Volunteer Fire Fighters Association

Cathy Noakes walked away from the New South Wales Rural Fire Service (RFS) in 2014, but she never quit firefighting.

After more than a decade of active service, three of them as captain of her brigade in Farringdon, Ms Noakes stepped down in frustration with the RFS bureaucracy.

“You weren’t allowed to just go and put out a fire,” she said. “You always had to wait for approval. So, as you waited, the fire just escalated.”

Instead, Ms Noakes joined the “mosquito army”, a network of community-based firefighting teams, that went on to play a vital role in firefighting efforts during the 2019-2020 bushfires around Braidwood in the NSW Southern Tablelands.

With their own firefighting gear and radios, local knowledge and experience, the “mozzies” worked in close partnership with their local brigades when RFS resources were stretched beyond their limit across the state.

You FLIR K1 may be due for an upgrade.

The K1 includes a USB-C port in the top compartment. The USB port allows the user to update the System firmware by first downloading an update file from the FLIR website and then connecting the K1 to a PC to transfer the file.

On June 7 2020 a media release was issued by President Mr. Holton with a recommendation that a RFS Volunteer Benevolent Fund be set up from the $51M raised by Celeste Barber. In the recent Commissioner’s Update Sep 21 one of the new priorities was to establish the Benevolent Fund to assist the volunteer firefighters and their families. It is good to see an initiative of the VFFA for RFS volunteer members being followed up.

My medal proposal is different, in that everyone qualifies. Not everyone qualifies for the National Medal, or the National Emergency Medal, and it represents a certain event or period in time similar to a military campaign or General Service Medal. There is no Long Service Good Conduct Medal available to you either. My proposal is a medal that represents a gift to you from your nation that recognizes your services and commitment to the Australian community. It doesn’t just recognize your service on the fire ground it represents all those days and weeks of training beforehand, committee meetings and maintenance days and fund raisers. Not to mention the other emergencies you are required to attend like car accidents. It represents the gratitude we feel as a nation for all that time you are required to spend away from your families and those special days you miss.

The Victim summaries contained in this document are from volunteers and staff who have bravely contacted the author to express their destressing and desperate plights. What is clear in every case is that the New South Wales Rural Fire Service (RFS) knowing showed an arogenate disregard of its duty of care as an employer. It, the RFS, fosters a culture where reports of Bullying, Harassment, Discrimination and Sexual Misconduct were ignored, supressed or dismissed. Complaints and grievances are systematically lost and investigations delayed and incompetently mishandled to the point complainants simply give up and leave the service. Retaliation is a common occurrence for victims of the RFS. It is common for a complainant to be the subject of a new counter complaint especially when the original complaint is about a Captain or other senior member of their Brigade. Dog Whistling and Gaslighting are common place and go unchecked even in the presence of senior RFS staff.

Bushfires are more difficult to put out in long unburnt, heavy fuels. Prescribed burning is important in reducing fuel loads and is undertaken periodically, is a milder burn, aiming to minimise crown scorch and usually only burns a portion of an area. It can be called prescribed burning, hazard reduction burning, controlled burning or ecological maintenance burning. Prescribed burning can use ground and aerial prescribed burning, the latter using aircraft to drop small incendiary capsules on a grid spacing that allows for mild burns and covering large areas safely. The mild burns are designed to join up late in the evening where conditions are cooler and the grid is designed for that to occur. It is important that flame heights are kept as low as possible and there are unburnt patches remaining.

A team of researchers at Griffith University are conducting a survey to try and identify knowledge and knowledge gaps in relation to the impact of fire-fighting chemicals on species and ecosystems in Australia as part of a larger project.

They are looking for the opinions of people from groups involved in fire management in Australia.

These groups might include fire services, researchers, policy makers, land managers, government and chemical manufacturers.

Nestled beside one of Melbourne’s busiest roads, sits the Bolin Bolin Billabong — a site of immense cultural significance for the traditional owners, the Wurundjeri people.

Part of a once-vast wetland that flowed into the Yarra River, it’s known to them as Birrarung.

It used to be rich in native foods such as waterfowl, fish, eels and plants.

For associate professor in earth sciences and Wiradjuri man Michael Shawn Fletcher, it’s still rich — in priceless data.

His scientific analysis of this muddy waterhole gives an extraordinary window into the past.

RED Friday Peer Support Team Training is available for up to fifteen NSW RFS Volunteer Firefighters (fully sponsored by RED Friday).

RED Friday has created a program schedule specifically for NSW RFS Volunteers.

Note: You don’t have to be a member of the VFFA to participate.

The primary focus of the program is the development of the skills needed to provide a reliable internal support system at a Brigade level and a crisis response plan (external support programs) as needed.