31 Comments

1. As usual, I prefer to find out the truth. The truth, after all, is the only useful answer, except as propaganda.

   Good luck with that. Truth, so they say, is the first casualty of war, and I very much regret that far from being in the middle of a civilised discussion about climate change, we in the western world seem to be in the middle of climate change wars.

   Those who claim that there is a lot of misinformation about arson claims might – just might – be correct, but ti would be nice to see an objective information-gathering exercise on their part, rather than the knee-jerk response of circling the wagons, which we also see when anyone suggests that increasing wind farm activity might have a connection with increasing whale, porpoise and dolphin deaths and strandings.

   What we need to do is to find out what is causing wildfires and what is causing whale strandings, and to try to work out, having done so, what – if anything – we can do to reduce or end them. Sadly, there seems little chance of that approach in the MSM in the midst of the climate change wars.

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2. I wrote about the possibility of arson playing a significant role in the Australian bushfires in Jan 2020, when the BBC were strenuously trying to debunk claims of arson by climate change deniers and conspiracy theorists. We all know how dedicated the BBC is to uncovering the truth.

   Debunked – BBC News Video Which Supposedly ‘Debunks’ #ArsonEmergency Claim

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3. “Wiki is a trustworthy source, isn’t it?”
   This would indicate otherwise:
   “Jimmy Wales is an internet entrepreneur and co-founder of Wikipedia and Wikia. He is a non-executive director of Guardian Media Group, owner of the Guardian and the Observer”
   https://www.theguardian.com/profile/jimmy-wales

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4. Thanks to Jit for examining the role of arson in the more recent Aus bushfires.

   I’ve lived in a bushfire-prone area of NSW now for over 40 years. In that period, there have been 5-6 bushfire seasons of note, including two that had me leave work and go home to form defence.

   While the left-wing media always squash down on arson as a cause of ignition, Jit has it correct in that the deeply entrenched fires are generally ignited by dry lightning well inside National Parks, although I’ll note a spectacular exception to that below, while the smaller ignitions nearer to hamlets and villages are generally lit by humans (deliberate or not) and are more easily contained.

   Evolution of the eucalypts (gums) in a dry environment has resulted (so far) in vegetation that actually produces an aromatic, flammable hydrocarbon vapour exuded through the leaf stomates. What possible advantage could that have for a specific vegetation in a bushfire ? The answer lies in the long-term wind patterns from El Nino oscillations, which are not caused through “excess” CO2. A harsh, extremely dry and strong westerly wind pattern (which occurs every few El Ninos) drives bushfire across the eucalypt forest at a huge rate, with burning clumps of foliage pushed by the wind up to a kilometre ahead of the firefront. The hydrocarbon vapour helps accelerate this, so pushing the front through at speed and allowing the eucalypts to recover more quickly. This next is a hard observation from the 40 years: whenever a strong westerly arises (and they can blow for up to a week), it is guaranteed that small fires will suddenly ignite over large areas peripheral to the hamlets in less than 24 hours. Since dry lightning can be observed in these cases, and almost never is, the suspicion is that firebugs will light them just to watch them run in the wind; I have to agree it is a truly atavistic sight. The firebugs themselves are almost never to be convicted, since there is no direct evidence, although arrests are plentiful.

   One spectacular arrest and conviction occurred about 15 years ago when a box kite was seen to be floating off a line way out over forest canopies during a heavy bushfire season. The police carefully tracked down the line controlling the kite and found a 16 year old boy floating his kite out over the canopy in a huge wind – with the tail(s) dripping kerosene from a small tank secured to his trail bike. Wet lightning, perhaps ?

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5. Small, gratuitous point about natural causes of fires: minor causes are related to iron pyrites. Pyrite can create sparks when struck and some fires have been caused during rock falls that include pyrites. More common are ignition sources involving the oxidation of iron pyrites. This is a strongly exothermic reaction (causing other materials to ignite) and many fires have been attributed to this source.

   Pedantry is rife.

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6. Jit,

   Thank you for highlighting these issues and thank you for the callout. I find the propaganda used to dismiss the importance of arson particularly annoying. As is often the case, an undemonstrated assumption is used as the basis for dismissing a counterview. In this case, the assumption is made that the only thing that has changed is the climate, and so arson has to be a red herring. The frustrating thing is that the numbers must be out there to enable a settlement of the issue, and yet no one is doing the research. When looking into the Australian bushfires, I did find this:

   “Australian arsonists: an analysis of trends between 1990 and 2015”

   https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6762153/

   But it opens with the following disappointing statement:

   “There have been few studies to date focused on identifying the characteristics of Australian arsonists, and a distinct absence of any analyses of trends in arson offending over time.”

   Even more disappointing is that the paper then only covered trends in characteristics and not trends in offending, thereby leaving the ‘distinct absence’ unaddressed. The paper did, however, point out that mental health and drug abuse had become more prevalent within arsonists, and so trends relating to those social problems do hint at a trend in offending. I also found this after a little more research:

   “There was a 22.8 pct increase in the number of forest fires that broke out in 2016 compared with the previous year causing a more devastating effect with the area of burnt land rising by 124.5 pct, the Fire Brigade Operations Center in the Athens suburb of Chalandri reports. The latest reports released also reveal that there was a sharp rise in the number of confirmed cases of arson discovered by investigators, making intentional arson the top causal factor for wildfires in 2016.”

   https://greekreporter.com/2016/11/13/fire-brigade-operations-center-reports-increase-of-arson-cases-and-wildfires-in-2016/

   So there is enough out there to debunk the debunkers, but I fear the propaganda war is already lost.

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7. P.S. Whilst there is a dearth of academic research on this issue, I should have acknowledged that there are amateur sleuths like Jaime Jessop who are prepared to dig out the relevant data, as she remined us earlier in this thread.

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8. Jaime, I am sorry to have forgotten your piece and should have acknowledged it. I see WordPress associated it with this story thanks to the keywords anyway. I have more reading to do to find out about some of the 2019-20 fires.

   Ianl, thank you for the info from the region. I have only theoretical knowledge of bushfires. My only brush with a real wildfire was a stubble fire that got out of control. Not in the same league.

   Regarding the volatiles, ecologists propose additional reasons for them. Neither seem entirely realistic. The first is that the shimmer of volatiles above the plants weaken the sunlight. The second is that in evaporating from leaves, the volatiles cool the plant. One thing that definitely does not slow down fire is the presence of highly-flammable litter, which as you will know, some eucalypts produce in abundance.

   As a local, did you hear whether Sokaluk was released? The internet does not seem to tell me.

   Alan, if I ever knew that, I had forgotten. Pedantry is excusable under all circumstances, except when the correction is wrong, so no worries there.

   John, one thing I have not mentioned here, but will discuss later, is the dearth of literature on arson and wildfires. It is matched by an abundance of literature on climate change and wildfires. Spooky that.

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9. No problem Jit, it was a while ago now, so I thought I would just mention it because obviously I remember writing it, but it even took me more than a few minutes to locate the article.

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10. Jit, perhaps it’s already on your list of forthcoming segments, but arson is not the only “far right wing climate denial conspiracy”. Fuel load is another. Of course you will know that; but I raise it to direct you to Vic Jurskis, who has written about the politics of it a number of times in Quadrant, for the Australian scene.

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11. ianalexs – this is a topic I intend to investigate. I read somewhere regarding the 2019-20 fires that the typical return period of a fire is 50 years (=2% of land burnt per year), Then it was claimed that 20% of the land was burnt in 2019-20, showing that the total was unexpectedly atypical.

    My question: what is the “natural” fire frequency?

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12. Re-reading Jit’s article has reminded me of another point I have recently mused upon. In the wake of the Black Summer there was indeed a lot of talk of bots and denialist propaganda seeking to exaggerate the role of arson in starting wildfires. Back then it seemed very important to downplay human causation and attribute the causation primarily to climate change. More recently, however, I have sensed that the form of argument has changed. We are now told that the role of arson was always a denialist red herring, indeed the mechanism for ignition is largely irrelevant. We are now told that human causation has always been accepted as primary but the real point has always been that climate change has created conditions that make fires worse. I am sure I am not imagining this shift in position, but does anyone else share this impression?

    Also, whilst I’m on here, I’d like to point out that the lack of research regarding trends in non-climate causations was one of the technical reasons given by Patrick Brown for his admitted failure to tell the full truth in his attribution study. A full truth has to address the questions asked by Jit at the head of his article and Brown and his climate science colleagues are no more able to answer them than are we here on Cliscep. Or perhaps I should wait to see what else Jit can discover.

    Burn the Witch!

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13. This comment seems to not have been loaded via your webpage, so added via W/Press site.

    [I’ve learnt to copy comment content before posting on your webpage, for this very reason! 😉 ]

    If it’s a duplicate trapped in spam, feel free to delete the redundant copy:

    ———————–

    Hi Jit, I remember this from around that time:

    “10 January 3:16 PM 2020 Queensland bushfires, investigation update

    The following can be attributed to a QPS spokesperson:

    On September 10, 2019 the Queensland Police Service established Taskforce Overcross to
    coordinate activities to prevent, disrupt and investigate all significant bushfires across Queensland.

    The Queensland Police Service and Taskforce Overcross continues to work collaboratively with its partner agencies, the Queensland Fire and Emergency Service and the Queensland Rural Fire
    Service to investigate fires and identify the potential cause and origin, including any possible human involvement.

    The taskforce has established that a number of the fires have been deliberately or recklessly set by school aged children. A number of these have been lit in grass and bushland which in some cases has caused significant property damage. Not only does this behaviour put lives and property at risk, the lighting of fires can lead to prosecution for serious offences.

    As at January 8, 2020 there have been 1068 reported bushfires in Queensland since September 10 2019. Of these 114 fires have been deliberately or maliciously lit through human involvement and have been subject to police enforcement action.

    Enforcement action includes charging, restorative justice or cautioning.

    To date, 109 persons on 180 charges (including 36 adults and 73 juveniles) have been dealt with
    by police across Queensland for offences relating to recklessly and/or deliberately setting fires.

    The type of offences detected state-wide include unauthorised lighting of fires, contravening local fire bans, and endangering property under the Criminal Code.

    At this time of heightened danger and weather conditions, the community is asked to work with
    authorities to prevent fires.

    Parents and carers are urged to speak to their children about the consequences of lighting fires in
    this time of heightened danger and school holidays. The consequences can be dire – people can
    die, properties can be lost.”

    Click to access Media-statement-bushfires.pdf

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14. Joe P, apologies – your comment was stuck in spam. I’ve now deleted it. Thanks for your ingenuity and patience.

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15. Wildfires with natural causes may be more frequent that many people believe. In the 1970s I spent several summers field mapping in Northern Saskatchewan – a region of mostly virgin northern forests, home to very scattered indigenous people and Metis. In all the time I spent there (in total perhaps 14 weeks) we never met anyone, except floatplane pilots.

    There was much concern for our safety, especially our exposure to possible wildfires. Each day we were contacted from homebase and given a report of the nearest wildfires. If one had threatened us we would have been extracted by floatplane.

    Without that reassurance I feel sure that no one would have deliberately conducted arson, it would have just have been too dangerous. Flushing out game would have been unlikely as this was extremely scarce. Yet almost every evening we were informed of new fires, especially after storms.

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16. Jit, you are asking tough questions! I’d again defer to Vic Jurskis. But as a sketch answer here’s a few comments. There are different forest management paradigms in Australia. There’s the National Park, approach, where fire is not introduced. As VJ points out, that leads to accumulating fuel loads, and as IanL in comments above pointed out, that beautiful blue haze over the forested mountains on a glorious summer day, is an explosive eucalypt hydrocarbon. So national parks do burn, but in an uncontrolled way. It was probably always so for the closed canopy tall forests. There’s early accounts of burnt forests and their regeneration.

    But then there’s the role of Aboriginal fire. No doubt, open forests were burnt in a continual patchwork of deliberate low intensity fire. Yo some extent that approach is micked on public land throughout Australia as so-called “burn-offs” but probably not done nearly often enough. And VJ says, it’s too high intensity and doesn’t properly mimic the low fire temperature approach of the earlier Aborigines.

    The degree to which high forests were burnt as part of Aboriginal fire regimes is more contentious though. There are early accounts of explorers in say, the Otway Ranges in southern Victoria, where it’s clear there’d been no “firestick farming” producing a clear understorey, though there were signs of wild fire. (The forest margins though, did show signs of deliberate fire use). And then, you’ve got earlier European practices in those forests, before national parks: grazing licences — if you look at 1940s aerial photography (that’s the first available), you’ll see a relatively open understorey, due to cattle grazing. The understorey became much more dense once those areas became national parks in the 1970s. That’s floristically desirable in my opinion as an amateur botanist, but does make for a risky summer.

    Fire frequency: you’ve got me there. But that’s why past Aboriginal practices need to be considered. Vic Jurskis and others persuade me that many forests, particularly open forests, are artefacts of Aboriginal firing practices, and *not* firing them is neglect; leading to an altered lower frequency, higher intensity fire regime. As I say above, I’m more reserved about deep mountain forests. For those areas, I suppose it’s possible to calculate an average. From my own knowledge of the Otway Ranges in southern Victoria, I’ve seen historical fire maps (as best as can be drawn: the extent of fires in colonial times are only guessed from old newspaper accounts and perhaps limited landscape studies), and I would probably peg fire recurring in any one area of the forest at about 70 years.

    I don’t think I’ve got a sophisticated understanding, or at least, not a broadly based understanding of this topic. I’ll be interested, and no doubt informed, by what you write.

    PS Mark Hodgson — your point that the narrative has changed from “arson is a far-right conspiracy theory, that never happened” to “actually, humans are the evil factor (or more accurately, white settlers — not indigenous firestick farmers) but the fires caused by their evil settler ways are now exacerbated by climate change” is perceptive. I can’t say if that narrative evolution tracks exactly through media accounts (it’s possible the record is messier, and both narratives may have coexisted but the emphasis has changed), but it’s a very plausible observation.

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17. Ianalexs, thank you for the comment. It was unwise of me to ask for a number! But a single number was what was reported – perhaps we the public are not to be trusted with complex answers.

    What you are saying makes sense in that ecological communities shape their environment just as the environment shapes them. So fire frequency determines the make-up of the community, and the make-up of the community determines fire frequency. If fire frequency drops, non-fire-adapted species may eventually transform the community into one that is not as flammable and vice versa. When someone says “eucalypt” to me, I think of the flammable kind, and then think a 50-year period is long. More to read as usual.

    John, I have not noticed the change you speak of, but as I will no doubt be canvassing news archives for a bit such a pattern might become evident. I will report back.

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18. Alan, it sounds like quite a trip! Any old photos you would like to share?

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19. JIT no photographs I’m afraid, but we camped in the Clearwater valley an absolutely wonderfully beautiful area. So much so that upon returning to Regina I campaigned forcefully for the entire valley to be made into a provincial Park. Apparently with no success, but several years later I saw a map of Saskatchewan with the entire valley now a Park. Can’t say I was responsible but at least was an early proposer.

    Forgot to mention that our camp had a 3person helicopter and it’s pilot staying with us (which would not be much good if we were threatened by wildfire – for that we would have needed the floatplane).

    If you thought that was “quite a trip” you would have even more enjoyed my summers in subsequent years that I spent in a motel in Banff and Jasper(Alberta) flying all over the Rocky Moutains. This was when I was employed by Amoco.

    Although those years sound fabulous (and they were) they also used up those summers, which on the Prairies were short and very precious. I had a young family that I very much missed, although when based in Banff they visited and were taken up in the helicopter (= huge bragging rights at School the following fall).

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20. Alan,

    I have visited Banff, Jasper and Clearwater, and share your wonder at the beauty of such places. I believe the lake at Clearwater sits atop the fault line that stretches down to California.

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21. Mark. There are many Clearwater Rivers in Canada. I suspect you are referring to Clearwater Lake Provincial Park rather than Clearwater Valley PP. can’t find much about it but the main feature (probably the reason for its park status) is its rapids. I remember deliberately avoiding these until my last day when I shot the rapids in our canoes. Absolutely fabulous! Thank you for causing me to remember that memorable day.

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22. Jit,

    I still haven’t found anything that properly quantifies the trends in the various factors that contribute to the growth in the numbers and intensities of Australian bushfires, but I have started to look at the work of the criminal psychologist Dr Paul Read of Monash University. In particular, I have found this presentation in which he took part:

    Click to access Climate_Convo_bushfires.pdf

    The presentation is in three parts, but it is the second part to which I draw your attention (the introductory part is just a conventional focus upon the climate change problem, concluding that “Climate change [is] sitting behind so much of this!” The final part focuses upon planning issues).

    The central part is Dr Paul Read’s contribution and it is titled, “Climate + Arson; Interactions and new ideas”. In particular, note the slide labelled ‘Firestorms?’ It’s a not very scientific graph but it claims, nevertheless, that there has been recent growth in the following contributory factors: Poverty, autism, domestic violence, ICE (don’t know what this means), youth unemployment, ghetto estates, recession, record temperatures, fuel load, and above all, complacency. I also suspect that he could have added an increase of care in the community for the mentally ill and an increase in drug abuse.

    I know it doesn’t help a great deal in answering your questions because, as Dr Paul Read points out in another slide, “Ignition analysis needs a nested hierarchical regression model”. Nevertheless, it is the first example I have found of an academic directly linking the rise in wildfire occurrence to rises in various societal problems. You will note, of course, that of the above list, only one of the trending causal factors is related to climate change.

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23. “How big are the fires burning in Australia’s north? Interactive map shows they’ve burned an area larger than Spain”

    https://www.theguardian.com/news/datablog/ng-interactive/2023/nov/15/bushfires-in-australias-north-this-year-have-burned-an-area-larger-than-the-size-of-spain

    Arson isn’t mentioned here, but this is nevertheless interesting:

    La Niña, invasive grass and land management practices are all factors in the larger-than-average bushfires that have burned an area bigger than Spain…

    …Experts say the massive fires are primarily due to a higher-than-average fuel load built up over the recent wet La Niña years, with an invasive grass species also contributing to more intense burns….

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24. Of course the Guardian won’t write this, think about it, and row back from its alarmism about forest fires and climate change:

    “Canadian man who claimed wildfires were a federal conspiracy admits arson
    The country saw record-breaking blazes during the summer and Brian Paré pleaded guilty to lighting more than a dozen fires”

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/jan/16/canada-wildfires-conspiracy-man-pleads-guilty-arson

    A Canadian man who claimed forest fires were the result of a government conspiracy has pleaded guilty to lighting more than a dozen blazes during the country’s record-breaking wildfire season, as nearly 100 fires persist in drought-stricken regions.

    Brian Paré admitted to 13 counts of arson and one count of arson with disregard for human life at the courthouse in central Quebec, an act that drew away key firefighting resources from nearly 700 fires in the province last summer.

    Those blazes, which required the aid of international fire crews, charred more than 4.5m hectares of boreal landscape. Virtually all of those fires were caused by lightning strikes, the Quebec’s fire service says.

    But at the courthouse in the town of Chibougamau, prosecutor Marie-Philippe Charron said on Monday two of the 14 fires lit by Paré forced the evacuation of 500 homes, the Canadian Press reported. The largest fire lit by Paré consumed nearly 873 hectares of forest.

    Fire officials investigated a string of five blazes in June that had no possible natural cause and broke out days after the province had implemented a fire ban. The 38-year-old Paré quickly became a suspect when he was spotted in the location of the fires and “demonstrated a certain interest in fires” after an interview with police, said Charron.

    In June police began watching his social media posts, which frequently focused on the province’s wildfires. He shared content suggesting the record-breaking fire season was the result of government intervention, not climate change. The prosecution said police specialists developed a suspect profile based on the fires – and increasingly, Paré’s seemed a match.

    Police later obtained a warrant to install a tracking device on Paré’s vehicle and found he travelled to locations where other fires were started.

    After he was arrested in September, he admitted to starting nine fires and “claimed he was doing tests to find out whether the forest was really dry or not”, Charron told the court….

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25. Firefighter ‘who wanted to be hero’ arrested over deadly Chile blaze

    Police in Chile have arrested a former firefighter on suspicion of contributing to a deadly forest fire which killed 137 people in February.

    …

    The firefighter detained in May said he and the park ranger had agreed that it would be financially beneficial to them if they could do overtime fighting fires.

    The 22-year-old described lighting cigarettes with matches and throwing them from his car.

    BBC link

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26. The BBC buried that story deep in their website. Well done for digging it out!

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27. “California fire agency engineer arrested on suspicion of starting five wildfires

    Cal Fire says Robert Hernandez ignited blazes while off duty in forest land in north of state”

    https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/sep/20/cal-fire-engineer-arrested-arson

    and

    “‘It’s guerrilla warfare’: Brazil fire teams fight Amazon blazes – and the arsonists who start them

    Firefighters and police in Rondônia battle fires intensified by both the climate crisis and a criminal assault on the rainforest”

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2024/sep/20/amazon-brazil-firefighters

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28. Mark,

    That second article offers a perfect example of the sort of duplicitous journalism in which the Guardian engages. The article is quite clearly stressing the role played by organised, criminal gangs of arsonists in the Amazonian jungle, and the day-to-day stresses this places upon the firefighters (based upon interviews with a chap called Baldoini). Any reasonable reading of it would point to the conclusion that the recent trend in fires may have a lot more to do with this trend in arson rather than climatic trends. But, of course, the Guardian journalist would not be happy with the reader drawing such a conclusion, and hence he finishes with:

    In the Bible, “it says the world will end in fire – and what we’re witnessing today isn’t far off the scriptures,” Baldoíno reflected, remembering the record-breaking wildfires that have also hit countries as far apart as Canada and Portugal.

    How the hell is the author supposed to know what Baldoini was reflecting upon as he referred to biblical scenes he had personally witnessed? What are the odds that he was engrossed in Amazonian firefighting but in reflective mood chose to remember Canada and Portugal? It is obvious that an editorial position taken by the Guardian has been sneakily made to look like one shared by their eye-witness. If I were a mind-reader like the Guardian journalist, I would be assuming that, after a day spent fighting fires started by arsonists, he would be reflecting upon arson, pure and simple.

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29. Attribution study: Imperial College scientists find that climate change increases the risk of arson by at least 10 times.

    Forthcoming BBC or Guardian headline. Betcha. Watch this space.

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30. A strange article from the Guardian, and despite its climate alarmism, I think one paragraph in particular undermines that case:

    “Can a 15th-century Indian singing tradition help stop wildfires?”

    https://www.theguardian.com/global-development/2025/jun/03/15th-century-indian-singing-tradition-help-stop-wildfires-sankirtan-mandali

    …Forest officials are enlisting devotional song-and-dance troupes – sankirtan mandalis – to help in the fight against fires in the dry deciduous woods of Odisha state in soaring temperatures. Fires have already affected more than 4,500 hectares (11,120 acres) of forest in Odisha this year, up from about 4,000 hectares in 2024. Officials are using technology such as AI cameras and satellite data to track blazes but are also turning to the appeal of song to ask villagers not to burn leaves in the forest, apractice believed to benefit the soil, but which has led to uncontrollable wildfires in recent years.…

    The forest fires, it appears, are largely man-made, and when the locals are encouraged to desist from burning leaves in the forest, the number of fires has gone down – despite the demon climate change.

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31. Mark – seems to me this article is more about Woman power in India, with climate crisis tagged on.

    I have no problem with highlighting Indian Woman taking more control of there lives, but this partial quote spoiled that –

    “Nayak was married at 10. Now 25, she has two children aged eight and 10. “These days, girls are studying, even working as pilots,” she says. “I had never thought that I had talent, that I would go out and sing and people would bless me.””

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