Fallen Vic firefighter was 30-year veteran

HIGHLY experienced and passionate about firefighting, Victorian firefighter Peter Cramer died doing what he'd devoted half his life to.

The 61-year-old, from Tyers in Victoria's Gippsland region, was one of more than 70 Victorian emergency services workers sent to Tasmania on Thursday to help fight the state's devastating fires, which have destroyed more than 130 homes since January 4.

Mr Cramer died on Sunday at Taranna, east of Hobart, while working on foot to identify potential containment lines on the southern boundary of the Forcett fire, about 2-3 kilometres from the active fire edge.

He was to have returned home on Tuesday, but was found dead at 5pm (AEDT) on a bush track after he failed to make a scheduled call-in.

Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment (DSE) chief fire officer Alan Goodwin said Mr Cramer had been a DSE firefighter for more than 30 years and a CFA volunteer for more than two decades.

A well respected firefighter, he was a DSE training co-ordinator who also volunteered his time to train CFA volunteers.

"As training co-ordinator he loved teaching and passing on his knowledge and had a passion for fire and land management," Mr Goodwin told reporters in Melbourne on Monday.

His wife Julie and family remembered him as a "tremendous husband, father, brother and mate" who loved helping people.

"We knew that firefighters were his second family," a family statement said.

"Peter truly believed his work made a difference to the community. He was a truly dedicated firefighter."

They also remembered a man with a great sense of humour and larrikin charm who was known for his cheeky smile and kind words.

Mr Goodwin first met Mr Cramer on a deployment to the US in 2003, which his family said was a career highlight.

"He was always fun, he greeted you with a smile and a solid handshake, and that's how I will remember him," Mr Goodwin said, echoing the family's sentiments.

Mr Goodwin said the cause of death was unknown and Mr Cramer had recently passed a fitness test.

"Certainly all our firefighters that we send away, all our firefighters go through our fit-for-fire program, through medical testing and so forth, and Peter was certainly part of that," he said.

David Hamilton, president of the United Firefighters Union Victorian branch, said Mr Cramer's death highlighted the strenuous conditions and mental and physical demands placed on firefighters.

"These things can always be done better, and if, unfortunately, these high dangers and situations are occurring, I think the agencies and government probably should look at managing it better or increasing firefighter numbers," Mr Hamilton said.

Fire Services Commissioner Craig Lapsley said losing a firefighter came as a shock.

"To lose someone in active duty is something you don't plan for," he said.

"We take our caps off to what Peter has done in three decades of service to Victoria through firefighting."

A CFA spokesman said Mr Cramer was well known and well regarded in the Gippsland region and his colleagues at Swifts Creek and Tyers, where he was a member, were devastated by the news.

Mr Cramer would volunteer his time to work with "dozens and dozens and dozens" of new recruits, he said.

"He was a pretty remarkable person," the spokesman said.

The Tasmanian and Victorian premiers have sent their condolences to his family.

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Kimberley the place to be in 2013

WESTERN Australia's remote Kimberley has been recommended by the New York Times as one of the best places on the globe to visit.

And while one of the world's great newspapers has raised fears about the industrialisation of the vast area, WA Premier Colin Barnett says they're unfounded.

In the Times' list of The 46 Places to Go in 2013, the Kimberley region was cited as finally being open to the travellers "willing to trade big bucks for land-based access to some spectacular spots".

Naming The Berkeley River Lodge, Kuri Bay, and El Questro as potential spots for the adventurous, the paper also warned visitors "the region was loaded with iron, and mining companies will continue to go after it".

Woodside's Browse joint venture project, which controversially proposes bringing gas and condensate onshore for processing at a planned gas hub at James Price Point, 60km north of Broome, is the major proposed industrial development in the area.

But Mr Barnett says despite vocal opposition, the vast landscape still remains largely untouched.

"I think people are discovering the Kimberley and it is one of the world's great wilderness areas," he said on Monday.

"The Kimberley is twice the size of the state of Victoria. It is a vast area, and this government has created four new marine parks, one new major terrestrial park and also spent around $60 million on conversation protection.

"There has been a lot of debate about James Price Point. I understand that and I respect people's point of view.

"But that is a tiny area of the Kimberley - if the Kimberley was the MCG then James Price Point would be one seat."

BHP Billiton exited the controversial $30 billion Browse LNG project late last year, while legal action has been launched over the environmental approval process surrounding the project.

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Climate change talk 'convenient': Newman

Qld premier Campbell Newman (R) says it's "convenient" to blame climate change for the bushfires. Source: AAP

THE Queensland premier says it's "very convenient" to blame climate change for conditions that have always occurred in Australia.

Campbell Newman made the comment after federal Nationals Leader Warren Truss said it was "utterly simplistic" to draw a link between climate change and Australia's recent heatwave and bushfire crisis.

But last week, the federal government's Climate Commission said the heatwave and bushfires had been exacerbated by global warming.

On Monday, Mr Newman was asked if he believed there was a link between the bushfires, the heatwave and climate change.

"It's very convenient to blame things that have happened in this country for millennia on climate change," he replied.

He quoted poet Dorothea Mackellar's poem My Country.

"Remember 'I love a sunburnt country' ... it talks about 'flooding rains, fires' and all those sorts of things. Nothing new.

"Any such comments are still open to question.

"I believe we can leave to the experts to make the debate about whether that's the case."

Mr Newman on Monday said the Queensland government would give $200,000 to the Red Cross Tasmanian Bushfire Appeal fund.

Mr Newman spent some of his childhood in Tasmania.

The Australian Conservation Foundation hit out at Mr Newman's comments, saying the judgments should be "left to the experts".

"The Climate Commission says climate change is making heatwaves more frequent and making it more likely they will stay for longer," spokesman Tony Mohr said in a statement. "The same body of climate experts expects extreme fire danger days to rise more than 15 per cent in most of eastern Australia."

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Observatory fire threat a 'deja vu' moment

THE fire threat at Siding Spring Observatory in NSW was a case of deja vu for Australian National University (ANU) professor John Morris.

Nearly a decade ago Prof Morris was acting as director of the Australian National University's astronomy and astrophysics research school when the university's Mount Stromlo Observatory (MSO) fell victim to Canberra's firestorm.

He was acting in the same role on Sunday when he learned fires were heading for Siding Spring Observatory in NSW.

It was "deja vu", he told reporters in Canberra on Monday.

The Siding Spring Observatory was officially opened in 1964 because urban light pollution was making stargazing more difficult at the Mount Stromlo facility in Canberra.

It has since become Australia's premier facility for optical and infrared astrophysics observations, where observing international astronomers come to stay.

Dr Amanda Bauer, a Super Science Fellow at the Australian Astronomical Observatory (AAO), said it housed one of the world's most innovative and productive telescopes.

Sitting atop a 1164m hill, the four-metre telescope - maintained and operated by AAO - gives astronomers a look at the magnificent sights space has to offer, including the Southern Cross and the Milky Way.

"The view of the southern hemisphere night sky is the most spectacular anywhere that I have seen it," Dr Bauer told AAP on Monday.

Technology developed there included a robotic optical-fibre positioning system, which is now being used in Chile, she said.

According to ANU the observatory has witnessed a number of major discoveries.

In the early 2000s, the four-metre Anglo-Australian Telescope (AAT) completed a survey of more than 200,000 galaxies.

By measuring their distance the survey was able to confirm the existence of dark energy, which led ultimately to the 2011 Nobel Prize for Physics being awarded in part to ANU professor Brian Schmidt.

Prof Morris said the AAT was the site's major research instrument, but the Skymapper built after the 2003 Mount Stromlo fire was now providing important information to researchers.

There are also six or seven client telescopes at the site.

"We're interested obviously in the way in which the universe operates," Prof Morris told reporters.

"It's probably no exaggeration to say that the suite of telescopes at Siding Spring played a role in Brian Schmidt, our Nobel laureate, deciding to come and work in Australia.

"He spent a lot of time at Siding Spring and he's been watching what's been going on with great interest."

Schmidt was tweeting about the fire's movements and tweeting pictures of the devastation provided by the Rural Fire Service.

"The observatory seems to have largely survived, which is good news for a change, but many lost their homes," he tweeted on Monday.

Much been learnt from the telescopes at the site about individual galaxies, including the Milky Way and its stars.

Prof Morris said researchers tune their ideas using the Siding Spring telescopes, making hypotheses before using telescopes in Chile and Hawaii to test their theories.

In August 2007, during "routine observations" at the observatory, ANU astronomer Robert McNaught discovered a 10km-wide comet.

"It was the brightest comet in more than 40 years and was easily visible to the naked eye for observers in the southern hemisphere," ANU said in a statement.

Dr Bauer said work had been done at Siding Spring Observatory over the past decade to make it fire-ready, following the 2003 firestorm that engulfed Mt Stromlo in Canberra, completely destroying five of its historic optical telescopes.

The damage was so bad, authorities considered abandoning the Mount Stromlo site.

There are no longer working research telescopes at MSO - but it houses an advanced instrumentation technology centre.

ANU's acting director of facilities and services Wayne Ford said the Siding Spring Observatory was always going to be a bushfire risk.

"It borders a national park and it's heavily forested ... it's actually located on a mountain and fires like going up mountains," Ford said.

The devastation at Mount Stromlo provided many lessons.

A concerted effort had been made to improve fire trails near Siding Spring and to clear surrounding bush to protect it in the event of a bushfire.

"It's difficult land to do anything further than what we did, and we think our preparation was excellent," Ford said.

Prof Morris said it could take some time before the impact of the extreme heat and embers on the telescopes was assessed.

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Qld child protection inquiry resumes

The Queensland Child Protection Commission of Inquiry is set to hold hearings this week. Source: AAP

QUEENSLAND'S child protection inquiry will examine the over-representation of young Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islanders in the state's child protection system this week.

The Queensland Child Protection Commission of Inquiry, headed by former Family Court judge Tim Carmody SC, held its first round of hearings in July 2012.

It is reviewing the adequacy of government responses to allegations of historical abuse in youth detention centres and will make recommendations to reform the system.

The Brisbane hearing has called on nine witnesses, including indigenous elders, parents, academics and representatives from service and legal providers, to give evidence.

Witnesses have already told the inquiry Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander children are nine times more likely than other children to be subject to a protection order or an out of home care order in Queensland.

The proceedings will open in the Brisbane Magistrates Court at 10am (AEST) on Monday and be streamed live on the inquiry's website.

The 10-month inquiry has already held hearings in Brisbane, Ipswich, Rockhampton, Mount Isa, Beenleigh, Townsville, Cairns and Aurukun.

It will hand down recommendations on April 30.

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Six arrested in new India bus rape

Six men have been held over the rape of a passenger on a coach in northern India, police say. Source: AAP

SIX men have been arrested over the rape of a passenger on a coach in India, police say, weeks after the gang-rape and murder of a student on a bus in New Delhi sparked nationwide protests.

The victim had boarded the service to her in-laws' home in the northern state of Punjab when she was abducted and driven to a house in a district bordering the city of Amritsar, local police officer Raj Jeet Singh said on Sunday.

Five men joined the driver and conductor and took turns to rape the victim before dropping her off near her in-laws' village on Saturday morning, he said.

"Six men have been arrested on allegations of having raped a 29-year-old woman ... after forcibly taking her to an unknown location on the night of January 11," the policeman told AFP, adding that a seventh suspect was being hunted.

The attack echoes the December 16 gang-rape and murder of a 23-year-old student in Delhi, with five men on trial in the case, which has fuelled anger across India over the treatment of women.

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Japan extends sympathies over bushfires

JAPAN'S Foreign Minister Fumio Kishida has expressed his country's sympathies to Australia over the recent bushfires.

Mr Kishida arrived in Sydney on Sunday as part of his first overseas trip since the new government of Prime Minister Shinzo Abe took office late last month.

He told reporters after meeting Foreign Minister Bob Carr that he expressed his "heartfelt sympathy" to those affected by the recent bushfires.

"I'm reminded once again of the feelings of appreciation to the friendship and support extended to Japan by the Australian people at the time of the great East Japan earthquake," he said.

"On that basis I would like to express my heartfelt sympathy on behalf of the people of Japan and the Japanese government for the people who have been affected by the bushfires."

Senator Carr said Australia and Japan had a history of thinking of one another when disasters struck.

He thanked Mr Kishida and his visiting team for visiting Japan so early in his country's new administration.

"I thanked them as well for the language used by Prime Minister Abe when he said in announcing the importance of this part of the world that Japan sees the need to co-operate with Asian countries like Australia," he said.

"That's how we like to be described following the the Australia in the Asian Century white paper."

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Tas fire crews dig in ahead of Thursday

Police are planning to reopen the Arthur Highway on the bushfire-ravaged Tasman Peninsular. Source: AAP

TASMANIAN fire crews have made solid progress on consolidating containment lines around bushfires still burning ahead of higher fire danger conditions forecast for Thursday.

Tasmania Fire Service spokeswoman Shannon Fox said the watch and act message for the uncontained 24,040-hectare blaze at Forcett would be reviewed later on Sunday.

Firefighters had been strengthening containment lines around Bream Creek and Marion Bay and also at Lagoon Bay, but had to eventually pull out due to increased winds, she said.

"In Taranna, we've got a good, strong containment line in but we're working on looking after some hot spots that are within the already burnt out areas," she told AAP.

"What we are really trying to do is be prepared for Thursday when we expect fire danger ratings to increase again."

At Lake Repulse, fire crews consolidated containment lines to the south of Brown Mountain and New Zealand firefighters worked on containment lines at the Broad River Valley, Ms Fox said.

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Bipartisan support needed to boost dole

CONCERN from all sides of politics about the low dole allowance should spur action to increasing the entitlement payment, a key welfare lobby group says.

The government has begun modelling several measures to help people who are receiving the Newstart Allowance, such as single mums, the Weekend Australian reported on Saturday.

It reports that cabinet ministers, including transport minister Anthony Albanese, resources minister Martin Ferguson and human services minister Kim Carr are sympathetic to the push for an increase to the dole.

The Australian Council of Social Service (ACOSS) said politicians from all sides have recognised recently that the $35 a day Newstart payment was too low to live on.

"Now we need our federal leaders to come together and convert this concern into action," acting ACOSS chief executive Tessa Boyd-Caine said in a statement on Saturday.

One option being considered would allow such recipients to keep more of their payment if they worked extra hours.

Another possible change would lead to an increase in the amount from the current $35 a day payment.

Dr Tessa Boyd-Caine said these measures by themselves would not address those on the dole who were living in poverty and were expected to find a job.

"A $50 a week increase to the single payment rate is urgently needed to address this," she said.

She said ACOSS had calculated the Newstart payment remained $74 below the poverty line, so the $50 increase would help but not by enough.

The Australian Greens have said they would introduce legislation when parliament resumed on February 5 to increase the dole payment by $50 a week.

On Friday, Community Services Minister Jenny Macklin apologised for earlier remarks in which she indicated she could live on the dole.

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US man has been found years being abducted

A boy who was abducted 19 years ago has been found living in Minnesota under a different name. Source: AAP

A MAN who was abducted his paternal grandparents 19 years ago when he was five years old has been found living in Minnesota under a different name.

Richard Wayne Landers Jr was five years old when he and his grandparents, who were upset over custody arrangements, disappeared from the town of Wolcottville.

Indiana State Police say the now 24-year-old Landers was found in Long Prairie, Minnesota, thanks in part to his Social Security identification number.

His grandparents were living under aliases in a nearby town and confirmed his identity, investigators said. Police declined to say whether the couple would face charges, citing the ongoing investigation.

Landers' mother, Lisa Harter, screamed and was "jumping up and down for joy" when she learned a few days ago that her son had been found, her husband Richard Harter told The Associated Press in a telephone interview on Thursday. He said his wife is "the happiest woman on earth".

Harter said he and his wife were working with an attorney and hoped to reunite with his stepson soon. Police said Landers is married and expecting his first child.

Harter declined further comment and referred questions about the case to his attorney, who didn't immediately return phone messages on Thursday. Investigators declined to release the names under which Landers and his grandparents had been living.

Police said the boy's paternal grandparents, Richard and Ruth Landers, abducted him in July 1994 because they were "upset over pending court proceedings" regarding his placement.

Police said it appears the boy's father was never in the picture. Lisa and Richard Harter had married a year earlier.

Authorities believe the grandparents took the boy from their home in Wolcottville and fled. They were charged at the time with misdemeanour interference with custody, which was bumped up to a felony in 1999. But the charge was dismissed in 2008 after the case went cold.

Investigators reopened the case in September when Richard Harter turned over the boy's Social Security card to an Indiana State Police detective.

That turned up a man with the same Social Security number and date of birth living in Long Prairie, Minnesota. A driver's licence photo for the man appeared to resemble Landers, police said.

The grandparents were found living under aliases in nearby Browerville, Minnesota, and verified the Minnesota man was Landers.

"By all accounts, it didn't appear he suffered from any abuse, either physical or mental," Galaviz said.

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