why we suffer destructive bushfires?, page-2

I bet a lot of the houses that were lost belonged to people who had spent most of their lives in the city and moved or retired to the country in the past decade.
I have known a lot of such people and they have almost no idea about bush fires.
Even with the extreme conditions I think some of the destruction and loss of life could have been prevented by better awareness of property protection such as burning off before the fire season and of how to protect oneself in a major fire.
When all the analysis is done I hope that one of the outcomes will be to make people who move to rural areas aware of the dangers and how to minimize them especially to carry out hazard reduction burns early and only plant fire retardant trees near their houses.
Having said that my full sympathies go to those currently affected.
Dave R.