By CAM LUCADOU-WELLS
NEW arrivals’ lack of fire-smarts loom as a challenge ahead of a dry, perilous bushfire season, says the region’s CFA boss Trevor Owen.
Assistant Chief Officer Owen, who oversees Victoria’s south-east including metropolitan Dandenong, Casey and Cardinia, said he’d like to see fire awareness taught in primary and high schools even in the suburbs.
“We will continue to live amongst (native vegetation). It’s beautiful but incredibly dangerous.
“When you think of the growing risk we face, and it’s not going to go away, we should be educating children about the dangers of bushfires.
“We need to build it into schools so generations growing up appreciate the risk.”
There should be a concerted campaign to inform leaders of our community’s varied cultures, he argued.
“Many who come to Australia to live don’t understand the bushfire risk. They haven’t grown up around it and are oblivious.
“How we work with the multicultural communities is an important factor.”
The official fire season is expected to arrive early this year – sometime in November.
Soils have dried and grassland fuel has built over consecutive rain-sparse years.
Volunteers, as always, are the “backbone of the CFA’s firefighting power” this summer but more are needed to pitch in, Mr Owen said.
He believes volunteer culture is one of Australia’s success stories.
“It’s becoming increasingly difficult. Our average age (in the CFA) is getting older and there comes a time when our youth are going to have to step up.
“What better thing to do in your life than protect another, than to go out there and do good for the community?
“The Victorian community can’t afford a paid CFA workforce to replace its volunteers.”
To underline the point, the CFA’s 1240 brigades include just 33 that are staffed by paid fire-fighters.
The CFA covers more of metro Melbourne than the MFB but those in the suburban interface areas also help cover for under-resourced rural brigades.
“Volunteers in the metropolitan areas play such a critical role. They have got employers who can generously let them go and play a part.
“They are needed to help in the farming communities where people can’t just go and walk off their property on a regular basis during summer.”
During fire disasters, some spontaneously decide to “jump on the back of a fire truck”.
However, at best, each volunteer requires three months of training to get fire-ready, Mr Owen said.
As for himself, Mr Owen said he loves the CFA because of its family-like camaraderie and the calibre of its self-sacrificing recruits.
“They are, in my opinion, of the highest order in the community.
“To put your body and your life on the line for another is just something that says it all.
“And it’s damned good fun.”
