now we talk about the scale of the
Australian bushfires every day over 20
people have been killed hundreds of
millions of animals - more than eight
million hectares have been burnt and
there's an economic cost - and part of
that is the impact on tourism the prime
minister Scott Morrison turned to that
today
Australia is open Australia store a
wonderful place to come and bring your
family and enjoy your holidays they made
these comments on a visit to Kangaroo
Island just off the south coast it's a
haven for wildlife and a popular tourist
attraction - and from this image you get
an idea of how extensive the devastation
has been the fires have struck twice on
the island and 1/3 of the island has
been burned that inevitably means
animals including koalas had been killed
or badly injured and the island is home
to several endangered species including
the a kiddin it and also the glossy back
cockatoo
now it's feared many of these have been
killed or injured and even those animals
which have survived may have lost their
habitat now the fires on this particular
Island were started with lightning
strikes and they're part of a much much
broader problem all over Australia as we
know the brunt of these fires has been
borne by New South Wales and Victoria in
the southeast and unfortunately more hot
dry weather is forecast now one tactic
that's being used to control the burning
is this this is a fire fighter in
Victoria deliberately lighting small
fires in scrub that's believed to be
high risk the idea is that you reduce
available fuel for when the main fires
come through here's Katie Watson with
one farmer in the hills of Victoria
farmer Chris is holding his breath fires
have already scorched much of his land
and there's real danger that existing
bush fires further north could merge and
create one big mega blaze as the crow
flies it's probably about 70 or 80 Kay's
it seems like a long way in the forest
but you know two hours and can be upon
us
chris says there's a simple solution
more bushland needs to be burnt in a
controlled manner to stop fires getting
out of hand it's the lack of fuel
reduction burns which is causing these
intense megafires if you take away the
fuel the issue of these mega fires takes
is gone away but all of that said the
authorities are clear that fuel
reduction alone doesn't fix the problem
remember this is what Victoria's fire
chief said this week the reality is
we've had fire down a landscape here
that have has had burns go right through
it and it hasn't slowed it up at all and
so the emotive argument is not supported
that fuel reduction burning on a large
scale will fix all our problems and
here's the Commissioner of the New South
Wales Rural Fire Service we are not
environmental bastards we actually work
through a sensible environmental regime
our our priorities our life property and
in that environment ranks third so so we
have the streamlined processes and I can
say in any given year of all the burns
that we've got ready to go 70 or 80
percent are cleared environmentally
ready to go we're just waiting for the
window of opportunity now even putting
clips of our Australia coverage on the
BBC News YouTube channel on Twitter -
and we keep getting messages from people
claiming the story of these fires isn't
climate change it's arson here's an
example of someone taking up the issue
saying it's not dozens of fire bugs it's
hundreds climate activists and lighting
fires in a desperate bid to amp up
climate change fear and we know that the
hashtag asks an emergency is being
widely used so let's assess this one
researcher analyzed over 300 accounts
using this hashtag he found a third of
them displayed highly automated and
inauthentic behavior meaning they could
be BOTS or trolls and he concluded the
conspiracy theories going around
including arson as the main cause of the
fires reflect an increased distrust in
expertise and skepticism in the media he
says these are all major factors in
different information it appears that
Australia has for better or worse
entered that battlefield now some of
these tweets share art scores like this
it's on a website called summit news it
claims that almost 200 arsonists have
been arrested go into the article the
figure is actually a hundred and
eighty-three but
that includes minor offenses like
breaching a total fire ban so that could
be something like using machinery on a
hot day not deliberately lighting a fire
police in New South Wales say the number
of people actually charged with
deliberately lighting a fire is not 183
for 24 and even less of them managed to
start large fires and on this subject
you could listen to the authorities in
Victoria saying there's currently no
intelligence to indicate that the fires
in East Gippsland and the Northeast
that's the worst fires in the state had
been caused by arson or any other
suspicious behavior and it's also worth
emphasizing that the main issue here is
hotter drier weather meteorologists have
long been warning the long-term trend of
rising temperatures in Australia across
the last century would impact bushfires
and it could be good idea to read this
from 2008 an independent report
commissioned by the Australian
Government that proved to be remarkably
accurate it told us fire seasons will
start earlier and slightly later and
generally be more intense this effect
increases over time it should be
directly observable by 2020 and so it's
proved and it's that rather than arson
which is driving this crisis
you