In the immediate days following the February 2009 bushfires in Victoria, Australia, the messageboards on news sites were alight with comments. Most of the messages were ones of sympathetic horror of what had happened, and offered support. One particular post stood out to me. It was a person, from the United States, in a fire prone area, who set out in detail why what had happened in Victoria could not possibly happen to her. They had plans, and they had proper building codes; the list went on. Needless to say people jumped on her for her lack of sympathy, and ill-timed post. What they ignored was the underlying denial: "It couldn't possibly happen here."

We like to think that we are immune to tragedy. If we look the other way while making the proper plans, then we'll be okay. We could go a lifetime without being touched by this kind of tragedy up close. It could happen tomorrow given the "ideal" weather conditions. The normal can become abnormal very fast.

We all live with danger to a certain extent. The Earth moves and changes with the seasons, and under our feet. Extreme weather happens. You can prepare to an extent, but under some conditions you have to ride it out. It has happened in the past and it could happen tomorrow. Some of these events will and have become folklore, while other extreme weather events fade into history, and forgotten, so are the lessons from them.

In April 1815 the volcano of Tambora erupted in Indonesia, throwing a massive 100 square kilometres of debris into the atmosphere. The result was a volcanic winter in the year 1816. Europe was recovering from the end of the Napoleonic wars and in Northern America the war of 1812 was not a too distant memory. It seemed that with peace there would once again be prosperity. It wasn't to be the case.

The winter before had been unusually cold, and did not seem to break. Crops were killed off in May 1816 in Northwest America, and in Canada there were snowstorms in June. Famine spread across Britain, and people were on the move, trying to find food where they could.

Nowhere were the effects felt more than in Switzerland, which had a short growing season to begin with. In the alps it rained constantly, turning fields into a muddy mess, killing the majority of crops. Eyewitness accounts paint a horrible picture of farmers and their families being forced to eat grass to survive. Peasants moved to the towns desperately looking for work or food - grain prices had risen to the extent that they were out of the reach of most of the population.

Mary Shelley, who was staying in Switzerland with friends, was forced to stay inside because of the constant rain.. She and her friend John William Polidion competed with one another to write the scariest story. The result was Frankenstein and The Vampyre, which would be one of the inspirations for Dracula. In Britain, William Turner was said to have been influenced by the lurid sunsets of 1816 for many of his later works.

The cold, wet summer, meant many people starved. It was a famine beyond measure, caused by a volcanic eruption half way across the world. The people of Europe and North America could not have seen it coming, and would have been hard-pressed to prepare. Needless to say, without being too dramatic about it, an eruption like Tambora could happen again with the same effects.

In 1979 a storm crashed into the Fastnet fleet as they raced toward Fastnet Rock. The storm was vicious, much more so than the forecasters had ever expected. The fleet were totally unprepared for what hit them. Yachts were dismasted, as well as sunk and crews went into their life rafts, only to die as the storm tossed them about.

This may seem like a strange storm to talk about. Most life is lost on land when extreme weather hits. The implications of this storm, though, fit right in with the theme. You see the reason this was extreme was simple: this storm, on its way over from the plains of the US where it started, had channelled into the upper atmosphere, dragging down dry air and intensifying the storm to a stunning degree. To say this is a rare event is an understatement.

When this happened the storm broke up; its pieces crashed against one another chopping up the seas, which caused many of the deaths. If a storm of this nature were to hit land it would do so with the intensity of a hurricane. Most likely, this would be in an area where the houses were not built to withstand those types of wind forces.

Fastnet was a lesson to all concerned, and changes were made to the way the race was run as a result of this storm. Hopefully it will not happen again. The scary thing is that it just might,

Ice storms are not unusual weather in themselves. In Canada the majority of the population who live in snowbound areas are used to them. They know how to cope, and Canadians are sensible people who know how to plan for the eventuality.

An ice storm will usually last a couple of hours, and leave a thin layer of extremely hard ice over any surface that the supercooled rain hits. The 1998 ice storm was different. Instead of part of a day, there were several storms over a period of three weeks. That thin layer of ice developed into a thick layer of ice, centimetres thick. Large branches fell off trees, streets were impassable, and even more devastating, power was cut to a large proportion of the population as the large steel power poles literally crumpled under the weight of the ice. This meant no heating in houses, and hospitals on emergency generators.

A large proportion of Eastern Canada ground to a halt. There had never been a storm like this one in recorded history, and the modern infrastructure simply could not cope with the ice. Needless to say, this was hopefully a one-off event.

Late January brought scorching temperatures to Southern Australia. After a week where temperatures did not fall below 40C the infrastructure of Victoria was beginning to feel the heat. There were rolling blackouts as the power system could not cope with the demands on it; the public transport system in Melbourne was feeling the strain as rail lines buckled. Even at the Australia Open Tennis Serena Williams told reporters that while being on centre court playing, she felt like she was having an out of body experience due to the heat.

Reports started coming in of wildlife, usually shy of humans, coming up to houses in search of water and even approaching bike riders, such as the koala pictured on the side. Even worse, the coroner in Melbourne was reporting record deaths, especially among the elderly: those least equipped to deal with the heat. There was no more room in Melbourne's main mortuary, and local morticians were being asked to take up the overflow.

And still the heat persisted, parching areas that were already tinder dry. The scene was set for a disaster. The 7th of February was the hottest day in Melbourne since records had began in 1855, at a blistering 46.4C, and there were already fires burning in Victoria.

Fire authorities have an index for fire danger. The various factors should give them a figure within a range with the maximum being a possible 100. On Friday 6th of February authorities did their calculations and came out with a figure of 400. This meant they were looking at a scenario of above extreme for Saturday, and sadly, they got just that.

Gary Hughes, a reporter, was among those caught in the blaze that day, and he says it best:

They warn you that it comes fast, but the word fast doesn’t come anywhere near describing it. It comes at you like a runaway train. One minute you are preparing. The next you are fighting for your home. Then you are fighting for your life.

These were the worst fire conditions imaginable, at least up until this point. When fires had torn through Canberra in 2003, the nation gasped at the large loss of property. Thankfully in that case there had not been a large loss of life. It was not to be the case here. Unfortunately this could happen again. Mother Nature is under no obligation to give us what we expect.

We like to think that we can predict anything, and therefore control the outcome. This includes the weather. It's in human nature to think that we can do just that. One way is to keep telling ourselves that it couldn't happen here.

It's a convienient lie.

The truth is that it probably won't. We can take precautions, just like any sensible person should. Nature can still get the upper hand. It's up to us to limit its impact when we are hit with extreme weather we can't change. It's all we can really do.