The mercury is already nudging 40C on a February morning in Birdsville and, walking down the main drag, you could be forgiven for mistaking yourself in the nearby ghost town of Betoota.
A guard dog barks half-heartedly without emerging from the shade beneath a set of stairs while a raptor wheels above. There is not a person in sight.
The last census recorded Birdsville’s population as 110, but that figure drops by more than half over summer. Those who stick it out use terms like “hibernate” and “bunkering down” to describe how they survive the three months from December to March.
Yet while others have fled the heat, an Australian human rights lawyer has travelled in the opposite direction, as
