Well, That Was Close

Living where I do I truly realise there is a price to living in such serene beauty, it is a privilege and a responsibility. The bushland that is such a feature of my area that allows me to wake to kookaburra calls every morning and sleep in nothing more intrusive than rustling trees every night when dried by over 12 years of drought does cause a level of awareness that someone living in the suburbs seldom needs. We have had fire emergencies in the past, including last Saturday, but this one was different, this one was close and the possibility we would be under ember attack was real.

I have to say that answering the phone at this time of year is a bit nerve wracking. In my life there are only really about 4 people who call me on a semi regular basis which averages to about 1 call per fortnight. Being part of the Community Fireguard Phone Tree is one of the first things we got organised when we moved here, so through fire season any phone call could mean that my formerly calm day is just about to get turned up side down. Last year the Phone Tree got quite a workout because we had an arsonist doing their best to burn us all out, until last Saturday this year all had been calm.

Yesterday I looked up at the clock and realised that I was half way through making spiced grape jam and I was supposed to be at a CFA awareness meeting.... NOW. With that little kick I looked at my jam splattered top, mentally shrugged my shoulders, picked up my bag and keys and shuffled myself as fast as possible to the meeting. As with all circumstances when you are doing this I got half way down the road had a moment of doubt over my ability to remember to turn the jam off on the stove and had to back up a driveway turn around and check figuring there was not much point going to a CFA meeting if my kitchen was going to start a fire that would burn down half the suburb. Back at home the gas was off so all was well. I moved down our little dirt road just that bit faster than I prefer but this was important and I was now already at least 10 minutes late.

I arrived just in time to hear the final roundup of the local CFA's contribution to the firefighting efforts around Victoria. All I can say is that they are all working hard and deserve every single positive accolade they recieve over their conduct during this period. Next was going over the fire safety and fire plan strategies information all of which I have heard before but is never a bad thing to have refreshed.

While I was listening I mentally promised myself to go out and get both A and I a good heavy pair of full length coveralls this week as that is one thing I didn't have organised yet. We had natural fiber long lenght stuff but nothing heavy weight, we had "it will do" but not "good enough" for an actual fire situation. After a very emotional Q&A session where everything was covered from the CFA's powers to clear a road being blocked by work trucks on a High fire danger day, NONE, to bunkers and if the "CFA's stance on Go Early or Stay and Fight had changed" the meeting broke up and every one returned home. That would have been about 4:45pm.

About 5:15 when I was elbow deep in jam again the phone rang. Activate you Fire plans.. a Fire has started down on Peters Rd Belgrave and is buring up through the national park toward Sherbrook Rd. DANG IT, that is close, really close and the wind is pushing the fire in our direction.

Called next down on the list, who was home probably because they were also at the CFA meeting passed the message down the chain and started activating our fire plan for "stay and fight". The situation is not great but odds were on my side that we would experience no more than ember attack. Checked the CFA Website to see what if any information had been posted, changed clothes to the "It Will Do"s and did a thorough visual inspection of the block mentally noting our current trouble spots while keeping a good eye out for thick smoke.

I remembered at this point A was on his way home so called him and advised of the situation and suggested he stay away from one of the Major roads in our area as it would probably be closed. With him home we started in on the jobs that I can't do on my own, which is why if I am here alone the fire plan changes to "Go Early", but mostly just keeping visual contact with all areas on the block to ensure if we did start getting ember attacked we could get things under control before fire had a chance to take hold. This continued through the downgrade from "URGENT THREAT" to "ALERT" and stopped when we were issued with a "FINAL ADVISE" around 9:45pm.

In this case we got lucky.. we didn't even experience ember attack but that was due to dilegent work by the CFA brigades in the area a timely wind change around 8:00 and the fact that for this particular situation happened to be on the slightly less vulnerable side of the hill.