The wildfires in California

have been given considerable coverage in the local news media - and with good cause.
Downunder is prone to what we call "bushfires". We have had some serious fires in the past and we will have more in the future. 
Our house is just below the foothills of the range that divides the settled coastal area from the eastern part of the state. I can look out the front window and see some of the hillside. Pedalling back from the local shopping centre or library I can see some of the many houses nestled in among the many thousands of trees on the hills. 
As a child I travelled on the train to a station almost as high as the summit of the southern part of the range. The train does not go that far now but it still goes through areas of heavy vegetation, some of which are inaccessible by road and others which are difficult to access. Some of the areas which are difficult to access have been built on by people who want to live in what they believe to be "native bush". 
It is often these people who leave the areas around their homes "natural". They don't clear away excess vegetation. They fail to clear an area around their home and refuse to acknowledge the high fuel load. The fire danger is extreme for many people. There is no fire fighting equipment in the world that could save some of these houses in extreme conditions. Aerial assistance can only occur when the conditions are right. Strong winds down gullies - and fires create their own wind - can prevent just such aerial assistance and many houses are built in such gullies.  Ground crews cannot get to them and water to fight fires is in such short supply that the lives of crews are in added danger. 
Many of those crews are volunteers. They give up their time and risk their lives to fight such fires.
I am saying all this now because the "environmentally correct" movement still isn't listening.  The extremists who want things to remain "natural" and for things to be left as they are and those who want to live "in the bush" are putting the lives of many others at risk. Successive governments which have refused to recognise the huge risks associated with excessively long goods trains running through built up areas in the hills - potentially blocking vital level crossings in the event of a breakdown - have only added to the problem. 
It is time we started to think about what we have done and are continuing to do or we will face the same sort of disaster as California has had to face.