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c0lo writes:

Guardian

A specially deployed team of remote air firefighters helped save the trees from the giant Gospers Mountain fire

Firefighters have saved the only known natural stand of Wollemi pines, so-called "dinosaur trees" that fossil records show existed up to 200m years ago, from the bushfires that have devastated New South Wales.

The state's environment minister, Matt Kean, said a specially deployed team of remote air firefighters helped save the critically endangered trees from the giant Gospers Mountain fire.

The pines are in an undisclosed sandstone grove in the Wollemi national park, in the Blue Mountains, about 200km north-west of Sydney. They were thought extinct until discovered 26 years ago.

Kean said with fewer than 200 of the trees left in the wild the government had to do everything it could to save them, describing it as "an unprecedented environmental protection mission".

He said the operation by the NSW National Parks and Wildlife Service and NSW Rural Fire Service included air tankers dropping fire retardant and specialist firefighters being winched in by helicopter to set up an irrigation system in the gorge. As the fire approached, helicopters water bucketed the fire edge to reduce its impact on the groves of trees.

A scientific assessment found while some of the trees were charred the species would survive in the wild. Kean said the government would continue to keep the precise location of the trees secret to ensure their long-term protection.

Wikipedia

In both botanical and popular literature the tree has been almost universally referred to as the Wollemi pine, although it is not a true pine (genus Pinus) nor a member of the pine family (Pinaceae), but, rather, is related to Agathis and Araucaria in the family Araucariaceae. The oldest fossil of the Wollemi tree has been dated to 200 million years ago.

A brief blog entry with some photos on how the trees look in wilderness.

Original Submission