Map with hotspots

Still about the bushfires in Australia: a great map with the hotspots.

Smoke

The above picture was taken by SplaTT. Both photos are taken on the exact spot in the Upper Yarra Valley in Victoria. On the picture above you clearly can see what the impact of the smoke of the bushfires. According to SlaTT the fires are located 50-60 kilometers away.

Friday I saw some television footage of the smoke in the city center of Melbourne. That was scaring too.

On Tuesday morning (Australia), media reported that two fires in the north east of Victoria merged in one big blaze. Nearly three and a half thousand people are fighting the fires in Victoria. On Tasmania a firestorm damaged fourteen houses. Luckily, the fires haven’t killed anybody.

Ten Canoes

The aboriginal movie ‘Ten Canoes‘ was the big winner on the AFI Awards. “Ten Canoes swept all before it, taking out best film, best director and best original screenplay, on top of an award for “pursuit of excellence” to director Rolf de Heer”, writes The Age. Another film that was celebrated in Melbourne was ‘Kenny‘, a mockumentary about a toilet plumber.

You can browse through the list of winners at the website of the Australian Film Institute.

If you have the chance to watch ‘Ten Canoes’, you should take that opportunity. It’s just a brilliant movie. It can win an oscar

Fires in Victoria

This picture was taken by a Nasa Terra satellite on 5th December 2006. It shows the smoke of the bushfires in Victoria. The red spots are the actual fires. Today fifty fires are burning throughout the area and firemen don’t think they’ll be able to control the fires today because the weather is bad. Nasa stipulates that a strong El Nino-influence on the weather is not a good thing for the firefighters.

The fires are a result of the ongoing drought and high temperatures. These have created extremely risky conditions for fires in many parts of the country.

AWB loses temporalily its monopoly

The Australian wheat exporter AWB is to temporarily lose its monopoly. AWB is the sole exporter of Australian wheat. But after reports that it paid bribes to the Saddam regime in Iraq, the situation was criticised.

The government said AWB would lose its power to veto exports for six months, reports the BBC. The threat that the monopoly would be abolished forever, was not executed. Rivals of AWB see opportunity to sell crops overseas.

AWB was one of the biggest suppliers of the United Nations Oil for Food program.

Kevin Rudd

Labor has chosen for a change. Kevin Rudd has won the labor leader ballot. He wants to introduce some new faces to the shadow government. What will he do: “There’s too much short termism in Australian politics. The more I move around the Australian community the more people want to know ‘What is the long term?’ When you’re looking at the big ones like climate change, they want to know whether you’re real or whether you’re just coming up with something that sounds good between now and the next election.”

For Beazley, it was a particular sad day, as he lost the election and – more dramatic – his brother died in Perth.

Labor leadership ballot

Kim Beazley, the leader of the Australian Labor Party, has called a ballot on the leadership of the party. The 88 members of parliament will choose Monday between an experienced leader (Beazley) or fresh and new ideas (Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard).

Beazley returned to leadership two years ago. He is a well known politician and has a carreer of 26 years in parliament.

The challengers Rudd en Gillard entered parliament in 1998. They never been in a government. But they are popular. For half of the Labor caucus the duo is a sign of hope. Rudd en Gillard want a renewal of the Labor Party and want to take risks so that Labor can win the elections.

The principle difference between Beazley and Rudd & Gillard is freshness. They take the same stance on important issues as health care or uranium and are situated on the right wing of the Labor Party. Rudd is from Queensland, the state where the Labor Party is not succesfull. He has also more charisma than Beazley.

Whatever the result, it is said that Beazley looses, even if he wins the ballot. “A narrow victory would be so damaging that it would prove to be just a way-station to a more emphatic defeat early next year”.

The ballot is scheduled for Monday.