Australian

Ladies and gentlemen, it is time to update again, and I feel this may be a lengthy one.

As most of you avid readers and followers of my blog will now, I have returned to Australia from a five-month stint in Canada. I have now been home a week, and I am reminded of what it means to be an Australian, what it means to live in Australia, and all of things, I dislike about Australia.

Well, how to start this... obviously, the most significant change I had to get used to was the weather. I had gone from ridiculously cold (Ontario) to temperate (British Columbia) to extremely hot (NSW and Victoria). I survived the hottest day on record this summer, being only two days ago, and certainly not helped by the bushfires that consumed my suburb.

Thankfully, my house is OK, and everyone has survived. Unfortunately, one house (although not totally destroyed as a result of the fire) was damaged as a result. It was in this moment that I remembered what it was to be Australian, and what being an Australian entails. Bushfires!

Where I have lived my entire life, bushfires have been a harsh, unwelcomed reality of every day existence during the summer. For years we have set records for fires, in size, length, and in the size of the response from the Country Fire Authority (CFA). It's nothing to be proud of, yet it is one of those unfortunate facts.


Source: The Age, Photo by: Angela Wylie
While some, without naming names, will argue the actual threat to my home because it was apparently nowhere near me, I would like said person to have been here when my neighbours backyards were affected by embers causing spotfires. And to have the Council Rangers constantly surveying your property ever 15 to 20 minutes for spot fires, and to be told by Fireys that you should remain on high alert and be prepared to evacuate should the fire continue to burn out of control.

The Australian part however, was seen through the response of the residents, not so much the Fire Brigade. I am incredibly critical of their response on the day, I felt it was organised chaos, it was delayed, and Helitanker support was intermittent and insufficient. Yet, the residents, however Bogan the rest of Victoria think we are, supported and helped each other, throughout the entire time.

I knew nothing of the fire until my next door neighbour, who is new to me, bashed on my door interrupting my Wii bowling, to open the door to clouds of thick, black smoke, and the sight of flames that looked within touching distance. It was from that moment, that all of our neighbours who were home, rushed to scene of the fire because it was ridiculously close to residential areas. I witnessed people breaking into other peoples properties, not for the purpose of stealing or other sinister affair, but to ensure no one was inside, to take out peoples pets.

Law goes out the window in these emergencies, especially those of water restrictions as well. Currently, water restrictions are fairly tight here, and we're encouraged to use 155litres of water per person, per day. That definitely went out the window, and despite some spectator abuse, and disapproval in this (which I found extremely upsetting and unnecessarily rude).

Yet I was still amazed at the willingness of others to put themselves in face of flames, which my next door neighbour did to save a dog he heard barking from a backyard that was moments away from being wiped out by the quickly spreading fire. The instantaneous reaction to spot fires caused in the reserve behind our estate that bordered properties and infiltrated backyards, even without the residents being aware of it, or the CFA for that matter. The duty other residents assumed to secure other peoples houses for those who were not home... That is what it is be to Australian.

We were largely unprepared for a fire of this magnitude, that I will accept, its been years since one of this size and this ferocious. However, it is no excuse for the fire authorities to be unprepared either. I know and understand there were fires throughout Victoria on the day, but to have the two local fire stations totally void of any response for the first half an hour was a disgrace. To have one helitanker dropping water, was an issue. Everytime the tanker went to refill, the fire would spread quicker, and more ferociously.

Sure some of my facts could be wrong, but the Helitanker one is not, and the Fire Brigade response is certainly limited to what I could see...But from my perspective, at least where the main body of the fire was, our two stations were not present. My understanding is they were attending a fire a few suburbs over, obviously they can't leave a fire to burn, but nor should they ever leave a station completely unmanned for their area.

Since this fire, there have been others. So far there was one a suburb over in Langwarrin yesterday, that burnt 6 Hectares (1 Hectare more than Carrum Downs). That response was a lot more impressive, and a lot more organised. And again today, this morning, I was woken up by the helitanker response to another one in Carrum Downs. This could be as a result of still smoldering logs etc, that caught fire and spread, or someone came to finish the job, with whatever bush is left. Either way, today the response was more adequate, more timely, more impressive.

For those of you who don't know, FIRE is my deepest, and worst fear of all. As a child, the threat of bushfire was common, so you can imagine the torment I copped as a kid as a result of where we lived. But today, despite how irrational my fear may be, Fire is one thing I fear the most, above everything.

So to see my favourite Helitanker in the sky, was calming. He wasn't there on Monday, I know he was in Langwarrin yesterday, but seeing him today in Carrum Downs along with Mr. Shiny and New Victoria Helitanker, made me relaxed.



He is a beast, and while not as accurate as Mr Shiny and New, he carries more, and has saved this area numerous times to warrant such weird appreciation.