keep out the stars, turn out the lights

Guys, the bushfires happening here in Australia are so bad right now, and they’re not getting better. Here is some information so you can know what’s going on and also help. Please reblog and spread the word - we need all the help we can get.

Australia’s East Coast is still suffering horrifically from bushfires. I’m paraphrasing these from the Red Cross website, you can read more here.

NSW - the threat of bushfires remains high in my state. There are several areas that are still in the “catastrophic” rating. A map of the fires burning in New South Wales right now: here.

Tasmania - Thousands of people have been displaced, many losing their homes. There are still people missing, though at this point there are no confirmed deaths.

Victoria - Firefighters are fighting a 7070 ha blaze which is expected to continue for the rest of the week.

South Australia - There are several fires burning in South Australia, and they just went through a really bad heatwave like the rest of the south-east.

If you can, PLEASE DONATE. You can donate via the Red Cross to the Tasmanian Bushfires appeal here, as well as main Disaster Relief & Recovery here. If you don’t have the money, that’s okay - just spread the word! Post this on your facebook pages or just reblog here, and just let people know how they can help. Please.

In addition to all this some beautiful, wonderful people in fandom have organised the qldfloodauction which is similar to the ones organised for Pakistan and Haiti. People are auctioning off fic and art - please head over there if you have the chance and participate/donate.
 

Also, werewolfsfan has pointed me in the direction of fandom_flood_ap which has just been formed and is in the process of getting up and running. I'd just like to copy and paste something from their info page so you can get a better idea of what we're going through right now:


This community has been set up to raise donations for those affected by recent flood disasters in Australia. December 2010 and January 2011 have delivered some of the worst flood events here in recent memory. Those of us in the country watched a national television channel help to raise an impressive amount of money in the space of two hours.

That fundraiser was a day or two before the unprecedented "inland tsunami" hit the mountain town of Toowoomba. It was before the comedy news show The 7pm Project told viewers: "If you live in the Lockyer Valley, get out now. There is a wall of water coming your way." Since that telethon, 75% of the northern state of Queensland (Brisbane) has been declared a natural disaster area. Parts of the state are still watching rivers rise, and some of those towns are suffering their second evacuation in less than two months. It will take months, perhaps years, for Queensland to recover, and the pace of the rrescue and recovery will depend on whether there are any more torrential downpours.

Northern New South Wales (north of Sydney) is being flooded. Fewer people have been evacuated because the towns are smaller. Meanwhile, Western Australia (Perth) has also had floods and an idiot arsonist. The Northern Territory (Darwin) always has torrential downpours but they're looking at a cyclone soon. Victoria (Melbourne), which suffered from those horrendous bushfires two summers ago, has a flash flood warning out. South Australia (Adelaide) and Tasmania (Hobart) are on flood watches and are copping huge amounts of rain.

"It might be breaking our hearts … but it will not break our will"

Queensland Premier, Anna Bligh