The social justice issues of smoke im/mobilities

ABSTRACT

In 2014, the Hazelwood mine fire burned for 45 days. Local communities were impacted by smoke and ash, and there were reports of raised carbon monoxide levels. Local news and social media reported residents experiencing numerous physical symptoms of smoke inhalation, including bleeding noses, coughing, wheezing and chest tightness. Paper masks to filter particulate matter were made available to residents to wear outside. The dust and ash constantly seeped into homes and offices, which required cleaning daily and sometimes multiple times during the day. Smoke was free to move across physical and bodily boundaries while those most vulnerable were hampered by lack of movement: pregnant women, the elderly and children were advised to leave the area. However, this suggestion to ‘simply’ move ignored the context of a community disproportionately impacted through years of economic decline and societal change. This paper explores the unequal mobilities of smoke and people that arose as a result of this event and draws on concepts of mobility justice (Sheller 2018) and emergency mobilities (Adey 2016) to reflect on the political dimensions of uneven mobility in times of crisis.

KEYWORDS:

• Smoke
• Hazelwood
• unequal mobilities
• disaster

Acknowledgements

We acknowledge and pay our respects to the Elders and Traditional Owners of the land where our research is based, particularly the Gunaikurnai peoples of Gippsland.

We thank members of the Latrobe Valley, especially those living in Morwell and representatives from various organisations who participated in this research.

We thank the reviewers for their insightful comments and suggestions.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Additional information

Funding

Funding for this research was obtained from the Victorian Department of Health.