http://www.southerncrossroads.info/community/cape-of-fire.php
Has anyone seen the hard-hitting article by Dr Phoebe Barnard in the latest Full Circle Magazine? Phoebe draws attention to the coming "Fire Season" and the fact that many of our homes are very much at risk. It is now high time that we all come together to put pressure on the City, the Navy and other negligent landowners to clear their overgrown properties, before Simonstown, Glencairn and Fish Hoek also make world media headlines, just as did recent devasting fires in California, Greece and Australia.
Make no mistake, we are currently a prime candidate for experiencing similar devastating fires of our own, with many homes and lives swept away in unstoppable fire storms. Global warming is making weather everywhere more extreme and there is also a coming el Nino event that will create ideal fire conditions here. Large areas of land close to our houses are hugely infested with alien vegetation and with our fierce, dry south easter winds, the likelyhood is very strong that before not too long in the South Peninsula, we will also be facing our own tragedy as we are swept with an unstoppable mega fire.
Last year Scarborough lost five house when fierce winds took a fire into the heart of the village and Redhill informal settlement was devastated – but Scarborough at that time was not anywhere near as overgrown as are the Glencairn valley, Simonstown and other parts of the South Peninsula at present.
All of the South Peninsula Civic Associations really need get together to form fire committees and to join the Glencairn people and others in putting pressure on the authorities to clear overgrown properties. That would be my challenge to Simonstown – please start LOUDLY demanding action from the authorities on all overgrown properties now, for your own sakes, before it is too late.
Steve
Posted via email from My Stories, My Tales-> Our Far South Pot Pourri
