South coast blaze 'unpredictable'

Swirling winds are creating unpredictable conditions for firefighters battling a blaze close to homes at Burrill Lake on the New South Wales south coast.

Authorities haify;">Authorities have confirmed a holiday cottage near Dolphin Point was destroyed by the blaze last night.

Helicopters are waterbombing the fire and crews from surrounding areas have been called in to help protect properties.

Tim Carroll, from the Rural Fire Service (RFS), says strong winds are pushing the fire towards the township of Lake Tabourie, south of Ulladulla.

He says several rural properties are in the path of the fire and if residents choose to leave the area, they should go early.

Mr Carroll says if residents can see smoke and flames, it is probably already too late to leave.

RFS spokesman Matthew Schroder says the wind blowing on the fire ground is averaging about 40 kilometres an hour, with gusts of up to 60 kilometres an hour.

"The fire is still continuing to burn in amongst the properties there so our crews are in there working in behind the homes to ensure those properties are safe," he said.

"There is some wind that is impacting the fire at the moment, so the firefighters are experiencing quite sporadic fire activity as we speak, so they're trying to combat that throughout the day."

The Princes Highway is shut in both directions at Burrill Lake because of the fire.

RFS Assistant Fire Commissioner Rob Rogers says the holiday cottage destroyed last night "couldn't be defended" and the burnt out shell was discovered this morning.

Fingal Bay fire eases

Authorities say a bushfire burning at Fingal Bay, north of Newcastle, no longer poses a threat to properties.

Crews have worked this afternoon to contain a blaze burning through bushland in the Tomaree National Park in the Port Stephens area.

Lower Hunter Superintendent Jason Mckellar says the fire was heading towards properties, but it is now under control.

"What crews have worked on this afternoon is doing a backburn of an... area behind the houses at the back of Fingal Bay," he said.

"[The fire] has burnt out into the national park and met up with the wildfire and taken the intensity out of it.

"Now it will be a process of mopping up and patrolling that area."

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Swat diary: 'Bright future ahead'

Munir (not his real name), an administrator in the Swat region of Pakistan, has returned to his home in Swat three months after his family fled the conflict there. He describes the challenges of daily life with optimism about the future.

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We returned to Swat on 2 August. We were very excited. We were desperate to go to our village, but we were told by other villagers over the phone that people were not allowed to enter the village without a special pass.

Therefore we had to stay near Mingora for two days to obtain such passes before we could return to our home village. More than two feet grass had grown while we were away. Everything seemed to be in its place, nothing was stolen.

See a map of the region

After a few days staying at home I went out for a walk around the village. I found many houses badly damaged in the fighting. Our relatives' houses were among the damaged ones. Electricity wires and phone cables were lying scattered on the ground, although we do have power and our phone is working.

Many houses and shops were plundered. I saw three shops completely emptied. One shopkeeper told me that 200 sacks of rice had been stolen from his shop.

Three or four houses belonging to militants were completely razed to the ground. The army is still coming to our village to destroy houses known to belong to militants.

'Militants defeated'

I saw the hairdresser in my village openly and bravely shaving people. I heard songs in the streets and in the shops for the first time after a long while.

About 80% of the people from our village have returned. Life is getting back to normal, but there are problems.

Many people are without jobs d people are without jobs due to the curfews and people can't move easily inside Swat. Swat is like a jail for us now - there are many checkpoints and curfews are imposed all the time. People are sick of them.

Electric power is another big problem. It is so weak, that we can't switch on the motor to pump water up and we can't turn on the refrigerator to cool things. Power cuts can happen any time.

People are a little bit worried again as several suicide attacks occurred in the last few days. But as a whole, people are happy and satisfied with the operation in the area.

We are very happy with the army: people pat soldiers on the back and give them food and gifts - something that had never happened in the past. The army has regained its popularity. People feel indebted to the army also because it has reduced the price of bread from five to two rupees.

Everyone is pleased to be back home, though most people, including me, are anxious that leaders of the militants still haven't been arrested or killed.

You hear about bodies of militants turning up these days. Many people are of the view that the security forces are behind this.

But regardless of who's responsible, people get really happy when they hear that militants have been killed, because their dear ones were brutally killed by those militants.

I have so many stories of the cruelties happening in our lands. I hope I will write them down one day.

I am myself very happy of the way things have turned up. I am optimistic about the future because I see that the militants have been defeated.

They can't hold such a powerful position here again. Swat has a bright future because its people have learnt the importance of peace and education. They have become united.

I am now thinking about my wedding, which will take place soon after the Eid, before October.

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Cosgrove honoured amid E Timor celebrations

Retired General Peter Cosgrove has been presented with one of East Timor's highest honours at a ceremony celebrating the country's 10 years of independence.

Galign: justify;">General Cosgrove has been presented with the collar of the Order of East Timor by the country's President, Jose Ramos-Horta.

General Cosgrove was the head of the Australian-led multinational peacekeeping mission which arrived in East Timor after the vote for independence in 1999.

He says he is receiving the award on behalf of all those involved in the mission in East Timor.

Earlier today, Dr Ramos-Horta thanked Australia for its support and friendship.

Australia's Governor General, Quentin Bryce, has also presented Dr Ramos-Horta with three corrugated iron kangaroo sculptures which are now at the front of the President's palace.

Earlier, Dr Ramos-Horta restated that there would be no international tribunal to bring people responsible for human rights abuses in East Timor to justice.

He said he respected those calling for an international tribunal, but he said one would not be set up.

He called on the United Nations to disband its serious crimes unit, which is gathering evidence on those responsible for the violence in East Timor.

Indonesia's foreign minister, Hassan Wirajuda, attended the ceremony in Dili this morning.

Dr Ramos-Horta said he was confident Indonesia would bring people to justice in its own time.

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Adopted teen finds answers, mystery in China

By Barbara Demick
Christian Norris of Easton, Md., remembers little of his pre-U.S. life. A reunion at a Beijing hotel helps fill in some of the gaps. Reporting from Beijing - The father fell to his knees, weeping. The mother quietly buried her face in her hands. The 17-year-old boy stood upright and motionless -- whether out of shock or stoicism, no one knew.

Christian Norris, who had just returned to China for the first time since he was adopted by an American eight years ago, didn't know what to think.

The interpreter stood quietly on the sidelines waiting for what seemed an eternity, the only sounds were the sobs and the clicking of cameras that filled the room.

"Honey, are you OK?" Christian's adoptive mother, Julia Norris, finally asked. He nodded affirmatively, but said nothing.

The reunion between Christian, a high school student in Easton, Md., and his birth parents took place Saturday in a Beijing hotel room crowded with well-wishers and media on hand to witness the virtually unprecedented event.

Since the early 1990s, an estimated 75,000 Chinese-born children have been adopted abroad, and although they increasingly visit China on heritage tours, Christian is one of only a few who have managed to chase down their personal history.

"I'm not sure yet," Christian answered with a teenage boy's characteristic reticence when asked what he hoped would come of the reunion. "I want to move on."

Christian's case is unusual in several respects: He's male, whereas most adoptees are girls abandoned because of the Chinese preference for boys and the government's "one child" policy. And unlike most adoptees, who are given up as babies, he lived with his family until he was nearly 7, leaving him with fragmentary memories that became vital clues in the search.

His birth parents were medical researchers, better educated than most who give up their children, and it was possible to track them down on the Internet.

It also helped that his U.S. mother, who works for an adoption agency, is both a firm believer in open adoptions and a tenacious investigator who once worked for the television show "America's Most Wanted."

Julia Norris was able to enlist an army of volunteers through a Chinese nonprofit called Baby Come Home, which helps Chinese parents search for lost children.

"This is the first case we've handled where an adopted child came back to find birth parents, but I expect it is going to happen more often," said Yang Guan, one of the agency's founders. "I hope that China can move to a more transparent system where orphanages are more able to make information available."

Like many families, Christian's had its secrets and silences.

He was born Jin Jiacheng in 1991 in Yinchuan, a city in the Ningxia region several hundred miles west of Beijing, to a couple who both worked in a hospital and already had a son. Because his parents could have been penalized for having a second child, he was sent as a newborn to his father's home village to be raised by his grandmother and a 23-year-old uncle, who pretended the infant was his own son. When he turned 6 and was ready to start school, they sent him back to the city.

He had lived only briefly with his birth parents when he somehow got lost, his family says. His father, Jin Gaoke, said that they were on an excursion by bus and that he got off for a few minutes to buy food at a market, returning to discover that the bus had driven off.

"I hope you can forgive our mistakes," the father mumbled repeatedly during the reunion.

The family was wrenched apart by the boy's absence. His mother went into a deep depression. His father and uncle stopped speaking to each other, the younger one blaming the father for losing the child.

"He was like my son. I felt so bad when he was lost, I would drink liquor to take away the sadness," said his uncle, Jin Xiaowang, now 40 and still farming wheat, potatoes and corn at the village home.

Jiacheng somehow ended up 350 miles to the east in Henan province, where he was found wandering under a bridge and brought to an orphanage in the city of Luoyang.

In 2000, Julia Norris was 2000, Julia Norris was touring the orphanage on a business trip when she met the boy and fell in love. She returned the following year to adopt him, becoming a single mother. Three years after that, she adopted a Chinese girl as well. Christian Norris of Easton, Md., remembers little of his pre-U.S. life. A reunion at a Beijing hotel helps fill in some of the gaps. Growing up, Christian was frustrated by the fragmentary nature of his memories. He could remember only a house in the country, mountains in the distance, grazing yaks, a few names. How he had gotten lost had been erased from his memory, perhaps by the trauma of it all; he remembers only a man buying him food and giving him money.

"I thought they abandoned me. It didn't feel good," Christian said.

Julia Norris decided to pursue Christian's origins because she worried he would be tormented for life by nagging questions.

"He needed the peace of mind of knowing what happened," she said.

She worries that many Chinese adoptees, now young children, will eventually be asking questions that will be almost impossible to answer. Adoptees usually have no information except the date and place they were found.

Norris' daughter, now 6, keeps asking, "Mommy, can I find out who my birth parents are too?" Norris said. "I can't make her any promises. She was found on the day she was born."

For Christian, the memories aren't exactly flooding back, but bits and pieces are starting to make sense. He can't remember a word of Chinese or his birth parents, but he recognized his grandmother and the uncle who raised him. At the reunion, his Chinese family gave him a bag with his favorite candy as a young child and an abacus -- on which he had been learning to count before he disappeared.

"This I remember," he said, fingering the beads -- one of the few times he smiled.

His Chinese family seems just as eager to understand the life that Christian has led in the United States. They pored over a photo album the American family brought: Christian posing with a surfboard. With a Halloween jack-o'-lantern. With his sister in front of the Christmas tree.

They marveled over the strapping American teenager Christian has become. A handsome, athletic boy, at 5 foot 8 he towers over all of his Chinese relatives.

"He's so big," his uncle exclaimed. "And he has hairy legs. Just like an American."

Christian and his mother, along with an aunt and uncle, will travel this week to Ningxia to visit his birthplace. Then he will return to start classes at Easton High School.

His birth parents say they are thrilled to see him, but do not expect him to move back.

"Jiacheng's roots are in China, but his future is in the United States," his father said. "It is clear that he has been well cared for and has a bright future in America."

His birth mother, Shao Julian, added quietly, "We hope to stay in touch with him, but we wouldn't try to force him to come back to China -- we wouldn't want to hurt him twice."

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10,000 homes are threatened

Homeowners Jack and Debra Carr feel relief after hearing word from a U.S. Forest Service employee that their home in Big Tujunga Canyon is safe on Saturday night. (Christina House / For The Times / August 29or The Times / August 29, 2009)

Across the burning foothills, 1,000 are ordered to flee. Others watch, and dread the phone call to evacuate.
The unstoppable Angeles National Forest fire threatened 10,000 homes Saturday night as it more than tripled in size and chewed through a rapidly widening swath of the Crescenta Valley, where flames closed in on backyards and at least 1,000 homes were ordered evacuated.

Sending an ominous plume of smoke above the Los Angeles Basin, the fire was fueled by unrelenting hot weather and dense brush that has not burned in 60 years.

It took off Saturday afternoon in all directions, forcing residents out of homes from Big Tujunga Canyon to Pasadena, and reached toward Mt. Wilson.

Heavy smoke clung to the mountains and created a hot and massive convection column that limited the evening aerial fire fight.

Officials predicted that the blaze would continue its march toward homes and across hills through the night with flames that could reach as high as 80 feet.

Late Saturday, U.S. Forest Service officials said they were moving "several hundred firefighters" into the Acton area, where they expected the fire to reach this morning.

At midnight, crews were on alert for a wind shift.

The fire was headed toward Yerba Buena and Santa Clara ridges. El Dorado County Fire Capt. Larry Marinas said it was currently "probably bumping" against them, but all he could say for sure was that flames could reach those ridges "in 12 hours."

Forest Service officials said three civilians were burned and airlifted from rural Big Tujunga Canyon, where at least three to five homes were destroyed. One fire official, after surveying the canyon, estimated that the damage toll may be much worse.

No other homes had been lost by early evening as throngs of residents -- belongings loaded in cars -- descended from the hills.

"I wish I had good news for you," Les Curtis, a fire operations chief, said during a night briefing for firefighters. He shook his head and pointed to the map of the expanding fire zone. "How many of you have knots in your stomach?" he asked. More than a dozen raised their hands.

"Nothing can stop it," said Jost Vielmetter, 62, a Caltech scientist who watched the flames from the northern edge of Altadena.

By late Saturday afternoon, the fire had consumed more than 21,000 acres, propelled by temperatures that eclipsed 100 degrees, single-digit humidity and steep, rugged topography that made for a formidable foe despite low winds.

Firefighters can only expect a slight reprieve on the heat today as red-flag warnings extend until tonight. But more significant cooling and even a moist maroling and even a moist marine layer are expected Monday morning.

Fire officials estimate that about 10,000 homes are in danger if the fire continues burning unchecked.

At sundown, as scattered power outages hit the area, flames encircled the ridges near Briggs Terrace on the northeastern edge of La Crescenta. By 7:30 p.m., the northern end of Pickens Canyon, close to the neighborhood, exploded in flames.

"Oh, my God. This is what I've been dreading all day," said David Ferrera, 35, who grew up in the area.

It was the first time that he and his neighbors were seized with worry. At that point, clouds of glowing embers began floating up from the fire. Suddenly, so-called hotshots -- firefighters with shovels and axes -- rushed by on their way to battle.

Later, a wall of fire crept like lava along the mountainside toward Pickens Canyon homes. A tree would light up in a column of fire every few moments. On the streets, the air was still and quiet except for the crackle and roar of flames.

Firefighters climbed through backyards at the ends of the cul-de-sacs fronting the forest, laying their hoses and waiting to make a stand.
Across the burning foothills, 1,000 are ordered to 2C 1,000 are ordered to flee. Others watch, and dread the phone call to evacuate.
Capt. Kevin Klar of the Los Angeles County Fire Department was in place on Bristow Drive. "As far as the area goes, I think we're going to be all right," he said.

More than 1,800 firefighters from throughout California and the West used an arsenal of weapons to fight the flames.

Ten helicopters dropping buckets of water and eight air tankers were enlisted in the daytime fight.

Officials also are deploying at least one DC-10, one of the largest and most expensive pieces of firefighting equipment in the world.

Elsewhere, firefighters were on the verge of containing the Morris fire north of Azusa and a separate blaze on the Palos Verdes Peninsula. Firefighters also made progress on a fire near Hemet in the San Bernardino National Forest, which has burned nearly 2,300 acres and was 30% contained.

As flames bore down on canyon cul-de-sacs in the Crescenta Valley into the evening, residents watched raptly as firefighters -- in the air and on the ground -- valiantly kept the fire away from homes.

On the northern edge of Altadena, a DC-10 unloading fire retardant at the base of a column of smoke received a standing ovation from residents in the 3900 block of Chapman Court, which had been under mandatory evacuation orders for an hour.

Among them was physician John Cooper, 52.

"I think the firefighters are doing an incredible job. I'm in awe. I'd like to line them all up and shake their hands one at a time -- and we also have our fingers crossed," Cooper said, acknowledging the precarious nature of his address. "Live on the edge, and you take your chances."

Evacuated residents could only wait, watch and worry as flames licked the ridges near their homes. Some La Cañada Flintridge residents were evacuated Friday night, but on Saturday that mandatory evacuation order widened to parts of Altadena, La Crescenta, north Glendale and Big Tujunga Canyon. More evacuations were expected throughout the night.

All faced the same nerve-racking drill: the automated phone calls ordering them to leave, the choices about what to pack up, the negotiations with skittish pets refusing to be stuffed into portable kennels.

In Glendale, in the evacuation area north of Santa Carlotta Road, residents were packing up their cars and watering their lawns after being notified to leave.

Joanna Linkchorst, 42, dashed around her house videotaping her belongings, but appeared possessed of a preternatural calm. "For some reason I'm not concerned," she said. "There are far too many houses that would have to burn before it gets down here."

Although authorities stressed that people should not defy evacuation orders -- it puts them as well as fire and police personnel at risk -- some did anyway.

In Pickens Canyon, firefighter hotshots had taken up positions in front of about a dozen homes beneath the oak canopy. Every few minutes, patrol cars cruised by, urging holdouts to leave.

At 8:30 p.m., a law enforcement officer asked Bob Jamison and Gary Ireland, who were sprawled on lawn chairs watching the fire, to collect their belongings and leave the area.

"Everything's under control here," Jamison responded. "We got all the women, pets and important papers down the mountain."

Jay Porter, 47, and his two teenage sons stood on an Altadena ridgeline overlooking tinder-dry Millard Canyon as flames advanced to within 1,000 feet of his two-story Spanish-style home.

"I want to know what's going on here for as long as I possibly can," said Porter, who wasn't budging early Saturday evening. "Right now, I have more information than a lot of my neighbors."

He said, however, that he would relent overnight. He made reservations at a nearby Westin hotel that he said was offering "refugee specials" for evacuees -- in his case, that includes two dogs and a cockatiel.
Across the burning foothills, 1,000 are ordered to flee. Others watch, and dread the phone call to evacuate.
He watched as earthmovers in the distance rumbled over the ridge, toppling flammable chaparral and small trees in their paths. "Makes me happy," he said.

Ray Henmann, a 76-year-old graphic designer from Glendale whose home on Brookhill Street is in the evacuation area, said he had no plans to leave his home of 48 years.

The fire, he said, would have to come within a few streets of his home before he fled. "I'm not going to panic, I've lived too long to panic," Henmann said.

Across the region, there was no escaping the specter of what has been dubbed the Station fire. An ominous cloud of smoke wafted across the area and rose as high as 20,000 feet in the air, visible from the ocean and the San Fernando Valley, even the Antelope Valley. Otherwise fire-savvy Los Angeles residents were so startled by the sight that they inundated 911 emergency lines with calls about smoke. Authorities begged people to stop calling.

Donna Robinson, 60, of La Cañada Flintridge had been preparing to be evacuated since Wednesday, packing up documents, clothes and baby dish mementos of her adult children. She also packed up two dogs and three cats.

"I'm not even afraid now. I think it's good we're just out of the house. Now I feel it's not under my control," Robinson said Saturday morning as she sat with her husband, Paul, 57, outside the gym at La Cañada High, the evacuation center.

Others couldn't escape the worry. It showed on Sonia Castellon's face as she made her way into the evacuation center. "I was trying to keep calm, keep it together. But the moment you leave your home it's hard," the 46-year-old dentist said as she began to tear up.

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