Black Friday 1939: Victoria, 45 degrees C, 71 deaths, leaping balls of fire, and lit by the hand of man

Those who don’t know history…

On Black Friday 1939, on a day of high wind and savage 45 degree heat (110 Fahrenheit) many separate fires joined forces in Victoria to make mass conflagrations, one of which burned most of the western flanks of the Snowy Mountains all the way to New South Wales. In the end the conflagration burned through two million hectares, 3,700 buildings, 69 mills and killed 71 people. Five towns were completely destroyed – never to be rebuilt. At the time the atmospheric content of carbon dioxide was 310ppm and 90% of all human emissions were yet to be made.

In the end, they were horribly unprepared, the forests were horribly overgrown and the weather was horribly extreme. Just like 2020.

The Stretton Royal Commission into the Black Friday fires found that it “almost all fires are caused by man”, and recommended among many other things, the “common bush practice of controlled burning to reduce risks”. The Commission (as well as the fires) had far reaching effects: spawning roads, firebreaks, dams, aerial patrols. A radio network was set up that was considered better than the police and military. The Forests Commission more than doubled the area it was managing.

The report makes for […]