Australia Bushfires North Of Sydney 'Too Big To Put Out'

Brushfires raging across a 60 km (37 mile) swath northwest of Sydney, Australia, have caused some officials at The Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) to lament that "some fires were too big to put out.”

The fire that some have termed a "mega blaze" is about a one-hour drive away from Sydney and has affected about 300,000 hectares, reports have said. Authorities are instructing people to leave the area immediately and animals are being evacuated from the Walkabout Wildlife Park.

Sydney is feeling the effects, with black fumes sullying the air and causing a spike in smoke-related medical problems. Rob Rogers, the deputy commissioner of the New South Wales Rural Fire Service (NSW RFS), told ABC, "We cannot stop these fires, they will just keep burning until conditions ease, and then we'll try to do what we can to contain them." He added that a 60km stretch from Hawkesbury to Singleton was "just fire that whole way."

More than 2,200 firefighters from Australia are fighting the blazes, with Canada and the U.S. expected to add to those numbers over the weekend. According to a tweet from the NSW RFS, there were still 95 fires burning with about half contained as of noon Saturday.

Not so many years ago, the accusing finger would be pointed to a random lightning strike, a careless campfire, an arsonist or pointing upward to call the fire an act of God. Today, even atheists can join the fray and point to climate change as the culprit for any catastrophe with the slightest link to the weather.

The Australian brushfires now join typhoons / hurricanes, snow blizzards, heat waves, floods and droughts as being caused by climate change (nee global warming).

True to form, hundreds of bushfire survivors and farmers converged on the nation's capital, Canberra, to protest what they view as the government's lack of action on climate change.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison has dismissed accusations linking the crisis to his government's policies, but that did not stop one woman who lost her house to exclaim on a picture of the charred dwelling that, "Morrison, your climate crisis destroyed my home." Since October, bushfires have killed six people and destroyed more than 700 homes across Australia.

The BOM agrees that climate change has led to an increase in extreme heat events and can offer data showing that New South Wales had endured its driest spring season on record and predicted a repeat of Australia's 2018 summer, the nation's hottest summer on record.

For the current brushfires, the NSW RFS speculates that for them to be extinguished would require a “good rain.” If that happens will those that blamed the fires in the first place on climate change now credit it for the rain or simply give thanks for another act of God?