My sister in law got herself out, the kids and the horses down to Lilydale to relative safety, while my brother in law stayed. After seeing all the news coverage and everything he now agrees that if it gets close again he will be out of the area as fast as possible, way before it gets close. All the people who died in cars while trying to escape it was horrific and to listen to peoples accounts of what happened, makes your heart go out to everybody.
There is not much we can do up here but the wife being from Melbourne has donated to the Red Cross.
I first became aware of the magnitude of the thing on the British pilots website. THere was a post by a fireman from Victoria and subsequently it grew to six pages with quite a few photos.
ReplyDeleteI got some further info from BBC America. However, I was TOTALLY disgusted that the one hour news program on CBS in NYC devoted less than sixty seconds to the story, 39 minutes into the broadcast and immediately segued into a story about some awards show and some dogs. It made me sick.
Please convey my best wishes to your wife for her family members there.
Many thanks for your words I will pass them on. It does not surprise me about the United States, no offense but the news never seems to happen outside of America except if it involves Americans.
ReplyDeleteQuite untrue, Stu. The Australian fires have been all over the news here.
ReplyDeleteIf there's fires in California, do the Australians and English see it all over their media? No, I'd guess.
YD my apologies thanks for correcting me, we also get lots of coverage of the California fires, although not full coverage there is always a clip in there somewhere. Although the newspapers never see further than the edge of the shores. Maybe I should shut up and research it better....lol
ReplyDeleteNo worries, Stu. You're probably in part right-I've no doubt there are more than a few here who if asked to point out Australia on a map would point at Alabama.
ReplyDeleteActually, blogging with people overseas helps give a sense of wanting to know about their homes.
The news here (remarkably) had a piece on the snow in London and has been covering the Aus fires.
Though I will say the BBC World Service, which we get on National Public Radio here, does give tremendously better world news than our networks do.
I'll give you a 'Dumb Yank' story-
I was in a store before Christmas and the girl at the counter was from the UK. Her accent was Yorkshire (yes, I can pick out the Yorkie sound). She said she was from Leeds. I said it sounded more like she was from Yorkshire.
DUH! Leeds is IN Yorkshire! D'oh!
Anyway, glad to hear the wife's relatives are safe for now.
Never been any good with accents, I can pick out the broad easy ones but any posh ones then I don't have a clue! Canadian's seem to hate it when you ask if they are American's!
ReplyDeleteGlad to hear your family are ok, you don't have to go far to find people who's family aren't at the moment.
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