The authorities also failed to learn from history that the areas at greatest risk were in a arc around the outer fringes of Melbourne and they issued no specific warning for those areas and, instead, simply said it was a ‘Statewide alert’. Worse still they clearly implied that the main danger would be in areas well removed from Melbourne like around here.

I don’t think it would have been unrealistic for the authorities to suggest on Friday that anyone living in the forested fringes of Melbourne should consider coming into the city for a day to visit relatives in the safer suburbs or just go sit on a beach until this ‘one day in a generation’ was over. It would have saved a lot of lives.

Brumby even said that people should just “stay at home”. I realise he was referring to the elderly and heat stress but it sent a mixed message.

I joined the CFA to find out the fire risk associated with my 10 acres. In the 2006 fires, where we were under direct threat, even with CFA experience and having made provisions for such an event, I was still found wanting when it was put to the test.

I set up all my defences, roof sprinklers, gutter blocks to hold water, Diesel generator pump backup for electric pumps etc., and then looked for the weaknesses. I found:-
I was relying on plastic 3/4″ hoses that could melt.
My pump delivery system is 2″ polypipe some of which is above ground.
One end of the house had no taps to attach hoses to and, of course, that was the direction the fire would have come in by.

As a result of that evaluation, our fire plan was to evacuate.

My point is that only through CFA training, I had enough facts to determine that one-out, there was not enough of me to manage all the equipment at my disposal. The only safe alternative was to evacuate.

And although not the only answer, education does work quite well.

I started Prep in 1984 – the first summer term since the Ash Wednesday fires. I can still vividly recall the video about fire we all watched. I remember a… TV commercial? showing people in a car as a fire approached, showing them getting down behind the front seats with a blanket over them.

And with the events of this last week, I dredged up my knowledge of how to survive a bushfire, and it was surprisingly comprehensive. Having never ever joined the CFA or the SES, I can only assume that somewhere during the almost 20 years I spent growing up in Tallangatta that this knowledge seeped in from somewhere, be it a poster I read at school, or a video or something…. That’s what we need to recreate. Not just for the people who move to the bush, either. EVERY Australian – or Victorian at least – should know this stuff like the back of their hand. We should also drill into people that the purpose of the CFA is primarily to stop the fire. Not to save people or property (though the heroic bastards will do their best to do that as well).

Maybe along with energy efficiency ratings, houses should also be given a ‘Fire Resistance’ rating…. so people will know how likely it would be that that house would survive a bushfire, and what they could do to improve that rating. I think also the CFA and the DSE should look again at the language they’re using to disseminate information. Aware, Alert, Under Threat… they get kinda meaningless, kinda complicated. Something simple and direct like “A fire today will kill you if you stay in the area”.

I can’t agree with forced evacuation. People should have the right to defend their house. If fireplans and fire safety has been followed to the utmost degree, then I do believe that most houses (in a standard bushfire situation) are perfectly defendable. Like I said above, the CFA is not responsible for saving your house, and I dread to think of what would happen to insurance premiums if houses were left undefended during the bushfires which visit up with alarming regularity.

Sorry. I’ve gone on a bit….

I think that if you live in Yackandandah, Dederang or any of the small settlements in this area or on the fringes of Myrtleford or Beechworth, every single house would need firefighting equipment as part of their fire safety plan. I wouldn’t be surprised if this is not the case though.

A question to you Greg, how many people in the King Valley do you think would be adequately prepared to defend their homes? How many do you think could be if they were better informed?

The CFA have never provided a pro-forma for a fire plan. We need one and we need an authorisation process through the local CFA before we are given the right to stay and defend.

Compulsory completion of the CFA Minimum Skills program – maybe during HSC – for all people living in bushfire prone areas might help. Not only would we be better educated about fire and fire plans, those who stay to defend their homes would ease the demands made of our overstretched CFA brigades.