Ryan Bridge: Shocks can come any time

Tongariro is a National Park for a reason. It's a stunning part of the country.

The fact is currently on fire is worrying not just because it's a fire and you want fires to be put out, but also because of where it's happening.

Ruapehu/central North island's been taking a hammering lately.

Viv Forbes: The Growing Menace of Trees

Australia is threatened by dangerous trees. They have infested our cities, menace our power lines, invade our grasslands and fuel our worst bushfires.

The meander by Cyclone Alfred through south east Queensland illustrated how bad this danger has become.

Big tall trees smashed power lines and over 450,000 people lost power, some for days; big tall trees crushed cars and closed roads; and in every cyclone big tall trees fall on houses, shops and fences. 

Ian Bradford: The Wind Farm Situation. It’s Not getting Any Better - Part Two.

In part 1, I mentioned the millions of birds and bats sliced up by wind turbine blades.  I should have mentioned the insects too, which all perish under the whirling blades.  For the sea built turbines, crabs are immobilised and crayfish (lobsters), are born deformed. In NZ we have the tourist attraction called the Kaikoura whale watch. Visitors go out to sea in boats run by the tourist company, and view whales frolicking about.  Along the East coast of the United States there is also a booming tourist industry of whale watching.  The difference is that all the whales being watched are dead, washed up on the shore after dying from the effects of the construction of offshore wind turbines. In fact, 72  whales have died on the east coast in a year. These are all large whales. Many are North Atlantic right whales of which there are only 340 left.  

Viv Forbes: Aussie Bushfires Nurtured in National Parks

Listen carefully to a typical bush-fire warning: “A big fire in the XYZ National Park is now threatening adjacent homes and farms”. 

For decades now politicians have been recklessly locking up more land in National Parks, Reserves and Heritage Areas. There are now over 500 national parks covering over 11% of Australia.

In addition to this huge area of nationalised parks, the Howard government, in cahoots with compliant States, created untouchable Kyoto forests on private land in order to meet silly carbon dioxide obligations imposed by the Kyoto Protocol.