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Our planet is burning in unexpected ways - here’s how we can protect people and nature

<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/luke-kelly-159658">Luke Kelly</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/david-bowman-4397">David Bowman</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-tasmania-888">University of Tasmania</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/ella-plumanns-pouton-1470045">Ella Plumanns Pouton</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/grant-williamson-109967">Grant Williamson</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-tasmania-888">University of Tasmania</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/michael-shawn-fletcher-99786">Michael-Shawn Fletcher</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a> People have been using fire for millennia. It is a vital part of many ecosystems and cultures. Yet human activities in the current era, sometimes called the “<a href="https://theconversation.com/did-the-anthropocene-start-in-1950-or-much-earlier-heres-why-debate-over-our-world-changing-impact-matters-209869">Anthropocene</a>”, are reshaping patterns of fire across the planet. <a href="https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-environ-120220-055357">In our new research</a>, published in the Annual Review of Environment and Resources, we used satellite data to create global maps of where and how fires are burning. We calculated about 3.98 million square kilometres of Earth’s land surface burns each year. We also examined research spanning archaeology, climatology, ecology, Indigenous knowledge and paleoecology, to better understand the causes and consequences of fires. Our international team found strong evidence fires are burning in unexpected places, at unusual times and in rarely observed ways. These changes in fire patterns are threatening human lives and modifying ecosystems. But the future does not have to be bleak. There are many opportunities to apply knowledge and practice of fire to benefit people and nature. <h2>Here’s how fire patterns are changing</h2> Exploring multiple approaches and scales enables a deeper understanding of where, when and how fires burn. Satellite data provide evidence of changes in fire patterns at a global scale. <a href="https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2020RG000726">Annual fire season length</a> increased by 14 days from 1979 to 2020 and <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-04325-1">night fires</a>, which indicate fires that cannot be quickly controlled, increased in intensity by 7.2% from 2003 to 2020. Other changes are apparent only when we look at data from particular regions. An increase in fire size and the frequency of large fires has recently been observed in <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.2103135118">forests and woodlands of the western United States</a>. Meanwhile fire-dependent grasslands and savannahs across <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/gcb.14711">Africa</a> and <a href="https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019GL082327">Brazil</a> have experienced reductions in fire frequency. It’s also important to consider the timescale and type of fire when interpreting changes. In Australia, <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41467-021-27225-4">satellite records show</a> the frequency of very large forest fires has increased over the past four decades. At longer time scales, <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13280-020-01339-3">charcoal and pollen records</a> indicate the frequency of low-intensity fires <a href="https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/fee.2395">decreased in parts of southeastern Australia</a> following British colonisation in 1788. <h2>Changes in fire affect air, land and water</h2> Many animals and plants have evolved strategies that enable them to thrive under particular fire patterns. This means changes to fire characteristics can <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abb0355">harm populations and ecosystems</a>. <a href="https://conbio.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1111/conl.12905">Large and intense fires</a> are reducing the available forest habitat preferred by the greater glider. But a <a href="https://theconversation.com/research-reveals-fire-is-pushing-88-of-australias-threatened-land-mammals-closer-to-extinction-185965">lack of fire can be problematic too</a>. Threatened species of native rodents can benefit from food resources and habitats that flourish shortly after fire. There is evidence that emissions from recent fires are already modifying the atmosphere. The historically exceptional 2019–20 Australian wildfires produced <a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abe1415#:%7E:text=Intense%2C%20widespread%20bushfires%20in%20Australia,from%20a%20moderate%20volcanic%20eruption.">record-breaking levels of aerosols</a> over the Southern Hemisphere, as well as substantial carbon emissions. The <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-020-00610-5">wildfire smoke-related health costs</a> of the 2019–20 wildfires in Australia included an estimated 429 smoke-related premature deaths as well as 3,230 hospital admissions for cardiovascular and respiratory disorders. Changes in fire patterns are modifying water cycles, too. In the western United States, <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2009717118">fires are reaching higher elevations</a> and having strong impacts on <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2200333119">snow</a> and water availability. New studies are revealing how the air, land and water that support life on Earth are connected by fires. Smoke plumes from the 2019–20 Australian wildfires transported nutrients to the Southern Ocean, resulting in <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03805-8">widespread phytoplankton blooms</a>. <h2>Humans are responsible for the changes</h2> Human drivers such as climate change, land use, fire use and suppression, and transportation and extinction of species <a href="https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-environ-120220-055357">are causing shifts in fire patterns</a>. Increasing global temperatures and more frequent heatwaves and droughts increase the likelihood of fire by promoting hot, dry and windy conditions. A pattern of extreme fire weather outside of natural climate variation is already emerging in <a href="https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/gcb.15388">North America</a>, <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-014-1183-3">southern Europe</a> and <a href="https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/ac1e3a/meta">the Amazon basin</a>. Humans modify fire regimes by changing land use for agricultural, forestry and urban purposes. Until recent decades, large fires in tropical forests were uncommon. But <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03876-7">deforestation fires</a> used to clear primary forest for agriculture often promotes more frequent and intense uncontrolled fires. Humans have transported plants and animals across the globe, resulting in novel mixes of species that modify fuels and fire regimes. In many parts of the world, <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/abs/10.1073/pnas.1908253116">invasive grasses</a> have increased flammability and fire activity. Social and economic changes propel these drivers. Colonisation by Europeans and the displacement of Indigenous peoples and their skilful use of fire has been linked with fire changes in <a href="https://esajournals.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/fee.2395">Australia</a>, <a href="https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2116264119">North America</a> and <a href="https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rstb.2015.0174">South America</a>. <h2>Using knowledge and practice of fire to achieve sustainability goals</h2> <a href="https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-environ-120220-055357">The pace and scale of these changes</a> represent challenges to humanity, but knowledge and practice of fire can help to achieve sustainability goals. This includes: <ul> <li><a href="https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/10.1098/rstb.2015.0174">good health and wellbeing</a>, by supporting community-owned solutions and fire practices that increase social cohesion and health</li> <li><a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301479718314658">sustainable cities and communities</a>, by designing green firebreaks and mixed-use areas with low fuels, strategically located in the landscape</li> <li><a href="https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.aam7672">life on land</a>, by tailoring use of fire to promote and restore species and ecosystems</li> <li><a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41561-021-00867-1">climate action</a>, by applying low-intensity fire to promote the stability of soil organic matter and increase carbon storage</li> <li><a href="https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/18/8/3921">reduced inequalities</a>, by allocating resources before, during, and after wildfires to at-risk communities and residents.</li> </ul> As the world changes, society as a whole needs to keep learning about the interplay between people and fire. A deep understanding of fire is essential for achieving a sustainable future – in other words, <a href="https://www.annualreviews.org/doi/abs/10.1146/annurev-environ-120220-055357">a better Anthropocene</a>.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/213215/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /> <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/luke-kelly-159658">Luke Kelly</a>, Associate Professor in Quantitative Ecology, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/david-bowman-4397">David Bowman</a>, Professor of Pyrogeography and Fire Science, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-tasmania-888">University of Tasmania</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/ella-plumanns-pouton-1470045">Ella Plumanns Pouton</a>, PhD candidate, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/grant-williamson-109967">Grant Williamson</a>, Research Fellow in Environmental Science, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-tasmania-888">University of Tasmania</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/michael-shawn-fletcher-99786">Michael-Shawn Fletcher</a>, Professor in Biogeography, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/the-university-of-melbourne-722">The University of Melbourne</a> Image credits: Getty Images This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/our-planet-is-burning-in-unexpected-ways-heres-how-we-can-protect-people-and-nature-213215">original article</a>.

Travel Trouble

"A night in hospital and a trip to the burns unit later”: Concerned mum's warning against popular fruit

Warning: This article contains images that some readers may find distressing. An Aussie mum has taken to the internet and shared photos of her son’s severe burns that came as a result of him playing with a popular fruit. “A night in hospital and a trip to the burns unit later.” She began in her Facebook post. Her son Otis was playing happily outside with a lime in the sunshine, but the next day horror ensued. “It wasn’t until the next day that we noticed a rash appeared.” The mother said. The parents had assumed the rash must’ve been an allergic reaction to the lime juice, however, the rash quickly developed into a “horrific burn,” she added. The parents took Otis to the hospital where they were informed their son was suffering from a condition called phytophotodermatitis. <blockquote class="instagram-media" style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/Cku5QH2thxE/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="14"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"> </div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <div style="padding: 12.5% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; margin-bottom: 14px; align-items: center;"> <div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(0px) translateY(7px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; height: 12.5px; transform: rotate(-45deg) translateX(3px) translateY(1px); width: 12.5px; flex-grow: 0; margin-right: 14px; margin-left: 2px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(9px) translateY(-18px);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: 8px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 20px; width: 20px;"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 2px solid transparent; border-left: 6px solid #f4f4f4; border-bottom: 2px solid transparent; transform: translateX(16px) translateY(-4px) rotate(30deg);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: auto;"> <div style="width: 0px; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-right: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(16px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; flex-grow: 0; height: 12px; width: 16px; transform: translateY(-4px);"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-left: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(-4px) translateX(8px);"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center; margin-bottom: 24px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 224px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 144px;"> </div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/Cku5QH2thxE/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A post shared by Tiny Hearts (@tinyheartseducation)</a> </div> </blockquote> Phytophotodermatitis, more commonly known as margarita burn, is a little-known condition which causes burns to the skin when a chemical called furocoumarin reacts to sunlight. The chemical is found in limes, citrus fruit and some plants. “The small lime he had been innocently playing with - had now burnt his skin horrifically!“ The mum said. “If our story can help raise awareness into phytophotodermatitis at least something good has come out of our horrific experience!” The woman has urged parents to be on the lookout for this little-known skin condition. To minimise the risks of phytophotodermatitis, <a href="https://www.healthline.com/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Healthline</a> suggests washing hands and other exposed parts of the skin immediately after being outdoors, wearing gloves when gardening, putting on sunscreen before going outdoors and wearing long-sleeved tops and pants in wooded areas. Photo credit: Getty

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Britain’s Got Talent burned by 334 complaints after "insensitive" stunt

Warning: This article contains content that some readers may find disturbing. Britain’s Got Talent is in hot water with its 16th season after the second episode drew in a staggering 334 complaints - a total of 400 across both episodes, Ofcom reported. The stunt that caused the ire, dubbed “insensitive” and “unacceptable” by the public, saw a professional stuntman named Thomas Vu cover himself in a fire-retardant gel, before he was set alight and left to solve a Rubik’s Cube. In the wake of the stunt, hosts Ant and Dec were quick to issue a warning to viewers, telling them “do not try this at home, ever.” And when the clip was uploaded to the official BGT Twitter account, the text ‘do not try this at home’ is splashed across the video. However, distressed viewers still took to the comments section to share their distaste, with one writing that it was “absolutely ridiculous and irresponsible [and] should never have been allowed to be televised especially on a family programme!!” <blockquote class="twitter-tweet"> Stuntman Thomas Vu solved the Rubik's cube in the most UNEXPECTED way: <a href="https://t.co/nSEWOokCSb">https://t.co/nSEWOokCSb</a> Do not try this at home!<a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/BGT?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#BGT</a> <a href="https://t.co/awPLBTmaEf">pic.twitter.com/awPLBTmaEf</a> — BGT (@BGT) <a href="https://twitter.com/BGT/status/1649110690987376642?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">April 20, 2023</a></blockquote> “BGT totally ill-considered showing a guy setting himself on fire whilst solving a Rubik’s Cube,” tweeted another. “No thought to the fact that impressionable children watch the show.” “Don’t get me wrong,” one began, “people do crazy stuff and it’s their choice and that’s fine by me but maybe that last act should have been well after the 9pm watershed?? Not sure that kind of playing with fire thing is suitable for young kids who probably stay up to watch BGT.” “Like what has BGT come to when we set people on fire for entertainment,” someone else said on the matter. And as yet another user put it, “sorry but showing a man setting himself on fire on a ‘family’ show is not acceptable. Even with the mention ‘do not try this at home’.” Concern for children continued from there, with one tweeting “The Rubik’s Cube fire stunt on BGT was totally inappropriate. Did you not think about burn victims and how seeing this would affect them?” Meanwhile, others simply found the stunt to be insensitive, with one even referencing the 1965 Bradford City disaster when they wrote “I just find this insensitive to anyone that has been through any trauma caused by fire.” Criticism for the episode was so intense, coupled with the volume of complaints flowing in, that the show was forced to issue a statement, telling viewers “Britain’s Got Talent showcases a mix of variety acts to engage audiences. “In this case, it was made very clear on screen that this act should not be tried at home and the programme was subject to strict compliance rules." Images: Britain’s Got Talent / ITV

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Junior staff are finding better contracts, senior staff are burning out: the arts are losing the war for talent

In 1997, consulting firm McKinsey & Company coined the term “<a href="https://www.fastcompany.com/34512/war-talent">the war for talent</a>” to define increasing labour shortages that had significant potential to impact organisational performance. The war for talent significantly impacted corporations at the time, creating a scarcity mindset and encouraging a wave of employee-focussed initiatives designed to attract and retain staff. For the most part, the arts and cultural sector have been sheltered from the war for talent over past decades. Global growth in creative oriented higher education coupled with the “<a href="https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/lsereviewofbooks/2016/04/26/book-review-be-creative-making-a-living-in-the-new-culture-industries-by-angela-mcrobbie/">romance of being creative</a>” has led to a steady stream of workers willing to enter the sector on low pay. However, in 2022 things have changed. Faced with labour shortages, arts and cultural organisations increasingly find it challenging to operate. In 2021, it was reported screen productions in Australia were <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-09-24/high-demand-creates-film-skill-shortage/100479392">being jeopardised</a> due to lack of technical skills. Now, summer festivals are <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/music/2022/nov/07/will-australias-festivals-survive-a-wet-chaotic-expensive-summer">struggling to find</a> frontline workers, including security, stage crew, ticketing and transport. It’s not just entry-level positions that remain empty. After <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2021/may/11/australias-culture-of-ideas-suffers-when-we-starve-our-creative-institutions-of-funding">a decade</a> of funding cuts and policy neglect, followed by the stresses induced by COVID-19, I am observing arts leaders leaving to find secure, better paid and sustainable work elsewhere. In Australia’s increasingly tight labour market, the arts are finally facing a war for talent. <h2>A culture of burnout</h2> If we consider the role of the “arts manager”, it becomes easy to recognise why arts leaders are abandoning the industry. Arts leaders do not just support the creation of art. They are marketers, customer service specialists, supply chain and logistics experts, grant writers, human resources managers and – increasingly – risk managers. They are trying to bring back audiences post-COVID while juggling a contentious funding landscape that balances the need for revenue with audience, staff and artist <a href="https://overland.org.au/2021/09/the-arts-in-australia-need-to-break-up-with-fossil-fuels/">expectations</a> arts organisations do not partner with corporations that fail to align with organisational values. I am increasingly seeing young people leaving arts jobs for opportunities that recognise their skills and provide secure, better paid work. Art workers are highly valuable in today’s economy where creativity and innovation are seen as <a href="https://australiacouncil.gov.au/news/speeches-and-opinions/creative-skills-in-times-of-crisis-how-the-arts-can-help/">keys to success</a>. This lack of younger workers increases the workloads of senior staff, causing them to be burnt out and leave the sector, too. Staff shortages jeopardise the sector’s ability to get back on its feet after the brutal impact of COVID-19. Those that remain in our arts companies are exhausted, left trying to rebuild programs and audiences with fewer resources. While “<a href="https://theconversation.com/quiet-quitting-why-doing-less-at-work-could-be-good-for-you-and-your-employer-188617">quiet quitting</a>” gets media airtime, others in the sector are asking arts workers to embrace the mantra of “<a href="https://larsenkeys.com.au/2022/09/26/post-covid-or-post-burnout-less-is-necessary/">less is necessary</a>”. Individuals need to take action to address their wellbeing. Still, it is also necessary to consider the systems and structures that underpin our arts organisations and how they impact workers. <h2>Structural issues</h2> One way to address the war for talent is to increase the labour supply. Higher education providers who develop creative talent are lobbying for more resources to expand programs and are pushing for changes to the Job Ready graduate scheme that <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-inequity-of-job-ready-graduates-for-students-must-be-brought-to-a-quick-end-heres-how-183808">imposes higher costs</a> on arts and humanities graduates. The latest <a href="https://www.aare.edu.au/blog/?p=14754">Graduate Outcome Survey</a> shows that the employment outcomes of creative arts and arts and humanities graduates have increased over 20% since 2019. The high rates of graduate employability aligns with Australia’s historically low unemployment rate, but also demonstrates the value creative skills now hold in the broader economy. What these positive statistics do not tell us, however, is the working conditions of those employed. The arts are the original gig economy. Of the over 80% of arts and humanities graduates employed six months after graduation, how many earn a living wage? How many work in the arts? How many recent creative arts graduates are juggling multiple short-term contracts simultaneously to build skills, grow networks and cope with cost of living increases? As Australia’s labour market tightens, arts workers are realising they can take their skills to better paid jobs with secure contracts, in fields such as health, technology and management consulting. Unless arts organisations respond by providing similar security and career paths, the departure of talented workers will only continue. This loss of staff will not only impact the ability of organisations to operate today, but will also influence the make-up of arts organisations in the future. When only those who can afford to work under precarious conditions remain, the ability of the sector to attract and retain leaders from diverse communities <a href="https://www.artshub.com.au/news/features/how-do-we-stop-losing-artists-from-the-sector-2578669/">decreases</a>. <h2>Decent work</h2> Arts leaders eagerly await the launch of a new <a href="https://theconversation.com/a-new-national-cultural-policy-is-an-opportunity-for-a-radical-rethinking-of-the-importance-of-culture-in-australia-188720">National Cultural Policy</a>, hoping for significant change in how the arts are valued. Yet arts organisations need to also get their own house in order. Sustainable arts careers mean <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-crisis-of-a-career-in-culture-why-sustaining-a-livelihood-in-the-arts-is-so-hard-171732">decent work</a>. This means structural changes in how arts workers are employed, a shift away from the reliance on volunteers and <a href="https://www.smh.com.au/culture/art-and-design/why-is-a-major-sydney-arts-festival-working-with-google-to-offer-an-unpaid-internship-20220516-p5als1.html">incorrect appointment of unpaid interns</a>, low-wage casual or fixed-term roles to more secure and fairly paid employment. Many in the sector are championing change. The National Association for the Visual Arts is campaigning to <a href="https://visualarts.net.au/news-opinion/2022/recognise-artists-workers/">recognise artists as workers</a>, highlighting the need for an award to support this group that often falls under the industrial relations radar. The music sector has made similar calls for minimum wages for artists, <a href="https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/paying-musicians-a-minimum-wage-would-kill-live-music-tote-owner-20220923-p5bkgw.html">yet face critics</a>. The pandemic showed us how important the arts are to our lives. For the arts to continue to play a vital role in our national identity and represent our diverse communities, the sector must be funded appropriately. It is also essential organisations create safe, secure and viable jobs for arts workers. If the industry can only exist by systematically exploiting workers, then the war for talent will be lost. Image credits: Getty Images This article originally appeared on <a href="https://theconversation.com/junior-staff-are-finding-better-contracts-senior-staff-are-burning-out-the-arts-are-losing-the-war-for-talent-194174" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Conversation</a>.

Art

Why a renowned artist is burning his own masterpieces

Artist Damien Hirst has begun burning hundreds of his own artworks after his latest collection prompted the buyer to either choose the physical work or the NFT representing it. Those who chose to buy the NFT, or virtual version, of the artwork were told their corresponding physical piece would be destroyed. Asked how he felt about burning the works, Hirst said, "It feels good, better than I expected." The artist himself burned each work individually, with the estimated cost of the works being burned equated to almost $18 million (AUD). Live-streaming the event, the Turner Prize winner and assistants used tongs to deposit individual pieces stacked in piles into fireplaces in the gallery as onlookers watched. "A lot of people think I'm burning millions of dollars of art but I'm not," Hirst said. "I'm completing the transformation of these physical artworks into NFTs by burning the physical versions. "The value of art, digital or physical, which is hard to define at the best of times will not be lost; it will be transferred to the NFT as soon as they are burnt." Hirst launched his first NFT collection last year, called The Currency, which was made up of 10,000 NFTs, corresponding to 10,000 original pieces of art, forcing buyers to choose what medium they would receive. According to London’s Newport Street Gallery, 5,149 buyers opted for the physical works while 4,851 chose the NFTs. Hirst’s works will continue to be burned until The Currency exhibition closes on October 30th. Image credits: Getty Images

Art

“He’s my hero”: 5-year-old saves baby sister from burning cot

A little boy who suffered severe burns after saving his 18-month-old sister has been praised for his heroics during an out-of-control accident in July last year. Jade, a NSW mum-of-four, was supposed to be asleep during an afternoon nap-time with her kids, but two of her youngsters were still awake and had found a gas lighter. The young mum said her five-year-old son Aspen and another of his siblings started several small fires around the room and blew them out, when they lit their younger sister Nirveya’s cot - which she was sleeping in - thinking it could be blown out just as easily. But, the plastic netting around her cot quickly went up, helping the fire spread. Aspen attempted to rescue his infant sister from her burning cot, but struggled to lift her out. “He tried to save her but she was too heavy and so he blames himself,” Jade told <a href="https://9now.nine.com.au/a-current-affair/nsw-boy-saves-infant-sister-from-burning-cot/eec9fae2-f013-4d52-823f-54a36b2e9ce7" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A Current Affair</a>. “He could not get her out. But to me, he bought time at the expense of him being burnt.” With the cot collapsing under his weight, the pair fell into the fire and Aspen shielded his little sister from the flames. “It burnt me when I covered her,” Aspen said. Waking up to “screaming and the fire alarm going”, Jade said she ran to the bedroom, where she saw Nirveya’s cot “completely consumed” by the fire. “The flames (were) as tall as I was: you could feel it, the heat from the door,” she recalled. “I just reached in, grabbed her and put her on the floor.” With an ambulance on the way, Jade’s sister Aisha arrived at the house at the same time as a stranger, who would go on to give Aspen immediate treatment for his burns. “As he approached he said he was a burns specialist; that he was close by at a friend’s event, a party, and got an alert,” Aisha said. Aspen’s brave actions meant his little sister - who could have been engulfed in the fire - was left with one minor burn to her nose. "All thanks for Aspen, she (Nirveya) could have been disfigured from the fire if she was consumed with it," Jade said. But, Aspen wasn’t so lucky, and faces years of treatment and operations after the cot’s plastic netting burnt into his arm. “I don’t think he quite knows how special (it is) … what he has done,” Jade said. “He’s my hero … he’s her hero.” His mum said Aspen just sees the physical wounds on his body, which has been difficult. "He says at school he wants to cover his burns because he wants the kids to still play with him and he doesn't want to get bullied for his burns," she said. Though Nirveya and Jade carry mental scars from the accident, with her young daughter waking “up a lot during the night” ever since, the strength of her son gives Jade strength too. “I think, ‘If you can do it buddy, I can do it too. You’ve been through so much’,” she said. Image: A Current Affair

Family & Pets

New research in Arnhem Land reveals why institutional fire management is inferior to cultural burning

One of the conclusions of this week’s shocking <a href="https://soe.dcceew.gov.au/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">State of the Environment report</a> is that climate change is lengthening Australia’s bushfire seasons and raising the number of days with a fire danger rating of “very high” or above. In New South Wales, for example, the season now extends to almost eight months. It has never been more important for institutional bushfire management programs to apply the principles and practices of Indigenous fire management, or “cultural burning”. As the report notes, cultural burning reduces the risk of bushfires, supports habitat and improves Indigenous wellbeing. And yet, the report finds: <blockquote> with significant funding gaps, tenure impediments and policy barriers, Indigenous cultural burning remains underused – it is currently applied over less than 1% of the land area of Australia’s south‐eastern states and territory. </blockquote> Our <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/s41598-022-12946-3" target="_blank" rel="noopener">recent research</a> in Scientific Reports specifically addressed the question: how do the environmental outcomes from cultural burning compare to mainstream bushfire management practices? Using the stone country of the Arnhem Land Plateau as a case study, we reveal why institutional fire management is inferior to cultural burning. The few remaining landscapes where Aboriginal people continue an unbroken tradition of caring for Country are of international importance. They should be nationally recognised, valued and resourced like other protected cultural and historical places. <blockquote class="twitter-tweet"> Different indigenous fire application today with a country full of weeds. First burn of of two applications this year. This is what we have to do to make country have less flammable vegetation. Walk through, More time and love put into country. <a href="https://t.co/pnoWFQbq6C">pic.twitter.com/pnoWFQbq6C</a> — Victor Steffensen (@V_Steffensen) <a href="https://twitter.com/V_Steffensen/status/1505384041402748930?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">March 20, 2022</a></blockquote> Ancient fire management The rugged terrain of the Arnhem Plateau in Northern Territory has an ancient human history, with archaeological evidence <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/science/2017-07-20/aboriginal-shelter-pushes-human-history-back-to-65,000-years/8719314#:%7E:text=New%20excavations%20of%20a%20rock,earlier%20than%20archaeologists%20previously%20thought." target="_blank" rel="noopener">dated at 65,000 years</a>. Arnhem Land is an ideal place to explore the effects of different fire regimes because fire is such an essential feature of the natural and cultural environment. Australia’s monsoon tropics are particularly fire prone given the sharply contrasting wet and dry seasons. The wet season sees prolific growth of grasses and other flammable plants, and dry season has reliable hot, dry, windy conditions. Millennia of <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-worlds-best-fire-management-system-is-in-northern-australia-and-its-led-by-indigenous-land-managers-133071" target="_blank" rel="noopener">skilful fire management</a> by Indigenous people in these landscapes have allowed plants and animals needing infrequently burnt habitat to thrive. This involves shifting “mosaic” burning, where small areas are burned regularly to create a patchwork of habitats with different fire histories. This gives wildlife a diversity of resources and places to shelter in. Conservation biologists suspect that the loss of such patchy fires since colonisation has contributed to the <a href="http://132.248.10.25/therya/index.php/THERYA/article/view/236/html_66" target="_blank" rel="noopener">calamitous demise</a> of wildlife species across northern Australia, such as northern quolls, northern brown bandicoots and grassland melomys. <blockquote class="twitter-tweet"> "Fire is the way to really look after the land and the people. Since we started here, we've been using fire. And we need to bring it back because it unites the people and the land." Jacob Morris, Gumea-Dharrawal Yuin man. 🎥 Craig Bender & <a href="https://twitter.com/VeraHongTweets?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">@VeraHongTweets</a> <a href="https://t.co/Afh6iwIrOX">pic.twitter.com/Afh6iwIrOX</a> — FiresticksAlliance (@FiresticksA) <a href="https://twitter.com/FiresticksA/status/1436177617049296901?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">September 10, 2021</a></blockquote> Collapse of the cypress pine Our study was undertaken over 25 years, and wouldn’t have been possible without the generous support and close involvement of the Traditional Owners over this time. It compared an area under near continuous Indigenous management by the Kune people of Western Arnhem Land with ecologically similar and unoccupied areas within Kakadu National Park. We found populations of the cypress pine (Callitris intratropica) remained healthy under continual Aboriginal fire management. By contrast, cypress pine populations had collapsed in ecologically similar areas in Kakadu due to the loss of Indigenous fire management, as they have across much of northern Australia. The population of dead and living pines is like a barcode that records fire regime change. The species is so long lived that older trees were well established before colonisation. The timber is extremely durable and termite resistant, so a tree killed by fire remains in the landscape for many decades. And mature trees, but not juveniles, can tolerate low intensity fires, but intense fires kill both. <figure class="align-center zoomable"><a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475072/original/file-20220720-22-odbe84.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475072/original/file-20220720-22-odbe84.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/475072/original/file-20220720-22-odbe84.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475072/original/file-20220720-22-odbe84.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475072/original/file-20220720-22-odbe84.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=800&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475072/original/file-20220720-22-odbe84.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475072/original/file-20220720-22-odbe84.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/475072/original/file-20220720-22-odbe84.jpeg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=1005&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" alt="" /></a><figcaption>Cypress pine timber can remain in the landscape decades after the tree died. Michael Hains/Atlas of Living Australia, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc-sa/4.0/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">CC BY-NC-SA</a></figcaption></figure> Since 2007, park rangers have attempted to emulate cultural burning outcomes. They’ve used aircraft to drop incendiaries to create a coarse patchwork of burned and unburned areas to improve biodiversity in the stone country within Kakadu. Unfortunately, our research found Kakadu’s fire management interventions failed to restore landscapes to the healthier ecological condition under traditional Aboriginal fire management. While the Kakadu aerial burning program increased the amount of unburnt vegetation, it didn’t reverse the population collapse of cypress pines. Searches of tens of kilometres failed to find a single seedling in Kakadu, whereas they were common in comparable areas under Aboriginal fire management. Our study highlights that once the ecological benefits of cultural burning are lost, they cannot be simply restored with mainstream fire management approaches. But that’s not to say the ecological impacts from the loss of Aboriginal fire management cannot be reversed. Rather, restoring fire regimes and ecosystem health will be slow, and require special care in where and how fires are set. This requires teams on the ground with deep knowledge of the land, rather than simply spreading aerial incendiaries from helicopters. <blockquote class="twitter-tweet"> After 60 years of fire exclusion, another magic day restoring fire to Arakwal-Bundjalung-Bumberlin country. <a href="https://t.co/xRRNb4ELdQ">pic.twitter.com/xRRNb4ELdQ</a> — Dr. Andy Baker (@FireDiversity) <a href="https://twitter.com/FireDiversity/status/1537768580455931905?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">June 17, 2022</a></blockquote> There’s much to learn There remains much for Western science to learn about <a href="https://theconversation.com/fighting-fire-with-fire-botswana-adopts-indigenous-australians-ancient-burning-tradition-135363" target="_blank" rel="noopener">traditional fire management</a>. Large-scale institutional fire management is based on concepts of efficiency and generality. It is controlled by bureaucracies, and achieved using machines and technologies. Such an “industrial” approach cannot replace the placed-based knowledge, including close human relationships with Country, underpinning <a href="https://www.firesticks.org.au/about/cultural-burning/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">cultural burning</a>. Cultural burning and institutional fire management could be thought of as the differences between home cooking and fast food. Fast food is quick, cheap and produces the same product regardless of individual needs. Home cooking takes longer to prepare, can cater to individual needs, and can improve wellbeing. But restoring sustainable fire regimes based on the wisdom and practices of Indigenous people cannot be achieved overnight. Reaping the benefits of cultural burning to landscapes where colonialism has disrupted ancient fire traditions take time, effort and resources. It’s urgent remaining traditional fire practitioners are recognised for their invaluable knowledge and materially supported to continue caring for their Country. This includes: <ul> <li>actively supporting Indigenous people to reside on their Country</li> <li>to pay them to undertake natural resource management including cultural burning</li> <li>creating pathways enabling Indigenous people separated from their country by colonialism to re-engage with fire management.</li> </ul> Restoring landscapes with sustainable cultural burning traditions is a long-term project that will involve training and relearning ancient practices. There are extraordinary opportunities for Indigenous and non-Indigenous people alike to learn how to Care for Country. <hr /> The authors gratefully acknowledge the contribution of Victor Steffensen, the Lead Fire Practitioner at the Firesticks Alliance Indigenous Corporation, who reviewed this article.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/184562/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /> <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/david-bowman-4397" target="_blank" rel="noopener">David Bowman</a>, Professor of Pyrogeography and Fire Science, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-tasmania-888" target="_blank" rel="noopener">University of Tasmania</a>; <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/christopher-i-roos-1354187" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Christopher I. Roos</a>, Professor, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/southern-methodist-university-1988" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Southern Methodist University</a>, and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/fay-johnston-90826" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Fay Johnston</a>, Professor, Menzies Institute for Medical Research, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-tasmania-888" target="_blank" rel="noopener">University of Tasmania</a> This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/new-research-in-arnhem-land-reveals-why-institutional-fire-management-is-inferior-to-cultural-burning-184562" target="_blank" rel="noopener">original article</a>. Image: @FireDiversity (Twitter)

Domestic Travel

Famous ‘Napalm Girl’ receives final burns treatment

The woman known around the globe as “Napalm Girl” has received her final round of treatment for the burns she received as a child when her village in Vietnam was hit by a napalm bomb. Kim Phuc was just nine years old when South Vietnamese planes dropped the bomb on the village of Trảng Bàng in 1972 and she was photographed running naked from her home, covered in third-degree burns after her clothes caught on fire. The iconic photo, taken by Vietnamese-American photographer Nick Ut before he rushed Ms Phuc to a hospital, won a Pulitzer Prize and became a symbol of the awful consequences of war. Ms Phuc, who has since become a Canadian citizen, has lived with the pain and scars from the attack ever since. On Tuesday, she underwent a 12-hour medical procedure in Miami, with local media reporting it was the final course of laser therapy for her scars. <img src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/2022/07/kim-phuc1.jpg" alt="" width="1280" height="720" /> Kim Phuc underwent the last of her laser therapy treatments for the burns across her body, 50 years after she received them. Image: Getty Images Now 59, Ms Phuc also reunited with Mr Ut and recalled the distressing moment when they first met. “I heard the noise, bup-bup bup-bup, and then suddenly there was fire everywhere around me and I saw the fire all over my arm,” Ms Phuc said of the moment the bomb landed, per NBC 6 South Florida. “[Ut] told me after he took my pic that he saw me burned so severely, he put down his camera and he rushed me to [the] nearest hospital.” Mr Ut also recalled how terribly injured Ms Phuc was. “I saw her burning, her body burning so badly,” he said. But when he took her to a local hospital, staff initially refused to treat her and told him to take her to another hospital two hours away. “I get upset, I hold my media pass, I say, ‘I’m media, if she dies, my picture’s on the front page of every newspaper tomorrow’ … they took her right away inside,” he said. During her decades-long recovery, Dr Jill Waibel has been helping her, using laser therapy to heal and remove scar tissue. “It used to be that everyone with an injury like Kim’s would pass away and so we are blessed now that we can keep people alive but we really have to help them thrive and live,” Dr Waibel said. <blockquote class="instagram-media" style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/CfR-zFYPGjV/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="14"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"> </div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <div style="padding: 12.5% 0;"> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; margin-bottom: 14px; align-items: center;"> <div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(0px) translateY(7px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; height: 12.5px; transform: rotate(-45deg) translateX(3px) translateY(1px); width: 12.5px; flex-grow: 0; margin-right: 14px; margin-left: 2px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; height: 12.5px; width: 12.5px; transform: translateX(9px) translateY(-18px);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: 8px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 20px; width: 20px;"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 2px solid transparent; border-left: 6px solid #f4f4f4; border-bottom: 2px solid transparent; transform: translateX(16px) translateY(-4px) rotate(30deg);"> </div> </div> <div style="margin-left: auto;"> <div style="width: 0px; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-right: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(16px);"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; flex-grow: 0; height: 12px; width: 16px; transform: translateY(-4px);"> </div> <div style="width: 0; height: 0; border-top: 8px solid #F4F4F4; border-left: 8px solid transparent; transform: translateY(-4px) translateX(8px);"> </div> </div> </div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center; margin-bottom: 24px;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 224px;"> </div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 144px;"> </div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CfR-zFYPGjV/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank" rel="noopener">A post shared by Nick Ut (@utnicky)</a> </div> </blockquote> Ms Phuc now lives in Toronto and is the founder of the Kim Foundation International, which provides aid to child victims of war. On the 50th anniversary of the attack, Ms Phuc penned an essay for <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2022/06/06/opinion/kim-phuc-vietnam-napalm-girl-photograph.html" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The New York Times</a>, revealing she hated the photo for a long time as she struggled to heal amid the photo’s growing popularity. “You don’t grow out of the scars, physically or mentally,” she wrote. “I am grateful now for the power of that photograph of me as a 9-year-old, as I am of the journey I have taken as a person. “I’m proud that, in time, I have become a symbol of peace. It took me a long time to embrace that as a person. I can say, 50 years later, that I’m glad Nick captured that moment, even with all the difficulties that image created for me. “That picture will always serve as a reminder of the unspeakable evil of which humanity is capable. Still, I believe that peace, love, hope and forgiveness will always be more powerful than any kind of weapon.” Image: Nick Ut / Canapress

Caring

Heartwarming update for toddler who suffered catastrophic burns

The family of the boy who suffered burns to 40 per cent of his body have shared a heartwarming update. Elijah Whitton was left in critical condition after a fire ripped through the family home in Mildura, Victoria on May 1. The two-year-old was rushed to hospital where he was placed in an induced coma due to the devastating burns to 40 per cent of his body. Almost three weeks later, Elijah’s sister Alyia shared an update on his condition after his third wound debridement. “Elijiah came out of his third wound debridement surgery on May 12,” Alyia wrote on the <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/d86xr-fight-for-elijah" target="_blank" rel="noopener">GoFundMe</a> page. “He has adapted well to the changes made. Elijah had skin grafting to his face and to his lower body. “His swelling has reduced and his skin has improved. His breathing tube has been removed and he is now breathing on his own. Both of his eyes have opened. “However, he is still getting used to the new changes, he's been a bit more agitated since coming out of surgery, which is expected. “He is recovering incredibly well!! “Thank you to everyone who has contributed to Elijah's fight to recovery, words will never be able to summarise how grateful we are.” Aliyia also said that Elijah had his fourth wound debridement on May 19 - she is yet to update on the progress. If you would like to donate to Elijah’s family go to the GoFundMe link <a href="https://www.gofundme.com/f/d86xr-fight-for-elijah" target="_blank" rel="noopener">here</a>. Images: GoFundMe/7News

Caring

Warning after child suffers horrific burn from everyday item

When it comes to using hand sanitiser, most of us don’t think twice and squeeze a little on our palms. Almost every place has hand santiser handy, but this has renewed calls to parents to keep an eye out for it around their children. Paramedic and mum-of-two Nikki took to Instagram to show the dangers of children misusing hand-sanitiser. She shared an image of a young boy named James to the <a href="https://www.instagram.com/p/Cawa4MAM34G/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Tiny Hearts Education</a> page, who suffered a horrific chemical burn in his eye after using a foot pump hand sanitiser dispenser. “It took days for James to be able to open his eyes and several weeks to get the all-clear of no long-term damage,” Nikki wrote. Exposure of the chemicals in hand-sanitiser to the eye can cause minor injuries or even “complete blindness”. “These kinda accidents can occur from a whole range of chemicals. It could be acidic agents such as bleach, window cleaner, vinegar and pool chemicals, or alkali agents such as fertilisers, drain cleaners, sparklers, plaster and cement - but the list is endless!” The passionate mother warned parents in similar incidents to irrigate the area first, listing how to do so, before rushing to the emergency department. “Irrigating the eye is so important as we aim to flush out as much of the chemical as possible. It is best done with Normal Saline but when this is not available running water will do the trick.” She suggested wrapping the child “like a burrito to help keep them still”, while assisting older children over the sink. Slightly warm water should be run over the eyes as the child blinks repeatedly to help flush out the chemical. This should be done for at least 15 minutes. Nikki also warned of contacts to be removed before any process. “P.S Also a reminder - PLEASE do not let little ones use foot pump hand sanitiser dispensers!!” Image: Instagram

Caring

Burning is the slickest film about climate change since An Inconvenient Truth – and that’s its problem

Review: Burning, directed by Eva Orner. The word “crisis” comes from the Greek krinein, which means to decide. You’re stuck in the middle of a burning fire: you need to decide whether you are going to stay and perish; whether you are going to fight to put it out; or whether you are going to leave and let it burn. Burning, Eva Orner’s new documentary, is about the climate crisis, and the Australian government’s decision to (metaphorically) let the fires burn. It is quite explicit in its claims, and this makes it effective as a kind of cinematic essay. It carefully presents – via the words of interviewee <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.smh.com.au/culture/books/former-fire-chief-greg-mullins-faces-the-firestorm-again-20210918-p58stw.html" target="_blank">Greg Mullins</a>, former New South Wales fire commissioner – the history of bushfires in Australia. <iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/hTfyD7ALJtU?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe> While acknowledging, as the refrain goes, there have always been fires in Australia, the film presents evidence and analysis showing fires have massively worsened in recent years in frequency and severity in line with the forecasts of climate scientists regarding global warming. Burning goes on to argue the 2019-2020 “Black Summer” bushfires, its ostensible subject, could have been headed off by a well-conceived response to global warming. Past and present Through a series of talking head interviews, Burning convincingly argues the severity of the devastation of the Black Summer bushfires is largely the fault of the Morrison government (and preceding conservative governments) in refusing to recognise climate change is real, and to enact policies addressing this. Mullins’ commentary is joined by, among others, scientist <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.australianoftheyear.org.au/recipients/tim-flannery/110/" target="_blank">Tim Flannery</a>, young activist <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.vogue.com.au/culture/features/teenage-climatechange-campaigner-daisy-jeffrey-on-what-its-really-like-to-be-a-young-activist/news-story/4b7442757e6e066df7d3ce31f07410cd" target="_blank">Daisy Jeffrey</a>, writer <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.magabala.com/collections/bruce-pascoe" target="_blank">Bruce Pascoe</a> and residents affected by the bushfires who talk about the devastation their communities faced. Through meticulously curated and assembled archival footage, we also hear from a list of the usual suspects: Tony Abbott, Malcolm Roberts, Barnaby Joyce, Alan Jones, and of course, Prime Minister Scott Morrison. The film is careful to tie this back to much earlier conservative discourse, with an interview with Alexander Downer in which he contests the reality of global warming. <a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/430676/original/file-20211108-16752-1s9xxhz.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/430676/original/file-20211108-16752-1s9xxhz.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="A charred landscape" /></a> Burning argues the Black Summer bushfires could have been averted if climate action had been taken. Amazon Prime It also – again, convincingly – demonstrates the role of the Murdoch media in propagating climate change denialism, with snippets from Sky News as recent as 2020 casting doubt on the reality of global warming. The film is at pains to point out this is not only historical, but current – we see Morrison recently bagging out electric cars (“<a rel="noopener" href="https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2021/aug/10/scott-morrison-walks-back-end-the-weekend-rhetoric-on-electrical-vehicles" target="_blank">It’s not gonna tow your trailer</a>. It’s not going to tow your boat. It’s not going to get you out to your favourite camping spot with your family.”) and proselytising about the future role of gas in Australia’s economy. Too polished It’s a very well-made documentary, full of stunning images of Australian geography and flora and fauna – beautiful <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.videomaker.com/article/c6/17127-bokeh-and-depth-of-field" target="_blank">bokeh</a>, slow tracking shots around leaves, etc – interspersed with dramatic meteorological charts, and some shocking footage of the bushfires burning across the country. It is, I would suggest, the slickest film about climate change since An Inconvenient Truth (2006), and, like that film, its polish plays against it as a documentary film experience. This is the annoying thing about the film: it’s so right at the level of content, but formally it falls short. Apart from a few select moments – harrowing images of charred animals, a koala trying to escape a fire, and a devastating interview with a young mother whose baby was born prematurely with a dying placenta because of smoke inhalation – the actual material centred on the bushfires is peculiarly uninvolving. We watch interviews with Cobargo residents that, given the subject, seem surprisingly run of the mill. It’s like the film mentions the smoke, but doesn’t capture its eerie apocalyptic quality. It mentions the intense heartbreak and brutality of the fires for towns like Cobargo, but doesn’t put us in the middle of it. It tells us things more than it makes us feel things, and this is seldom beneficial in the medium. Even much of the footage captured by residents seems strangely contained by the film, with what surely was a surreal, infernal nightmare presented instead in a thoroughly digestible, middlebrow fashion. <a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/430675/original/file-20211108-9989-1k54s2x.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/430675/original/file-20211108-9989-1k54s2x.png?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="A firefighter" /></a> Burning gets so much right in regards to its content, but is let down by its form. Amazon Prime Burning clearly examines climate change as a political weapon in Australia – and leaves no doubt about the connections between global warming and the recent bushfires. The message of the film is spot on, the logic of its argument faultless. There are striking moments – footage of dead animals; listening to Daisy Jeffrey; Bruce Pascoe’s closing words about the stewardship of the land. And yet it doesn’t work as well as it could as a piece of cinema. It lacks the edge of eco docos like <a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com/film-review-wild-things-packs-passionate-climate-activism-into-an-overly-polite-documentary-154374" target="_blank">Wild Things</a> (2020) partly because it’s too slick. We want a hot and sweaty, intense film from within the belly of the bushfires and the horrors of Australian climate policy – instead we get a polished and well-mannered one. It is a really good, well-made doco essay – primed for streaming (produced for Amazon, this is probably its primary intended medium, so it’s no surprise it isn’t very cinematic). Its material is compelling - it certainly stokes our indignation - but it is unlikely to teach a climate change believer anything they don’t already know, and a sceptic won’t watch or listen to it anyway. Burning is at Sydney Film Festival until Monday November 8 and will be streaming on Amazon Prime from November 26.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/171385/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /> <a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/ari-mattes-97857" target="_blank">Ari Mattes</a>, Lecturer in Communications and Media, <a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-notre-dame-australia-852" target="_blank">University of Notre Dame Australia</a> This article is republished from <a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com" target="_blank">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a rel="noopener" href="https://theconversation.com/burning-is-the-slickest-film-about-climate-change-since-an-inconvenient-truth-and-thats-its-problem-171385" target="_blank">original article</a>. Image: Amazon Prime

Movies

Hero jogger rescues family pets from burning home

Image: Youtube A good Samaritan has been caught on a California home's Ring security camera rescuing a cat, a rabbit and two dogs from a stranger's house. The hero, who has since been identified as Paul Murphy, was jogging past on the street when he saw smoke surrounding the family home. The homeowners, who were not home at the time, had no idea what was happening nor that their four pets were in danger until Murphy contacted them through their Ring surveillance camera. Courtney Polito, one of the homeowners, said she saw Murphy "running back and forth" on their porch. "So I answered it and he said, 'Hello, do you see there's smoke coming out of the top of your house?'" Polito said. Polito proceeded to share the home access code with Murphy as smoke alarms started going off. Murphy then ran in and out of the house to save the Politos' four pets. Had Murphy not helped when he did, the family would have lost everything. "The fire department said 10 more minutes and the house would have been gone," Polito said. Polito's husband, Tony, also told the outlet that to enter a stranger's house when it's on fire to rescue pets "takes a certain type of person." Murphy was able to get out of the house by the time firefighters arrived to extinguish the fire, but it's unclear what Murphy did in the meantime with the animals. Courtney Polito said she is looking forward to showing Murphy how grateful she and her family are for his help, and is looking forward to giving him "a hug.

Caring

"I was like a flaming ball": Man struck TWICE by lightning shares his story

Content warning: This article contains graphic content. Ten years after a freak accident killed and revived him, New Zealand man Troy Hall is sharing his recovery story. <a rel="noopener" href="https://7news.com.au/lifestyle/real-life/new-zealand-man-killed-then-brought-back-to-life-by-120000-volt-powerline-electrocution-shares-story-of-survival-c-4989811" target="_blank">Speaking to 7Life</a>, 32-year-old Mr Hall admitted he is “still battling demons” after he was struck by 120,000 volts of electricity twice in the same day. He hopes his story - which he has not spoken openly about before - inspires other burn victims to keep fighting. <img style="width: 0px; height: 0px;" src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/7846520/2e946d2bbca6449cab6c9484a3127404518fe165.jpg" alt="" data-udi="umb://media/804183b76228482694a00b127f46d34a" /> Troy Hall suffered severe burns across more than half his body. Image: 7NEWS In 2011, Mr Hall was working in picking fruit in an avocado orchard. The then-22-year-old had been working outside in the rain all day, climbing up and down cherry pickers to reach the highest fruit. His father John warned him to be careful of the overhead power lines, but Troy laughed off the warning as one of the lines “crackled” above them. He now says that act was “fearless and arrogant”. As his shift was about to end, Mr Hall searched for phone reception to call his then-partner and let her know he was finishing up and heading home. He managed to reach her after climbing up a cherry picker, then he made his way back down. “I was about four and a half metres away from the power line, but you know power jumps,” he said. What happened next was a blur for Mr Hall, but his dad has since helped him piece together the story. “I just remember blacking out,” he recalled. The pair believe that, due to the wet weather, an arc of electricity jumped from the nearby powerline and delivered 120,000 volts through the right side of Mr Hall’s head. The shock instantly killed him and he dropped to the ground. But, the young man was struck again, this time through his chest, which the pair believe brought him “back to life”. “It was only a few moments later, but it blew my chest up and restarted my heart,” Mr Hall said. “It lit me up from the inside… I was like a flaming ball.” He recalled that everything went instantly dark. “I couldn’t see or feel anything, I didn’t really understand what was going on,” he said. As Mr Hall tried to stand up, his dad came to aid and yelled at him to “stay down”. His co-workers and dad worked to try and “damp out” his body, which was engulfed in flames. “I could just hear everyone panicking and crying,” Mr Hall said. “Dad was yelling at me to ‘just stay in the water’.” By the time the ambulance arrived, his body had swelled up to five times its size and more than 60 percent was covered in third-degree burns. <img style="width: 500px; height: 375.3846153846154px;" src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/7846518/a817b3a257c8b33aeb00890ab6ed49564a60d6a7.jpg" alt="" data-udi="umb://media/61e8e9a1fa224341babafa0f3c950cd7" /> Troy spent months recovering, and says he is still “battling demons”. Image: 7NEWS “The doctors told me I probably would never walk or talk again,” he said. “I was trying to talk but couldn’t.” Despite facing the possibility of losing his right leg and arm, Mr Hall thought to himself, “‘I will f***ing show you’”. A few weeks later, he took his first steps and regained his voice shortly after. But, after undergoing multiple skin grafts taken from his legs, he lost an ear and sight in his left eye. “I have a prosthetic ear now, it looks so realistic - I just pop it on!” he said. “It’s actually a great party trick … the kids love it,” he laughed. Mr Hall has maintained that the last ten years have been far from easy, but that his recovery was due to his seven-year-old daughter Nevaeh. “I couldn’t have gotten through this without her,” he said. “I am so grateful she is in my life and I tell her that every time I see her.” With help from his dad and friends Richard and Viv, Mr Hall got back on his feet and has since started his own avocado business called Crispy Avo. “I certainly underestimated the power of electricity,” he admitted. With his continuing recovery, Mr Hall said he is still coming to terms with his appearance, but that it pales in comparison to current world events. “It’s a first world problem,” he said. Image: 7NEWS

Body

Stunning image of baby thrown from burning building

<div class="post_body_wrapper"> <div class="post-body-container"> <div class="post_body"> <div class="body_text redactor-styles redactor-in"> A mother was forced to throw her young child from a burning building during riots in South Africa. The riots have been set off by the imprisonment of former president Jacob Zuma. The mother and child were reunited after she threw him from the building. The violence began yesterday after Zuma began serving a 15-month sentence for contempt of court on Thursday as he refused to comply with a court order that investigated allegations of corruption while he was president from 2009 to 2018. "The criminal element has hijacked this situation," Premier David Makhura of Gauteng province, which includes Johannesburg, said. With more than half of South Africa's 60 million people living in poverty and the COVID-19 pandemic impacting livelihoods, the desperation has reached a boiling point. "We understand that those unemployed have inadequate food. We understand that the situation has been made worse by the pandemic," an emotional Mr Makhura said on the state South African Broadcasting Corp. "But this looting is undermining our businesses here (in Soweto). It is undermining our economy, our community. It is undermining everything." Photo credits: <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.9news.com.au/world/mother-throws-child-from-burning-building-south-africa-riots-zuma-jailing/4c3b7259-e2df-4910-a6ad-63ffaa76aedb" target="_blank">9NEWS</a> </div> </div> </div> </div>

News

Social media star warns against "life hacks" after burns

<div class="post_body_wrapper"> <div class="post_body"> <div class="body_text redactor-styles redactor-in"> A social media star has warned others against trying online "hacks" as she suffered from third-degree burns on her body. British dancer Abbie Quinnen recreated a popular trick from YouTube with her boyfriend AJ Pritchard, but was engulfed in flames when a flaming wine bottle exploded and lit her face, hair, arms and chest on fire. Quinnen has gone through weeks of intensive care and up to 20 hospital visits, but has thanked her fans for support. "I'm so overwhelmed with all your love and support. Thank you all so very much! It means a lot," she wrote. She explained the incident and warned fans against trying the hacks. "Unfortunately I have had an accident. Whilst we were attempting to create a glass bottle into a vase from following a YouTube tutorial, it went terribly wrong," she explained. <blockquote style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/CMrklVYHCjP/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="13"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"></div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"></div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"></div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"></div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"></div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;"><a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none;" rel="noopener" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/CMrklVYHCjP/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank">A post shared by Abbie Quinnen (@abbiequinnen)</a> </div> </blockquote> "It resulted in me incurring injuries & burns requiring continuous hospital treatment over the past seven weeks." "I also want to say a massive thank you to the nurses and doctors at the Chelsea & Westminster burns unit for their incredible care and treatment," she added. The hack the pair were trying was turning a glass wine bottle into a vase after following a tutorial on YouTube. The glass bottle was cut in half by dipping a length of rope in flammable liquid and lighting a flame to it, but the technique backfired when the bottle exploded. </div> </div> </div>

Caring

Man accidentally burns house down in proposal gone wrong

<div class="post_body_wrapper"> <div class="post_body"> <div class="body_text " style="text-align: left;"> A man’s romantic candlelit proposal went completely south after he accidentally set his home on fire - leaving the couple’s house destroyed. Albert Ndreu spent two weeks carefully plotting the perfect proposal after buying a ring for his girlfriend of one year, Valerija Madevic. The 26-year-old used 100 tea lights and around 60 balloons to transform their Sheffield, UK home as he spelt “Marry Me?” with the candles. He even had a bottle of champagne and a “non-stop romance” playlist on loop, ready to surprise Valerija when she finished work. But disaster soon struck when Albert left home to collect Valerija, leaving the candles unattended. As they returned, they saw witnesses watching their home “burning down”. “I was planning the proposal for over two weeks – I kept struggling to find the right thing to do to mark the special moment,” Albert said. <iframe src="https://www.facebook.com/plugins/post.php?href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fdreamweddingsmagazine%2Fposts%2F3313697575361378&width=500" width="500" height="789" style="border: none; overflow: hidden;" scrolling="no" frameborder="0" allowtransparency="true" allow="encrypted-media"></iframe></div> <div class="body_text ">“I wanted to do something from my heart even if it didn’t go exactly as planned.” Despite the moment going horribly wrong, it didn’t stop Albert from getting down on one knee and luckily for him, Valerija said “yes”. “I was so worried about everything going wrong I never imagined I could set the house on fire,” he said. “But it will always be an unforgettable day for us and a story which will be amazing to tell our children.” Speaking of the proposal, Valerija said she started the evening thinking her now fiancé had done something stupid after he came to her work with flowers. “When I got the flowers I thought he must have broken something or destroyed something in the house,” she said. “Little did I know he had destroyed our entire living room.” But she was even more stunned after Albert got down on one knee among the ashes of their belongings. “He pulled out a box from his pocket and I was just speechless. “He said that he messed up – our house was literally in flames – but asked me if I would marry him. “And I said yes.” After the dramatic proposal, three fire crews were able to extinguish the flames, leaving the home filled with ashes. </div> </div> </div>

Relationships

White Island volcano tour guide's miraculous recovery after surviving eruption

<div class="post_body_wrapper"> <div class="post_body"> <div class="body_text "> 19-year-old Jake Milbank, a White Island tour guide, has been seen for the first time since the volcano erupted on December 9. He was leading a group of tourists around the volcano when it erupted, with the blast claiming the lives of 21 people. Milbank suffered burns to 80 percent of his body, but is now enjoying spending time with his family and his beloved family pet. He was allowed to leave the hospital for the first time on March 1 and it was the first time he had been outside in three months. “After more than three long months in hospital things are finally starting to look up as my medical team have cleared me for day leave,” he wrote in an Instagram update. “The first thing on my list was to go and see this little cutie who hasn't seen me in a whopping 1.8 dog years. “Such an awesome feeling to be back out in the real world breathing in some fresh air.” <blockquote style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/B9lZPh6hJID/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" data-instgrm-version="12"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"></div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"></div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"></div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"></div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"></div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <a style="color: #000; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;" rel="noopener" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/B9lZPh6hJID/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank">After more than three long months in hospital things are finally starting to look up as my medical team have cleared me for day leave! The first thing on my list was to go and see this little cutie who hasn’t seen me in a whopping 1.8 dog years 😅 Such an awesome feeling to be back out in the real world breathing in some fresh air. I’d like to say a huge thank you to everyone who has helped me get to this point, I couldn’t have done it without you all ❤️</a> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;">A post shared by <a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px;" rel="noopener" href="https://www.instagram.com/jake_milbank/?utm_source=ig_embed&utm_campaign=loading" target="_blank"> Jake Milbank</a> (@jake_milbank) on Mar 11, 2020 at 12:03am PDT </div> </blockquote> Milbank also updated his <a rel="noopener noreferrer" href="https://givealittle.co.nz/cause/help-support-jakes-recovery" target="_blank">Give a Little</a> page, explaining that he had been able to spend the day celebrating his aunt’s birthday. “I am now fully grafted which means my physio regime has been getting more and more intense as my skin grafts heal,” the Give A Little update said. “From walking on the treadmill to pumping iron we are seeing improvements every day. “I am finally beginning to gain weight and have put on three kilograms in the last three weeks.” Friends and family of Milbank have been making the eight-hour round trip to the hospital to visit, including colleagues from White Island tours. “Words can't even express how amazing my family have been, they have been so supportive, keeping me company and bringing me home cooked meals, I can't thank them enough,” he said. </div> </div> </div>

Caring

Lewis the koala put to sleep in hospital after horrific bushfire burns

The 14-year-old buck who made international headlines after footage emerged of him coming out of the NSW bushfires with horrifying burns, has died. Lewis the koala was rescued by a heroic grandmother who carried him in her arms and the heartbreaking moment sent hearts racing around the world. The Port Macquarie Koala Hospital has shared sad news on Tuesday afternoon, saying staff made the decision to put him to sleep. “We placed him under general anaesthesia this morning to assess his burns injuries and change the bandages,” the hospital said in a post at about 2.30pm. The hospital said Lewis’ burns became worse “and unfortunately “would not have gotten better”. <blockquote class="twitter-tweet"> UPDATE: Lewis, the koala who went viral in this daring rescue video, has died at Port Macquarie Koala Hospital <a href="https://t.co/RshwIOyvyn">https://t.co/RshwIOyvyn</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/RIPLewis?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#RIPLewis</a> <a href="https://t.co/nsdOVVAI0U">pic.twitter.com/nsdOVVAI0U</a> — NowThis (@nowthisnews) <a href="https://twitter.com/nowthisnews/status/1199342797469425664?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">November 26, 2019</a></blockquote> “The Koala Hospital’s number one goal is animal welfare, so it was on those grounds that this decision was made,” it read. $1.66 million in donations streamed in for the hospital after Lewis’ sad rescue went viral. Grandmother Toni Doherty was filmed ripping the shirt off her back near Long Flat in NSW to save the wailing koala. The 14-year-old suffered burns to his feet, stomach and chest. Named “Ellenborough Lewis” after Toni’s grandchild, or Lewis for short, he had been receiving care by long-term home care volunteer and koala hospital supervisor, Barb. “Barb hand feeds Lewis a single leaf at a time, with feeding taking up to an hour a feed,” the hospital said on Friday. “Lewis’s prognosis is guarded as he sustained significant burns however he is receiving the best possible care.” <img style="width: 500px; height: 281.25px;" src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/7832794/koala-lewis.jpg" alt="" data-udi="umb://media/8dba411c87ee48d3aa0091b70f4a008e" /> Lewis was just one of 31 koalas brought into the hospital from fire-grounds in the surrounding area, and an estimate of 350 koalas was killed as a result of the horrific bushfires. There are grave concerns from wildlife rescuers that there is a “much worse” toll of about 1000 koalas across NSW, Queensland and South Australia who were killed. Toni’s husband Peter Doherty told <a rel="noopener" href="https://www.nine.com.au/" target="_blank">Nine</a> they “were there this morning” when Lewis died. “We are naturally very sad about this, as we were hoping he’d pull through but we accept his injuries were severe and debilitating and would have been quite painful,” Mr Doherty said. The Port Macquarie Koala Hospital is part of a not-for-profit organisation established in 1973. They operate with four staff members and rely on the help of 140 volunteers. According to its website, the hospital has a treatment room, eight intensive care units, six outdoor intensive care units and 33 rehabilitation yards. In total, they handle between 200 and 250 koalas every year.

Family & Pets

The Amazon is burning: 4 essential reads on Brazil’s vanishing rainforest

Nearly <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/21/world/americas/amazon-rainforest.html">40,000 fires</a> are incinerating Brazil’s Amazon rainforest, the latest outbreak in an overactive fire season that has charred 1,330 square miles of the rainforest this year. Don’t blame dry weather for the swift destruction of the world’s largest tropical forest, say environmentalists. These Amazonian wildfires are a <a href="https://www.cnn.com/2019/08/22/americas/amazon-fires-humans-intl-hnk-trnd/index.html">human-made disaster</a>, set by loggers and cattle ranchers who use a “slash and burn” method to clear land. Feeding off very dry conditions, some of those fires have spread out of control. Brazil has long struggled to preserve the Amazon, sometimes called the “lungs of the world” because it <a href="https://www.sciencealert.com/the-amazon-is-burning-at-a-record-rate-and-parts-were-intentionally-set-alight">produces 20% of the world’s oxygen</a>. Despite the increasingly strict environmental protections of recent decades, about a quarter of this massive rainforest is already gone – an area the size of Texas. While climate change <a href="https://climate.nasa.gov/news/2780/nasa-finds-amazon-drought-leaves-long-legacy-of-damage/">endangers the Amazon</a>, bringing hotter weather and longer droughts, <a href="https://www.thedialogue.org/analysis/nearing-the-tipping-point-drivers-of-deforestation-in-the-amazon-region/">development may be the greatest threat</a> facing the rainforest. Here, environmental researchers explain how farming, big infrastructure projects and roads drive the deforestation that’s slowly killing the Amazon. 1. Farming in the jungle “Deforestation is largely due to <a href="https://theconversation.com/strict-amazon-protections-made-brazilian-farmers-more-productive-new-research-shows-105789">land clearing for agricultural purposes</a>, particularly cattle ranching but also soybean production,” writes Rachel Garrett, a professor at Boston University who studies land use in Brazil. Since farmers need “a massive amount of land for grazing,” Garrett says, they are driven to “continuously clear forest – illegally – to expand pastureland.” Twelve percent of what was once Amazonian forest – about 93 million acres – is now farmland. Deforestation in the Amazon has spiked since the election last year of the far-right President Jair Bolsonaro. Arguing that federal conservation zones and hefty fines for cutting down trees hinder economic growth, Bolsonaro has slashed Brazil’s strict environmental regulations. There’s no evidence to support Bolsonaro’s view, Garrett says. “Food production in the Amazon has substantially increased since 2004,” Garrett says. The increased production has been pushed by federal policies meant to discourage land clearing, such as hefty fines for deforestation and low-interest loans for investing in sustainable agricultural practices. Farmers are now planting and harvesting two crops – mostly soybean and corn – each year, rather than just one. Brazilian environmental regulations helped Amazonian ranchers, too. Garrett’s research found that improved pasture management in line with stricter federal land use policies led the number of cattle slaughtered annually per acre to double. “Farmers are producing more meat – and therefore earning more money – with their land,” she writes. 2. Infrastructure development and deforestation President Bolsonaro is also pushing forward an ambitious infrastructure development plan that would turn the Amazon’s many waterways into electricity generators. The Brazilian government has long wanted to build a series of big new hydroelectric dams, including on the Tapajós River, the Amazon’s only remaining undammed river. But the indigenous Munduruku people, who live near around the Tapajós River, have stridently opposed this idea. “The Munduruku have until now successfully slowed down and seemingly halted many efforts to profit off the Tapajós,” <a href="https://theconversation.com/amazon-deforestation-already-rising-may-spike-under-bolsonaro-109940">writes Robert T. Walker</a>, a University of Florida professor who has conducted environmental research in the Amazon for 25 years. But Bolsonaro’s government is less likely than his predecessors to respect indigenous rights. One of his first moves in office was to transfer responsibilities for demarcating indigenous lands from the Brazilian Ministry of Justice to the decidedly pro-development Ministry of Agriculture. And, Walker notes, Bolsonaro’s Amazon development plans are part of a broader South American project, conceived in 2000, to build continental infrastructure that provides electricity for industrialization and facilitates trade across the region. For the Brazilian Amazon, that means not just new dams but also “webs of waterways, rail lines, ports and roads” that will get products like soybeans, corn and beef to market, according to Walker. “This plan is far more ambitious than earlier infrastructure projects” that damaged the Amazon, Walker writes. If Bolsonaro’s plan moves forward, he estimates that fully 40% of the Amazon could be deforested. 3. Road-choked streams Roads, most of them dirt, already criss-cross the Amazon. That came as a surprise to Cecilia Gontijo Leal, a Brazilian researcher who studies tropical fish habitats. “I imagined that my field work would be all boat rides on immense rivers and long jungle hikes,” <a href="https://theconversation.com/amazonian-dirt-roads-are-choking-brazils-tropical-streams-89226">she writes</a>. “In fact, all my research team needed was a car.” Traveling on rutted mud roads to take water samples from streams across Brazil’s Pará state, Leal realized that the informal “bridges” of this locally built transportation network must be impacting Amazonian waterways. So she decided to study that, too. “We found that makeshift road crossings cause both shore erosion and silt buildup in streams. This worsens water quality, hurting the fish that thrive in this delicately balanced habitat,” she writes. The ill-designed road crossings – which feature perched culverts that disrupt water flow – also act as barriers to movement, preventing fish from finding places to feed, breed and take shelter. 4. Rewilding tropical forests The fires now consuming vast swaths of the Amazon are the latest repercussion of development in the Amazon. Set by farmers likely emboldened by their president’s anti-conservation stance, the blazes emit so much smoke that on Aug. 20 it blotted out the midday sun in the city of São Paulo, 1,700 miles away. The fires are still multiplying, and peak dry season is still a month away Apocalyptic as this sounds, science suggests it’s not too late to save the Amazon. Tropical forests destroyed by fire, logging, land-clearing and roads <a href="https://theconversation.com/high-value-opportunities-exist-to-restore-tropical-rainforests-around-the-world-heres-how-we-mapped-them-119508">can be replanted</a>, say ecologists Robin Chazdon and Pedro Brancalion. Using satellite imagery and the latest peer-reviewed research on biodiversity, climate change and water security, Chazdon and Brancalion identified 385,000 square miles of “restoration hotspots” – areas where restoring tropical forests would be most beneficial, least costly and lowest risk. “Although these second-growth forests will never perfectly replace the older forests that have been lost,” Chazon writes, “planting carefully selected trees and assisting natural recovery processes can restore many of their former properties and functions.” The five countries with the most tropical restoration potential are Brazil, Indonesia, India, Madagascar and Colombia. Written by Catesby Holmes. Republished with permission of <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-amazon-is-burning-4-essential-reads-on-brazils-vanishing-rainforest-122288">The Conversation. </a>

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Big news for Turia Pitt as Aussie celebs chime in with their support

Turia Pitt, burns survivor and ultramarathon woman, has announced that she is expecting her second child with her partner, Michael Hoskin. She announced the news via Instagram on Saturday, announcing that they were expecting “Baby #2”. “When Michael and I want to share big news, I insist on creating a Beyonce-inspired video montage,” Pitt posted on Saturday. “Baby #2, we can’t wait to meet you.” She added: “PS I promise we’ll find you a more appropriate name soon.” <blockquote style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/B1NvRXugGqu/" data-instgrm-version="12"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"></div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"></div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"></div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"></div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"></div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <a style="color: #000; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px; text-decoration: none; word-wrap: break-word;" rel="noopener" href="https://www.instagram.com/p/B1NvRXugGqu/" target="_blank">When Michael and I want to share big news, I insist on creating a Beyonce-inspired video montage. Baby #2, we can’t wait to meet you 💛 PS I promise we’ll find you a more appropriate name soon 😂</a> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;">A post shared by <a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px;" rel="noopener" href="https://www.instagram.com/turiapitt/" target="_blank"> Turia</a> (@turiapitt) on Aug 15, 2019 at 11:24pm PDT </div> </blockquote> Footage in the video montage shows Pitt and Hoskin cuddling on a balcony, playing with their first-born son Hakavai and attending an ultrasound appointment where there’s a glimpse of their new baby on the way. There’s also footage of Pitt showing off her baby bump, which garnered support from Aussie celebrities. “OMG! Congratulations! Another one through to the keeper,” champion surfer Layne Beachley wrote. Supermodel Megan Gale posted: “Beautiful news! Congrats guys.” Pitt and Hoskin welcomed Hakavai back in 2017, which is six years after Pitt suffered burns to 65 per cent of her body after a bushfire in Western Australia. <blockquote style="background: #FFF; border: 0; border-radius: 3px; box-shadow: 0 0 1px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.5),0 1px 10px 0 rgba(0,0,0,0.15); margin: 1px; max-width: 540px; min-width: 326px; padding: 0; width: calc(100% - 2px);" class="instagram-media" data-instgrm-captioned="" data-instgrm-permalink="https://www.instagram.com/p/BzCvWT1g3IZ/" data-instgrm-version="12"> <div style="padding: 16px;"> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: row; align-items: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 50%; flex-grow: 0; height: 40px; margin-right: 14px; width: 40px;"></div> <div style="display: flex; flex-direction: column; flex-grow: 1; justify-content: center;"> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; margin-bottom: 6px; width: 100px;"></div> <div style="background-color: #f4f4f4; border-radius: 4px; flex-grow: 0; height: 14px; width: 60px;"></div> </div> </div> <div style="padding: 19% 0;"></div> <div style="display: block; height: 50px; margin: 0 auto 12px; width: 50px;"></div> <div style="padding-top: 8px;"> <div style="color: #3897f0; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: 550; line-height: 18px;">View this post on Instagram</div> </div> <p style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; line-height: 17px; margin-bottom: 0; margin-top: 8px; overflow: hidden; padding: 8px 0 7px; text-align: center; text-overflow: ellipsis; white-space: nowrap;">A post shared by <a style="color: #c9c8cd; font-family: Arial,sans-serif; font-size: 14px; font-style: normal; font-weight: normal; line-height: 17px;" rel="noopener" href="https://www.instagram.com/turiapitt/" target="_blank"> Turia</a> (@turiapitt) on Jun 22, 2019 at 11:49pm PDT </div> </blockquote> Pitt was competing in a 100 kilometre ultra-marathon when she was caught in the flames. She lost seven fingers, endured six months in hospital and spent two years in recovery. She also endured over 200 operations during her time in hospital.

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