Well, I'm currently at Hill Top, and by tomorrow afternoon or evening I expect the fire to arrive. I'm staying to save my house from embers, if that's possible. If it goes, say goodbye to all my old radios and valve collection.

Well, I'm currently at Hill Top, and by tomorrow afternoon or evening I expect the fire to arrive.

Best of luck. Hopefully it will bypass your place but, yes, embers are a major danger.

I believe that in Spain the law was (is?) that any person over the alcohol limit in car could be penalised.

They don't have that here (yet) though you can be put on the bag if you are the driver and you sit in the driver's seat even only if you plan on sleeping it off. The law here is based on intent rather than doing the actual wrong and there's some precedent for it. That said, I think it'd be fair if someone hasn't started the car and put it in motion, the police should be using some discretion instead of acting like a tax collector.

In an unrelated matter, many years ago, police went to the carpark at the Ranch Hotel at North Ryde in Sydney and marked the left hand headlight of all cars with masking tape. Later that night, they set up booze buses on routes leading away from the hotel. Everyone with a marked headlight was bagged and the score was above average for the night with many being taken in to be booked.

The problem was, someone twigged and the masking tape became a topic of discussion the following week. Police had to return everyone's licence eventually because it went to court and the court ruled that because selection of motorists had to be at random (hence the name of the operation being random breath testing) and in this case the selection of motorists had been based on where they spent the night, the tests were invalid.

These days, the name random breath testing is a misnomer like points loss is rather than points gain. Now, anyone can be stopped regardless and if they are over, they are done.

Following on from Brad's earlier post, from today's SMH:

QUOTE: [NSW] Motorists caught throwing a lit cigarette out of their vehicle from January 17 will receive a fine of $660 and lose [sic] five demerit points. Both fines and demerit points will be doubled during total fire bans.

I have said it before: I was driving daily from Wangaratta to Albury and at night & probably the day it was a fireworks display as butts went out windows.

I saw several people throwing butts yesterday as well as ashing cigarettes out their windows which is just as bad. I don't have the benefit of an in-car camera so it's a little difficult to report the idiots. In 2020 there may be a camera coming.

" fine of $660 "

Remember in the mid fifties seeing signs up everywhere in the bush for fine of 200 pounds ($400) and 6 months in gaol for starting fires in a time of fire ban. $660 doesn't seem an appropriate adjustment for inflation - it would have bought you a good used car in the day.

The danger of fires was drummed into everyone including the kids. Drivers were warned about cigarette butts. The culprits were seen to be city people who had got into the habit in the city where it was just litter. Still the same now where littering is seen by many as minor reaction against authority.

I once saw a fire start by a thrown butt and it was unbelievable.
The weather was hot, dry and a stiff wind was blowing horizontally across the landscape.
The butt came out of a car window and landed in bone dry grass by the side of the highway.
We were stationary at a ding ding Train crossing and the driver in front of me was just bored and flicked the fag out, typical of the brainless morons who smoke habitually do.
Within seconds of the fag landing the flames started and then sheeted in an expanding fan across the paddock and was off out of control.
The train had to run the fire and then we drove off as fast as could but Mr stupid smoker then had the pleasure of fire spraying over him as the road cornered into the wind direction and ran across the face of the paddock with the cross wind and flames roaring.
I pulled into a property road and did a U'y and got the hell out there.
Stupid people that smoke and flick their butts should be deported.
No "butts", (sic) just deported.
Fred.

I had a similar experience a few years back. Where I live in the outskirts of Canberra it's a lot of bushland interspersed with a lot of homes. It's tinder dry here . A woman at traffic lights had her fag and ashing it out the window wandered why I pull up next to her and gave her a mouthful. Stupid,Stupid ,Stupid.

I see some bitch has been charged in SA with deception posing as a fire victim to get $300 from a Church apparently that's not all: It never ceases to amaze, at the depths of low some will go to.

Meantime around Albury a Fire truck has rolled and there is at least one dead.

There's a lot of looneys out there with lots and lots of blood on their hands.

From today's SMH:

QUOTE: Suspicions were raised when RFS volunteer Blake Banner allegedly turned up early to a fire.

Investigators became more suspicious in November, when police allege they saw the teenager sitting in a dual cab at the Bega River and noticed a fire shortly after.

Several hours later, police from the South Coast Police District arrived at the Tarraganda RFS shed and arrested the 19-year-old.

He was taken to Bega Police Station where he was charged in connection with the lighting of seven fires.

A total of 183 alleged arsonists have been collared since September. It's hard to believe that there's people who still don't think the majority of the fires have been deliberately lit and it's not the first time that firefighters have been prime suspects, particularly the younger ones that have an adrenaline rush to go and put out the fire they started in the first place. Those of these 183 that will eventually be found guilty are a national disgrace.

Bail is consistent with wussy sentencing & the bleeding hearts; Its retrospectively like scene out of something like "Monty Python's" Life of Brian.

He's just a naughty boy: So we confiscated his matches.

Pyromaniacs within Fire Brigades is actually rather common. I did mention where some years ago, one moved from Canberra to "The Rock" & took his trade with him & got caught as a result.

Of course we have also looters & scammers. Doesn't take long for the opportunistic lowlife scum to materialise.