The British newspaper "Daily Mail" quoted scientists at the University of Sydney as saying that nearly 500 million animals have died due to forest fires since last September, and Reuters confirmed this number in a report in its English version, yesterday, quoting environmental experts, This figure includes mammals, reptiles and birds, as well as hundreds of thousands of displaced and displaced wild animals.
Since the start of the fire season, last September, at least 20 people have been killed, dozens have been lost, 1,400 homes have been destroyed, and five million hectares of land have been burned.
The coastal region of southeast Australia, which was ravaged by forest fires, witnessed some rain and mild weather yesterday morning, but in Canberra, the country's capital, air quality remains at a dangerous level due to smoke from fires in the region.
Public exhibitions, museums, parks, companies and universities in Canberra have been closed, and some flights have been canceled, as air quality in the Australian capital remains the worst in the world, according to the Global Air Quality Database.
The government asked residents to stay in their homes, as the measure of the air quality index in the city center yesterday morning reached 1400, according to the Ministry of Health, and any place where the measurement of the air quality index reaches more than 200 is considered dangerous.
The Department of Home Affairs, which is responsible for coordinating Australia's response to disaster emergencies, has asked staff to stay in their homes for 48 hours due to poor air quality, except for some essential staff who work remotely.
The rain brought some relief to the firefighters, yesterday, but it was not heavy enough to put out big and dangerous fires.
And last Friday, the Australian National Navy evacuated thousands of people trapped in the fire, in the southeastern town of Malakota.
Thousands of tourists and residents left the areas most vulnerable to fires on the 300-km east coast, which resulted in traffic jams on the roads leading to Sydney and Canberra, while military aircraft dumped food in the isolated areas.
The Australian Prime Minister of Victoria, Daniel Andrews, noted that satellite telephones, water supplies and emergency equipment had been dumped.
Communications and internet lines were disrupted in some isolated towns, at the beginning of this week, and the water reached a boiling point, which made it unsuitable for drinking, and tens of thousands fled the most affected areas in southern New South Wales and East Victoria, before the fire conditions worsened.
20
People have been killed since September ... and 1,400 homes have been burned.
5
Millions of hectares of land are on fire.
Legal action
New South Wales police announced yesterday that they have taken legal measures - from warnings to criminal prosecution - against 183 people, including 40 juveniles, in relation to 205 forest fires since last November.
The states of eastern and southern Australia have been suffering from the forest fire crisis for months, and the authorities have said that many of the fires resulted from crimes from saboteurs, some of them at the age of 16, and it was reported that two incidents occurred on Saturday and Sunday in the Koma and Taro regions as a result of attempts to set fire to cooking, While another incident involved the ignition of multiple small fires in Kuntjani, and the rural fire service personnel had to be used to extinguish the fires, the police said that the three defendants would appear in court within the next three months.