lizards, and insects.
The shape of the land, or topography, strongly affects how bushfires behave. Fires spread faster uphill than downhill. The slope and direction of the fire also influence local weather, such as temperature and wind. The direction a slope faces, called the aspect, affects how much sunlight the fuel receives. This can change the fuel's moisture level and either slow or speed up a fire.
Australia's climate has warmed by more than one degree Celsius over the past century, leading to more frequent and intense heatwaves and droughts. Eight of Australia's ten warmest years on record have been since 2005. A 2018 study found that major droughts in southern Australia in the late 20th and early 21st centuries are likely the worst in 400 years. Average summer temperatures have increased, with early 2019 being the hottest summer on record. 2019 was also Australia's driest year since 1900, with rainfall 40% below average.
Heatwaves and droughts dry out plants, increasing the risk of bushfires. This has worsened in the last 30 years. Since the mid-1990s, southeast Australia has had a 15% drop in late autumn and early winter rainfall and a 25% drop in average rainfall in April and May. Rainfall from January to August 2019 was the lowest on record in some areas, with some places receiving 77% less rain than usual.
In the 2000s, scientists concluded that human-caused climate change would likely increase the number and intensity of fires in Australia. This finding has been supported by many reports since. In 2019, a report by the Australian Climate Council said that climate change made the severe bushfire conditions in New South Wales and Queensland worse. A scientist named Nerilie Abram stated that the link between recent extreme weather and human-caused climate change is scientifically certain. In 2020, scientists found that if Earth warms by 2.0°C (3.6°F), the hot and dry conditions that fueled the 2019–2020 bushfires would be eight times more likely.
Bushfires are not only made more likely and intense by climate change, but they also worsen it. Before the 2019–2020 bushfire season, Australian forests were thought to absorb all the carbon released by bushfires, leading to net-zero emissions. However, global warming is causing bushfires to burn more intensely and frequently. The 2019–2020 fires released 400 million tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, equal to Australia's average annual emissions in three months. These emissions will increase Australia's greenhouse gas emissions, contributing to global warming and making future megafires more likely.
Scientists now say that the 2019–2020 fires released about 350 million tonnes of carbon dioxide, equal to two-thirds of Australia's average annual emissions in 2017. A professor warned that Australian forests may take over 100 years to reabsorb the carbon released this fire season.
In January 2020, the British Met Office said the 2019–2020 bushfires contributed 2% to the increase in major greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Climate studies show that conditions promoting extreme bushfires in Australia will get worse as more greenhouse gases are added to the atmosphere.
Southeast
Impact on wildlife and fauna
Bushfires kill animals directly and destroy their homes, making it hard for surviving animals to stay safe even after the fires are gone. Professor Chris Dickman from Sydney University says that during the first three months of the 2019–2020 bushfires, more than 800 million animals in New South Wales and over one billion animals across Australia died. This number includes mammals, birds, and reptiles but does not include insects, bats, or frogs. Many animals died in the fires, while others later died because of a lack of food and shelter or because of attacks by feral cats and red foxes. Dickman explains that Australia has the highest rate of species loss in the world, and some native animals, like the Kangaroo Island dunnart, may become extinct because of the fires.
A 2020 study by the Australian government shows that 272 plant species and 55 animal species that are at risk had a large part of their habitat affected by the fires. Another 49 species had more than 80% of their habitat burned.
Koalas are especially at risk because they move slowly. During intense fires, they often climb to the top of trees and curl into a ball, which can trap them. In January 2020, it was reported that about half of the 50,000 koalas on Kangaroo Island, which are kept separate from mainland koalas to protect the species, died in the weeks before the report.
Wildlife ecologist Professor Euan Ritchie from Deakin University says that after fires, animals like frogs and skinks are left without homes, which harms already endangered species such as the western ground parrot, the Leadbeater's possum, the Mallee emu-wren (a bird that cannot fly far), and Gilbert's potoroo. Beekeepers also lost many hives in the fires.
Kangaroos and wallabies can run quickly to escape fires. However, in January 2020, it was reported that many kangaroos died trying to run away from fires near Batlow in New South Wales. The most resilient animals are those that can burrow underground or fly. Possums often get burned but can sometimes hide in tree hollows. Wombats and snakes usually burrow underground to stay safe.
Goannas can benefit from bushfires. Dickman says that in central Australia, goannas often come out of their burrows after fires and eat injured animals, such as burned birds, young birds, small mammals, and lizards.
In addition to the impact on animals, bushfires also harm plants. About 85% of the plants in Australia are found only in Australia. Many plant species are adapted to recover after fires, for example, by growing from seeds that stay dormant in the soil. However, the 2019–2020 bushfire season was more severe than any before, according to ecologist Sarah Legge. During these fires, 11 Australian bioregions and 17 major groups of native plants were severely burned. Also, up to 67%–83% of globally important rainforests and eucalypt forests and woodlands were severely damaged.
Impact on humans
Bushfires have caused the most serious harm to humans by killing more than 800 people since 1851. In addition to the loss of lives, homes, property, and livestock are often destroyed. This can leave people homeless, very upset, and without access to electricity, phones, or drinking water. Some people have discussed how many people may have died indirectly from the fires, but the number is likely around 400.
Bushfires create pollution made of tiny particles in the air that can harm human lungs. After the Hazelwood fire in 2014, a public health researcher named Fay Johnston found that young children who were exposed to smoke as babies, toddlers, or while still in the womb had changes in their lung function. She said that babies not yet born who were exposed to the Hazelwood smoke were more likely to have coughs or colds two to four years later. Other studies in Australia show that adults have more breathing problems because of air pollution from bushfires.
In January 2020, the city of Canberra had the worst air quality of any major city in the world. Orange-colored smoke entered homes and offices, making it very hard to breathe outside. This forced businesses and schools to close. Studies show that people living in areas with high pollution have a greater risk of heart attacks, strokes, and diabetes. A researcher named Professor Jalaluddin said that there is growing evidence that air pollution may lead to health problems like Parkinson’s disease and Alzheimer’s.
In 2019–2020, bushfires were described as "transformative and unprecedented" in size. About one-third of Australia’s population was affected, with some people experiencing long-term or extreme health problems. From September 2019 to the present, nearly 3,000 firefighters have worked daily in New South Wales to fight fires. About 90% of these firefighters are unpaid volunteers. A researcher named David McBride said that these workers often push themselves to the limit and may suffer from serious injuries like heat stress, chronic bronchitis, or asthma.
A study from the University of Tasmania found that smoke from the 2019–2020 bushfires caused 417 extra deaths. In parts of Sydney, pollution levels reached nearly 400 μg/m³, which the World Health Organization calls dangerous.
In Australia, studies show that male babies born in areas heavily affected by fires often have much higher average birth weights. This is because signals from the mother can directly influence how a baby grows in the womb.
After major bushfires, psychological problems may develop when people have time to think about their experiences. A study of 1,526 people who lost a lot during the 1983 Ash Wednesday fires found that 42% had mental health problems after one year, which is double the rate in unaffected areas. This number dropped to 23% after 20 months.
An example of how bushfires affect people is the 2016 fire in Yarloop, Western Australia. The fire destroyed nearly the entire town, including homes, historic buildings, and infrastructure. Two people died, and the town’s bridges and power lines were damaged. Two years later, many residents still felt traumatized. The Western Australian government spent A$64 million to rebuild the town and nearby areas.
The 2009 Black Saturday fires, the costliest in Australia’s history, caused about A$4.4 billion in damage. Experts believe the 2019–2020 fires may cost more than that and could harm industries like farming and tourism. Medical costs from the fires and smoke are expected to reach hundreds of millions of dollars. One study estimated that smoke and fires could cost Sydney up to A$50 million each day. The Insurance Council of Australia said that claims for fire damage could exceed A$700 million, with more claims expected as more areas become accessible. In January 2020, a measure of consumer confidence dropped to its lowest level in over four years.
In response to the fires, the federal government announced that volunteer firefighters would be compensated, military personnel would help, and a A$2 billion recovery fund would be created. New South Wales, the hardest-hit state, pledged A$1 billion for rebuilding infrastructure.
Economic activity has been hurt by these conditions for two years or more. Farming income has dropped by 22% since early 2017 and is expected to fall another 7% by the end of 2019/20. This would bring the total drop in farming income since 2017 to about 30%, similar to the decline during the Millennium drought. The recent bushfires are expected to reduce economic growth in late 2019 and early 2020 by about 0.2 percentage points, with some recovery later. However, the exact impact is uncertain.
Official inquiries
After many large bushfires, state and federal governments have started investigations to find ways to solve the problem. A report from 2010 said that between 1939 and 2010, there were at least 18 major bushfire investigations, including reports by government committees, coronial inquiries, and Royal Commissions. A report from 2015 stated that there were 51 investigations into wildfires and how they are managed since 1939. The report noted that Royal Commissions were not the best way to learn from past bushfires. Many investigations have suggested "hazard reduction burning," which involves controlled burns to reduce fuel, and set goals to burn a certain amount of forest each year to lower risk. However, planned burns are hard to carry out safely, and many studies have found these goals are rarely met. At the same time, fire management experts disagree about how well planned burning works.
In January 2020, during the 2019–2020 bushfire season, Prime Minister Scott Morrison mentioned the possibility of starting another Royal Commission. He said in an interview on ABC-TV 7.30 that any investigation into the crisis should be thorough and look into climate change and other possible causes. Letters Patent were later issued on 20 February 2020 for the Royal Commission into National Natural Disaster Arrangements.
Warnings
During fire season, the Bureau of Meteorology gives fire weather forecasts. Fire agencies use predicted weather conditions, such as temperature, humidity, wind speed, and how dry plants are, to decide the Fire Danger Rating. These ratings are part of weather forecasts and help people know what actions to take before the day. Ratings are shared through newspapers, radio, TV, and the internet.
In 2009, all Australian states began using a standard "Fire Danger Rating" (FDR). This system added a new level called "catastrophic fire danger." The first time this level was used for Sydney was in November 2019 during the 2019–2020 bushfire season. In 2010, after a national review, new conditions for each rating were set for grassland areas in most regions.
The Australian Fire Danger Rating System was used nationwide starting 1 September 2022. It replaced the earlier McArthur Forest Fire Danger Index. The system aims to clearly explain fire danger to the public. It has four levels that show what actions people should take and how dangerous the fire risk is.
Remote monitoring
In Australia, wildfires are monitored from a distance using technology. Geoscience Australia created the Sentinel bushfire monitoring system, which uses satellite data to help fire-fighting groups evaluate and manage risks. Another tool is MyFireWatch, a program based on an existing fire service system. It was rebuilt by Landgate and Edith Cowan University for the public to use. In addition to satellites, Australian firefighters use unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs) to help control fires. Technologist Angus Dorney noted that Australia's fire services have developed without much technology. He said that both cultural changes and technological solutions will be needed for new technologies to be effective.
Regional management
The National Council for Fire & Emergency Services is the main organization that represents fire, emergency services, and land management groups in the Australasian region.
The Rural Fire Service (RFS) is a volunteer-based firefighting group that works as part of the Queensland Fire Department. The Queensland Fire Department includes professional firefighters who respond to fires in both urban and rural areas of Queensland.
In New South Wales, Fire and Rescue NSW (FRNSW), the Forestry Corporation of NSW (FCNSW), the National Parks and Wildlife Service (NPWS), and the New South Wales Rural Fire Service (RFS) work together to manage and fight fires across the state.
The Country Fire Service (CFS) is a volunteer-based fire service in South Australia. It operates under the South Australian Fire and Emergency Services Commission (SAFECOM).
In Victoria, the Country Fire Authority (CFA) provides firefighting and emergency services to rural and regional areas, as well as parts of Melbourne’s outer suburbs and growth areas not covered by the Metropolitan Fire Brigade.
In Victoria, the Department of Environment, Land, Water, and Planning (DELWP) is responsible for fire suppression and management. This includes planned burning on public land, such as State Forests and National Parks, which cover about 7.1 million hectares (18 million acres; 71,000 square kilometers; 27,000 square miles), or roughly one-third of the state.
In Western Australia, the Department of Fire and Emergency Services (DFES) and the Department of Parks and Wildlife (P&W) share responsibility for managing bushfires. DFES supports several groups, including the Fire and Rescue Service (FRS), Bush Fire Service (BFS), Volunteer Fire and Rescue Service (VFRS), State Emergency Service (SES), Volunteer Fire and Emergency Service (VFES), Emergency Services Cadets, and the Volunteer Marine Rescue Service (VMR).
In Tasmania, the Tasmania Fire Service manages bushfires with the help of the Tasmanian Parks and Wildlife Service and Forestry Tasmania.
Guidelines for survival
Local authorities give information and teach people who live in areas where bushfires can happen about where fires are happening now, how to keep people safe and protect homes and belongings, and when to leave in a car.
Major bushfires in Australia
Bushfires have caused more than 800 deaths in Australia since 1851. In 2012, the total cost of bushfires was estimated to be $1.6 billion. However, in terms of money cost, bushfires are less expensive than damage from drought, severe storms, hail, and cyclones. This may be because bushfires often happen in areas with few people. The 2009 Black Saturday bushfires in Victoria caused 173 deaths over 21 days. This was the highest number of deaths from any single bushfire or bushfire season in Australia, making it the worst bushfire in the country’s history. The severe fires during the summer of 2019–2020 affected areas with many people, including popular holiday spots. NSW Rural Fire Services Commissioner, Shane Fitzsimmons, said this season was "absolutely" the worst bushfire season ever recorded.