THE new national fire danger ratings system is a shambles which should be overhauled for the next fire season, some of Australia's top fire scientists have warned.
Kevin Tolhurst, the expert relied on by the Bushfires Royal Commission to explain the behaviour of the February 7 fires, told The Sunday Age that the new rating system was an overly simplistic ''political outcome'' invented over three days last September by fire service bureaucrats using ''very little science''.
Former CSIRO fire scientist David Packham agreed, saying the new system was ''smoke and mirrors'', with the word ''catastrophic'' thrown around in areas ''without taking any account of the environment'' it sought to describe.
''We're very fortunate this year has been a gentle year,'' Dr Packham said.
And former CSIRO bushfire research group project leader Phil Cheney said the differences between the top three ratings was very small, and that introducing a ''catastrophic'' rating was ''a fear tactic''.
The new fire danger rating system, which ranges from ''low-moderate'' to ''catastrophic [code red]'', came out of a meeting in an ''accelerated solutions environment'' last September attended by senior members of fire agencies, representatives of the Bureau of Meteorology and researchers.
People living in fire danger areas are told to leave early if the fire danger is catastrophic, extreme, severe or very high, whether or not there is a fire in the area.
Dr Tolhurst, a senior lecturer in fire ecology and management at Melbourne University's Creswick campus, said this was dangerously simplistic.
''Creswick, where I live, is one of the 52 high fire danger towns. But to expect that everyone in Creswick will evacuate on a day of catastrophic fire danger is ridiculous and unrealistic. It's only good for the looters,'' he said.
Recent research by the Australasian Fire and Emergency Services Authorities Council found that despite the deaths on Black Saturday, about half the people in fire danger areas would still stay home on a code red day.
The finding prompted Premier John Brumby to say that ''too many'' people were still complacent about fire danger.
Dr Tolhurst said this was ''unfair criticism''.
''People in the survey were saying, 'We'll wait until we know that there's a fire in our vicinity,' and that's a reasonable thing to do,'' he said.
The new system relied far too heavily on weather forecasts, and did not take into account vegetation, topography, population, how long since the last fire and the probability of ignition, he said.
''Very little science actually went into it. It really wasn't what the royal commission recommended,'' Dr Tolhurst he said.
He had heard that he was excluded from the meeting because he had a contrary view.
But Professor John Handmer of RMIT University, who was involved in the new rating system, said the focus on catastrophic days was justified because of the huge losses of life and property that occurred on those days.
''On a code red, catastrophic day, people in these towns are well advised to leave unless they've got very good preparations, and have thought about contingencies,'' Professor Handmer said.
Federal Attorney-General Robert McClelland has called a meeting in April to review the fire season and debate any changes to the rating system.
Dr Packham said this was an opportunity to improve the system. But Dr Tolhurst feared that ''once it's in place it's going to be difficult to undo, because of the amount of money they've already spent on promotion''.
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