and
The 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission final report states that ‘…Fifty-two significant bushfires have been recorded in Victoria since 1851, two-thirds of them in the past sixty years…’ (Volume 1, page 2)
The Report also stated: ‘…On the basis of the evidence presented, the Commission concluded that Victoria has a range of characteristics that predispose it to bushfires generally and to the occasional ferocious bushfire in particular. There are few other locations in the world with similar characteristics…’ (Volume 1, page xxiv)
The 1925/26 Fire Season: 426 fires, Total Area Burnt 395000 ha, comprising 193500 ha of Reserved Forest and 201500 ha of Crown Land. (Source: FCV Annual Report 1925/26)
A State Forests Department was established in Victoria in 1908. In 1918 the Forests Commission, Victoria (FCV) was formed to administer the relevant legislation and to manage the Department. From the outset a key requirement of the Department / Commission was to meet ‘…The need for an effective fire prevention and fire suppression organisation….’
Responsibility for the relevant legislation lay with the FCV until 1983. In that year the FCV was effectively incorporated into a new body, the Department of Conservation, Forests and Lands (CFL). That organisation’s successors in law have been the Departments of:
1 The Bush Fire Brigades in Victoria, Australia - AV Galbraith (Empire Forestry Journal, Vol 16, No.1, July 1937)
Gillespie, J., Wright, J., Calder, S.W., Leonard, M.G., and Williams, B. (1994). A Fraternity of Foresters – A History of the Victorian State Foresters Association. Jim Crow Press, Daylesford, Australia.150 pp.
Moulds, F.R, (1991). The Dynamic Forest – A History of Forestry and Forest Industries in Victoria. Lynedoch Publications. Richmond, Australia. 232 pp.
Parliament of Victoria (2010). Report of the 2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission. Volumes 1 – 3. Parliament of Victoria. 1141 pp.
Pyne, S.J. (1998). Burning Bush: A Fire History of Australia. University of Washington Press. 521 pp.
Pyne, S.J. (2006). The Still-Burning Bush. Scribe. 138 pp.
State Aircraft Unit, Victoria (2007). Some milestones in firefighting and forestry aviation in Victoria. SAU – Vic. 3 pp. (Article here)
Youl, R., Fry, B. and Hateley, R. (2010) Circumspice: One hundred years of forestry education centred on Creswick, Victoria. On-Demand Printers, Port Melbourne, Victoria. 278 pp.
Victorian Government – DSE (2010). History of helicopter rappel operations in Victoria. Victorian Government. 28 pp.
"Let us regard the forest as an inheritance, not to be destroyed or devastated, but to be wisely used, reverently honoured and carefully maintained. Let us regard the forest as a gift, entrusted to any of us only for transient care, to be surrendered to posterity as an unimpaired property, increased in riches and augmented in blessings, to pass as a sacred patrimony from generation to generation."
Baron Ferdinand von Mueller - Suggestions on the Maintenance, Creation and Enrichment of Forests (1879)