welcome to a special news round we've come to Australia to see the very real effects of climate
change I thought we're all gonna die and now all of our houses were gonna burn down it was really
smoky you could see people around wearing like full gas masks that you would wear during like
a war it was happening the sky just went orange and like the Sun was almost like piercing was
almost like a laser coming through the sky and then you just look up and you're like something
and something really really Bad's happening it was just all over the news all anyone ever
talked about you forgot what blue sky was like it was just smoke for like a month these were the
scene has been fire ripped through large parts of Australia record high temperatures a lack of rain
combined with strong winds there too fires burning out of control houses businesses and vehicles were
destroyed and animals had to be rescued from the flames Newsround has come to Australia to see what
life has been like for kids and their families who have lived through some of the worst forest
fires the country has ever seen the stories were really worrying for everyone and the smoke is a
big problem we're just going to stay at home the whole time it's also hot and humid they couldn't
even step out of our house keep the smoke was so bad so we just stay inside well I actually was
suffering with seasonal as well just because of the fire my doctor said it's actually equivalent
to smoking 20 cigarettes a day Australia is used to bush fires but they have never been as big or
caused as much damage as these ones fires spread quickly and lasted for months in large parts of
the country with New South Wales and Victoria the worst affected so why was this fire season so bad
20 19 was the hottest and driest on record with temperatures hitting at least 40 degrees Celsius
in every state that was combined with months of drought partly caused by an unusually strong
weather cycle called the Indian dipole higher than usual temperature differences between the
two sides of the Indian Ocean meant flooding in parts of East Africa and a lack of rainfall in
Australia and climate change had an impact to its thoughts that is increased the risk of bushfires
by at least 30 percent so how close were the fires well there were about 100 metres away I
live in you know Giselle lives in Blackheath she had to leave her home to escape the fires
burning nearby there were 20 try it fire trucks an hour just go whizzing down the street there
was planes and helicopters and it was so loud you could smell the smoke we had to wear face masks
and it was really not a good smell at all the sky was like red just completely red for a lot of the
time in the night time mainly and it was just really scary and I didn't like what was it like
to have all of that going on outside your house I was super scared I just sort of tried to keep
myself occupied with other things then thinking about it the whole time my dad actually wanted
to stay back and fight the fires with the hose but I did not want that and my nan called up
from where she lives and she just said you need to get out of there because it's getting really
close to us dad put all of our stuff in the car and dead and I cleaned out the yard we just sort
of raked up all of the leaves and the front and back yard and then put them in big plastic bags
and put a bit a piece of scrapped in over the top so that if any embers came they wouldn't
catch the leaves on fire because if that one leave would have gotten on fire because we
had so many leaves in our backyard I just dead leaves everything would have caught on fire and
it might have just blown our house up pretty much luckily for gizelle and her dad the wind changed
direction and their home was saved but houses in neighboring towns weren't so lucky and nearby bush
land was severely burned it's had a big impact on the communities here I'm shuffling down one
of the streets of a really small village called Clarence and it's been really badly damaged by
the fires some of the houses have been completely destroyed and it's quite a few burned-out trucks
here as well it's quite overwhelming to see the impact of the fires here it must have been so
scary people living here I just can't imagine what it must have been like to live through
conditions for firefighters have been very dangerous and intense many of the people
trying to control the flames are volunteers that means they don't get paid despite risking their
lives for other people I went to meet John he's worked as a volunteer firefighter since he was
17 hi John how are you I'm a if I meet you what if the bush fires been like this summer these fires
would normally last a couple of weeks or a month but the fires due to the size and the area have
lasted for months how have you guys been coping with that I'm as best we can there big ships we've
had guys out there for 18 hours sometimes which isn't great but we don't want to leave until we
know it's safe so how do you deal with such danger on a daily basis you just don't have time to think
I'm scared you know it's sometimes dangerous and you're trying to just monitor what the fires doing
the fires get very intense around the houses and you have other people to think about then and we
had the people from Clarence some of those crews lost their houses and they were out the next day
with us yeah even after losing the house they still want to get back out on the truck and help
their career and help the district out to try to prevent it from happening other people no animal
Tyler often helps out at the fire station giving out food supplies to volunteers okay so how did it
feel when you knew that your dad was out fighting these fires oh I feel very very scared and and
shocked and I missed him when he wasn't around that much I had a dream he might die in the fire
but now the fires have got lower and I got it I started not getting that much scared I feel
very very proud for him he's very good at it this is part of the Blue Mountains world heritage site
it's a fit severe damage during the fires with most of the trees being burned it's really quiet
here because a lot of the animals that used to live have either died or run away it's estimated
that more than a billion animals have been lost in the fires so where did the flames come from yes so
the flames came from the north from this direction pretty much all the way to the horizon of what you
can see has been burned and came right up and over where we're standing standing now and how high
were the flames yeah the maximum they'd probably be close to 100 meters high coming out of the tops
of the tall trees we've had three major fires over the summer and the in the upper blue mountains
and they've burned nearly 70 percent of the Blue Mountains National Park the Blue Mountains is a
really special place it's world heritage-listed because of the biodiversity it's official word
diversity they have in this area so we have over 100 species of eucalypt we don't know the extent
of the damage but it's expected that the the fire would have impacted on several of those species
and how does the first go about recovering from it is part of the natural process it's why we
haven't had on the scale before we have had fires before and the bush always comes back
these koalas were rescued from the Blue Mountains before the worst of the fires
an organization called science for wildlife was studying these koalas they wanted to bring them
out from the wild ahead of the fires to protect them and luckily we here at Taronga Zoo were able
to bring them in and look after them here at the zoo if we hadn't rescued these koalas they would
have lost their habitat to the fire and probably most of them would have lost their lives in the
in the bush fires so now that we have the koalas here at Turanga we are trying to just keep them
happy and healthy so that means feeding them first and foremost and koalas are really fussy
eaters so we brought those drives in and then we had to spend a lot of time going out and finding
food for them so actually back went back to where they're from and brought through down from there
to make sure that they were getting the food they were used to and we've been trying lots
of different other species as well trying to find out what they like so this is Naomi she's
an adult female when we brought her in she had a jury in the pouch in the time we've had her
here that Joey is actually emerged from the pouch and is riding around on mums back starting to eat
leaves itself and it's even starting to venture away from um sitting a little apart from um at
times so growing up before allies so I think for everyone watching the fires we were all feeling
very helpless some feel very lucky to be part of the effort to to look after these koalas and know
that such an important koala population has been saved it's an amazing feeling to be able to be
part of that Aboriginal people have been living in Australia for thousands of years long before
Westerners came to the country they are used to managing dry seas and fires dan used to be a
professional firefighter but after learning about the techniques used by his Aboriginal ancestors
believes their method of cultural burning should be used more widely fire for us is essential to
look after our country and people go on how can you use fire to actually look after the bush isn't
it destructive doesn't it just burn everything and that's that's the mindset that we're trying
to change in this country cultural burning is when small areas of bush are burned in the cooler parts
of the year to reduce the amounts of leaves and sticks on the ground this cuts down the
amount of fuel for bush fires making them less intense when they occur naturally professional
firefighters do something similar but on a larger scale the Aboriginal method is different because
they use one small spot of fire which burns slowly and moves outwards from a central point the amount
of heat that we're generating from these spot fires as opposed to a line of fire is a whole
lot different that also gives insects and lizards and snakes and other bigger animals time to move
away so is it as safe the way of doing it is it it's certainly a safer way has so many so many
levels so it's safer for us it doesn't have the same impact on trees that then lead to
the amount of heat that's you know impacting on the trunk itself but also on the canopy that's
all sacred why would you want to burn that and that's what I'm saying about cultural burning
takes all of that into account I'm hoping that they are listening you know it's time for them
to start considering Aboriginal people taking a more active and a leading role in creating
programs where we're seeing more certainly more involvement by Aboriginal people in
looking after country and leading that process the Australian Prime Minister has been criticized for
how we responded to the bush fires and fourth a stood towards climate change climate change
is what the experts call a threat multiplier so whatever conditions there are existing climate
change essentially makes them worse and makes them bigger unless we reduce our emissions and
stop burning gas and coal as much as we do in Australia those extreme weather events those
are going to be more frequent and more intense Australia has to move as quickly as it can to a
hundred percent renewable energy it has to leave gas and coal in the ground instead of digging them
up to be burned and pollute the atmosphere fixing climate change we know what needs to be done we
know what needs to happen now we just need to make sure that the government's do what has
to be done Scott Morrison has admitted there were mistakes in the government's response and has set
up an investigation into how the bush by crisis was handled but says the country is on track to
cut carbon emissions with all the the climate protests it's an amazing way of bringing light
to a terrible terrible situation but though I do feel there are ways that we could be investing
more time and thought into helping prevent all these things and it's just little things that
people can do and it just really does make a big difference it's like 7 billion people do
something little that's a big big difference what do you think about the future what do you think
needs to be done to kind of prevent this from happening again I don't think there's anything
to prevent it honestly I think we just need to be prepared and know we're doing and hopefully
safe safe I definitely think a leaders need to do more at the end of the day our climate is
changing so we do need to do more it will take time for people here to get back on their feet
and to come to terms with what has happened many are saying that more needs to be done to manage
bush fires and to tackle climate change to try and avoid this level of dead station from happening
again but there are signs of hope in the Blue Mountains the trees are beginning to recover
there are now enough new leaves for koalas to eat so Naomi and her Joey have finally made it home
you