CFS News (April)
Thank you to everyone who supported the Cherry Gardens Brigade over the last summer. We received donations, letters of thanks, support, funding of get togethers (thanks Brandwood Drive and Edialta Rd!) and general wishes of goodwill from many people. It really means a lot to us as a group to know the community is behind what we do, so thank you all. This summer saw us heavily involved interstate in Tasmania, NSW and Queensland, as well as the Yorke Peninsular, Adelaide Hills and Kangaroo Island fires. As an aside, our crew on Cherry Gardens 34P was instrumental in saving Melba’s Chocolate factory at Woodside on the first day of the Cudlee creek fire. Most firefighters in the Brigade spent time assisting with the Kangaroo Island fires, I deployed for three nightshifts on the 8th January. It was a remarkable deployment and many people have asked if I could share the experience, so I will give it a go over this and next month’s article.
My deployment to KI.
The strike team gathered at Adelaide Airport for a 6 P.M. charter flight to Kingscote. It was just one of many - there had been deployments previously and many still to follow. There were approx. 100 people on the flight, and we arrived at Kingscote just after 6:30 P.M. Busses took us to a camp on the Western side of the airport that had been set up by the SES. This was home for the next three days; we slept in newly developed SES “Humanihut’s”, six firefighters to a hut. A mess tent, showers and portable toilets made it all quite comfortable.
After dinner we formed into allocated crews –we were unknown to each other until then, but we worked together really well. Our appliance was from the Riverland and it served us well. Crew leaders were briefed as to allocated sectors and priorities for the night and we set off around 7:30 PM for what was to be a very tough night. Our first task was to protect a group of houses on the Northern coast approx. 50 km west of the airport. We travelled to this area with the rest of our strike team, along the way having to pass through the current fire front. We were now seeing first-hand the enormous scale of these fires. Beyond the front, literally everything was burning.
On arrival at the houses, we assessed the threats and likely fire behavior for later that night. We managed to protect and save the main group of three houses after many hours of firefighting, but some others were undefendable due access and being surrounded by thick scrub. I will never know if they survived the night or not. We were then tasked further west to assist with more properties under threat, along the way found the road blocked by a large tree, which had fallen after the base had been burnt out. This took significant time to chainsaw a section big enough for the appliance to get through. The area we were travelling through had been previously burnt, and small and large spot fires were everywhere, making it a very eerie landscape in the early hours of the morning.
-to be continued next month – May 2020 edition-
We train every Monday night for those who may be interested in what we do.
To report suspicious behaviour call Crime Stoppers on 1800 333 000.
For all other emergencies dial 000 and ask for “Adelaide, Fire” “South Australia”
See the CFS website for more information, and stay safe.