Mr Rick McRae
I trained as an ecologist at the University of Sydney. I am recently retired from a career in bushfires and emergency management spanning over three decades, based in Canberra. I worked as a fire management planner and as an arson inverstigator. I worked on a wide range of natural hazard risk assessments, including wildfire, flood, severe storms, landslides, raised dust and heatwaves. I have served on or chaired a number of national emergency management working groups, spanning spatial data, bushfire seasonal outlooks, emergency response, and training.
I am a visiting fellow at ºÚÁÏÍø´óʼÇ. I have specialised in fire behaviour, and served in terchnical specilaist roles on major fires in the ACT, Tasmania, and Canada. After the 2003 Canberra fires I studied fire thunderstorms (pyroCbs) and joined an international science collaboration studying them. I have worked on predictive tools and research dissemination. I have worked on key pyroCb case studies, and, working with Jason Sharples’ Bushfire Research Group in ºÚÁÏÍø´óÊÂ¼Ç Canberra, identified vorticity-driven lateral spread and confirmed pyro-tornadogenesis. I maintain the Australian pyroCb register. My current focus is studying the 2019-2020 Black Summer bushfires.
I work with the bushfire sector on research dissemination. To do this, I have presented numerous talks, workshops and research posters at annual conferences.
- Publications
 - Media
 - Grants
 - Awards
 - Research Activities
 - Engagement
 - Teaching and Supervision
 
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Bushfire Cooperative Research Centre's HighFireRisk Project, 2004-2008.
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GeoInisght program in 2000, a $2 million Technology Diffusion program from Federal Government’s Department of Industry, Science and Resources to facilitate the uptake of spatial data across Australia's emergency managemenbt sector.
 
- Humanitarian Overseas Service Medal (2017 British Columbia wildfires)
 - National Emergency Medal (Black Summer bushfires)
 - ACT Emergency (2003 Bushfires) Medal.
 - National Medal and clasp
 - ACT Emergency Services Agency Long-Service Medal and 2 clasps
 - Finalist, 2013 Eureka Prize.
 - 2020 Canberra Citizen of the Year (member of ACT Emergency Services Agency during Black Summer).
 
- Fire thunderstorms, including caser studies and outbreaks.
 - Predicting blow-up fire events
 - Analysing the context fo the Black Summer wildfires in Queensland, NSW, Victoria, and the ACT.
 - Terrain analysis for bushfire purposes
 - Remote sensing of wildfires
 - Drought measures for bushfire purposes
 - Regeneration of forest flammability after wildfires
 - Vorticity-driven lateral spread