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It’s around this time of year that Jill Tacon’s nose begins to twitch. Having lived in the Mount Eliza neighborhood south of Melbourne for over 50 years, the retiree is all too familiar with the early signs of approaching wildfires, known as “bushfires” locally. “My nose is super alert in summer,” she tells TIME. “I really look for the smell of burning. I also look at the sky to see if there is any smoke in the vicinity.”
That diligence paid dividends just three weeks ago when Tacon, 77, was out walking her Australian Kelpie and stumbled upon a fire by a nearby creek. She backed up, warned her neighbors, and Victoria state’s Country Fire Authority (CFA), which was fortunately holding a training session nearby, sent two trucks to put out the blaze before it could spread.
“They think perhaps it was a spark from a power line,” Tacon says of the fire’s cause. “We don’t really know. But it just reminded us that we are now in a very dry period of summer and we should rehearse in our minds what we need to do if there is a fire.”
It’s something plenty of Americans are also mulling following the firestorm that swept through Los Angeles County’s Pacific Palisades and Altadena neighborhoods last month, razing more than 16,000 buildings, generating 4.5 million tons of debris, and causing some $275 billion of damage. As the complex cleanup and recovery process gets underway, the debate about how to instill resilience and preparedness to fend off future catastrophes is heating up.
Australia’s experience battling bushfires offers invaluable context for the Golden State—and the wider U.S.—as rising global temperatures render increased fire risk the new normal. Even against the background of the L.A. carnage, Australia’s experience is undeniably more acute. Back in 2019, wildfires torched 83 million acres of Australia, an area twice the size of Florida.
Before the recent L.A. blazes started, the Grampians National Park just west of…
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