The Volunteer Fire Fighters Association (VFFA) has secured a site at the Henty Machinery Field Days. The focus of our presence at Henty will be to “Put the RURAL back into the Rural Fire Service”.
Our site will feature a couple of tanker trailers in an effort to create some discussion upon the need for the State government to formally recognise the firefighting capability that farmers bring to the table.
“Water doesn’t put out a fire, the crews do,” the anonymous pilot wrote. “Large aircraft such as what you have read about in this article take crews off the fire lines, sit helicopters on the ground for hours and stop precious production and critical gains,” the pilot wrote. “[The Bomber’s] water comes out at a force which sends embers out and start spot fires.”
“[The water bombing method] loosens ground, blows over trees creating hazards and ruins guards put in by crews.”
An extra (totally bias) round of applause to Gordon Hill. Those who know Gordon, also know that he wears many hats and he is dedicated to his volunteer service.
There is another, very active NSW RFS member in that group of worthy recipients. He is not representing the NSW RFS for the awards but, like Gordon, he wears many hats.
Who will be the first to point him out?
The Untold Story (2015) features the people from the high country in Victoria, talking about the problems with bushfires and wild dogs.
Cattle have been banned from grazing in the high country, this is a practice that was done perfectly for 160 years and proved to control fires and regenerate the bush.
Less fuel equals less fire.
Mr Grant forgot one simple fact. The NSW RFS headquarters does not put the fires out.
Firefighters (full time, part time and volunteer) put the fires out.
The Hon. Philip Donato (Orange) asks the question (directed to the Minister for Police, and Minister for Emergency Services) “In light of the recent announcement on the new Rural Fire Service training facility in Dubbo, will the Minister now reconsider the relocation of the entire Rural Fire Service headquarters to the Central West?”
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I’m flattered and stoked at the invitation to talk (for only a few minutes) about a mate I have known for nearly 50 years. I knew him well and he taught me heaps.
Tharwa – a district with a complete range of skills – centre of the intellectual universe – especially Friday nights!
The last three verses of Vals’ poem “Mans Cruelty to Nature” that he wrote in 2003.
City proud of trees amidst the homes, spread through the fields,
A place of pure bush-beauty should not expect such tragedy,
That thrust this town with vicious fear into a firebrand battlefield
Surely we were let down by such a feat of foolish travesty?
I wander now through black, bent, lonely, twisted trees,
Where as a child I savoured many misty moments here,
Still; eerie now, no urgent rustling movement through the leaves,
Fools have stolen sounds of chirping vibrant birds I held so dear.
Can the scars of gaping wicked wounds to nature’s precious folds,
Be ever salved and lessons learnt from man’s short sightedness,
Or will the blessed autumn rains bring life’s beauty to behold,
To hide human frailty beneath the newborn forest’s ruggedness?
The announcement to build a Centre of Excellence in Dubbo is a victory for the people of Dubbo, the VFFA, all volunteers, regional and rural people of NSW.
This news is certainly a step in the right direction as it will pave the way for increased regional and rural influence in the RFS Learning and Development Directorate.
The VFFA congratulates MP Troy Grant, Dubbo Regional Council, NSW RFS Commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons and NSW RFS Deputy Commissioner Rob Rogers for this commitment but does it goes far enough? The VFFA believes that a much larger chunk of the NSW Rural Fire Service, if not all, needs to be decentralised.
Enough talking, it’s time to listen.
After the 2003 Canberra fires, Mr Gary Nairn, MP stated that the House of Representatives, Select Committee heard a consistent message right around Australia:
1. There has been grossly inadequate hazard reduction burning on public lands for far too long.
2. Local knowledge and experience is being ignored by an increasingly top-heavy bureaucracy.
3. When accessing the source of fires, volunteers are fed up with having their lives put at risk by fire trails that are blocked and left without maintenance.
4. There is a reluctance by state agencies to aggressively attack bushfires when they first start, thus enabling the fires to build in intensity and making them harder to control, and
5. Better communications between and within relevant agencies is long overdue.
Very little has changed in the 13 years since the report by Mr Nairn with every increasing bureaucracy, disregard for volunteer firefighters, failures to engage local knowledge and a reluctance by state agencies to aggressively attack bushfires. In fact, the situation has become worse.
It goes without saying that a step in the right direction would be to re-engage with locals and move away from the city-centric management that will never be able to fully understand regional and rural issues.
The only people who can possibly understand regional and rural issues are regional and rural people. This is a no-brainer.
We need to decentralise all of the NSW Rural Fire Service so that regional and rural engagement begins to happen as it once did under local government support.