Bushfire and Natural hazards Cooperative research Centre (BNH CRC), which also functions as the IRDR National Committee for Australia, has presented a number of new publications, including several reports and journal papers.
A scoping study from the Capability needs for emergency and disaster management organisations project looks at the challenges of individual and inter-operational capabilities of first response, support and recovery agencies in a context of collaborative response to complex emergencies and disaster events, while a desktop review for the Mapping and understanding bushfire and natural hazard vulnerability and risks at the institutional scale study presents a summary of risk ownership allocation for the strategic management of natural hazard risks in Australia.
New journal articles online include papers from the Mapping bushfire hazards and impacts project, a Department of Environment, Land, Water and Planning Victoria commissioned research project and two papers that have come from previous Bushfire CRC projects investigating travel times and determining optimal travel routes from emergency services bases to bushfires and carbon loss from planned burning in southeastern Australian dry Eucalyptus forests.
A number of Ph.D. students from the previous CRC recently had their theses accepted; some of this research is now available online: Steve Curnin studied multi-agency, emergency management coordination and developed a conceptual framework to identify the core requirements of liaison officers working at state level control centres. Tarnya Kruger’s open access Ph.D. thesis explores how the organisation of volunteer support groups contribute to surge capacity in three federal states. She examines the extent to which local knowledge can enhance or jeopardise the work of firefighters (see here). The Ph.D. work of Valerie Densmore focused on how woody legumes can help restore ecosystems after bushfires. The knowledge gained from her research is important to predicting ecosystem resilience and fuel recovery following fire. Kerryn McTaggart’s Ph.D. thesis investigated the uptake of methane in the soil of alpine ecosystems in the Bogong High Plains in Victoria.
