As wildfires and bushfires intensify around the globe, individuals are nonetheless dying attempting to defend their properties. But ought to they?
Bushfire security researcher Dr Jim McLennan, who used to work as a psychologist, places it bluntly: “you want a bloody good motive to wish to die in a bushfire.”
McLennan says even in a home constructed to face up to bushfires, and even with luck in your aspect, the chance of staying to struggle a fireplace and defend a property is just too excessive.
These are the questions Cosmos lined in its new podcast collection, Debunks: Bushfires. Each week for six episodes Imma Perfetto, a journalist within the Cosmos newsroom, interviews specialists within the area, guides listeners by means of the science of bushfires, and unpacks all of the misinformation that comes with them.
If you missed out on the episodes thus far, they’re out there in your favorite podcast service. Here’s a range to get you began!
Do hazard discount burns work?
As the bushfire season intensifies in southern Australia, questions are flying about the easiest way to handle fires.
In the first episode of the season we discover hazard discount burning: what are they and do they work? How lengthy has hearth been within the panorama? And is there anything we will do to cut back the chance of bushfires?
Do I actually have to go away when the bushfire ranking is catastrophic?
Stay or go – what’s your plan on a catastrophic hearth day?
Episode 2 explores the science behind bushfire hazard scores and solutions the query: Do I actually have to go away when the bushfire ranking is catastrophic? We additionally get into the nitty gritty of what’s actually concerned in defending your own home when bushfire circumstances are at their most harmful.
Can I fire-proof my dwelling?
Can you construct a home that’s completely immune to all bushfire hearth injury? What about fire-proofing an current constructing?
In the third episode, Imma Perfetto interviews specialists and a pair who misplaced their dwelling through the Black Summer and rebuilt with hearth in thoughts, on what’s concerned in fire-proofing a house.
Who causes bushfires?
There are only a few crimes that make folks angrier in a bushfire season than arson. But what number of bushfires are actually began by arsonists?
Is arson actually a extra urgent difficulty than different issues that affect bushfires – like local weather change?
The 4th episode of this season of ‘Debunks’ explores the arson narrative: how we will inform what’s began a bushfire, what arsonists are like, and the way involved we actually have to be.
Has Australia all the time had bushfires this unhealthy?
In episode, we’re Australia’s historical past and our future of fireside. Has Australia all the time had bushfires this unhealthy? Or is local weather change making them worse?
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