Fire in Sydney

[Franco Cozzo]

Are there any AFF members located near the big fire in Western Sydney? Anyone have any updates?

[Giant Cranium]

All I now is that I'm 5 k from the CBS and it stinks. Went to Newcastle today and the whole trip back was in smoke

[Bluehoon]

Work out back of Castlereagh and drove home through Richmond Road, Garfield road etc. Road closures, cops and RFS everywhere. They have sent crews from C/town and northern beaches in as there are a number of spot fires in the area, in addition to main fires. It's grass fires, tree hopping throughout the area and being fanned by heavy winds.

Driving is hazardous due to the smoke, traffic is chaotic.

A good friend at work raced his truck home to go and get his horses out of the firepath, got the truck to the yard and got in his ute and bolted. We heard he had a head on accident at castlereagh due to the smoke.

Driving through schofields and in the general area there are people pulled over using buckets to put out spotfires, and grass fires. Using buckets and hoses.

Unsure as to loss of life, livestock and property however it's not an area for tourism right now...

[usernametaken]

http://www.broadcastify.com/listen/feed/12380/web

For those that want to listen in.

[XRFutura]

I live in winmalee, the fire has jumped the hawksbury road and is heading towards yellow rock. The wind is pretty erratic so who knows where it'll go.

[AndyXR6T]

We have friends in Castlereagh. The fires were about 2 streets away from them. Luckily they have sprinkler systems in their newly built home to slow down the damage but its fairly intense. I live in Penrith and found it wasn't as smoky as compared to wentworthville when I was driving home

[XRGhia]

There was also a decent fire at Wyee that nearly completely closed the freeway... Did about 3km's in an hour and 15 mins, just to end up driving nearly through the fire. Ended up stopped for 5 mins right next to the bloody thing because it looked about ready to jump across the freeway at any given time.


Here's hoping there won't be very much or no major damage to properties and/or livestock/people all over NSW's on-going fires

[Mechan1k]

The Yeti is probably out there fighting it.

There's been so much dry fuel laying around for years ... I was wondering when it was eventually going to go up ... used to live in the Hawkesbury ... and kind a glad I don't at the moment.

Hopefully the change tonight eases it ... there's 2 servos not far from where it was alight in Windsor Downs/Marsden Park on Richmond Rd as well.

[DBourne]

We were getting little bits of ash falling at Sydney Olympic Park, gives you an idea of how strong the winds were.

When I was out for my lunch ride it was a little smokey, but nothing bad. However, come arvo coffee time I was glad I wasn't on the bike!

[The Yeti]

I was on a strike team last night, but didn't see any action to speak of

I tell you what though it was going hard earlier in the day, they did VERY well not to loose to much

[hawkgirl]

it was about 500m from the in laws fence at londonderry.

they have all the right gear & hawk man went out at about 12:30pm to give his dad a hand to fill the firefighting tanks & prime pumps etc

i went to Coms to advise of availability but they had alreadyenough bums on seats for the radio so I went home again.

I wondered if you were out with the teams mr Yeti

[EgoFG]

Here I was 2 K from The Rivo fire, and maybe 5 from the Windsor downs one

Was hard to breathe here

[The Yeti]

Yea my place was the other way 2k from the Bligh park / Windsor Downs and about 5 from the Londonderry one

Na hawk girl I was on the "other" big red truck

Spewen I couldn't get on a truck earlier, time to get the old yellows out and go out with the old mob from time to time I think

[XRFutura]

Couple of pics from the aftermath of the winmalee fires

[calais]

I used to live in Hawkesbury Heights, and my parents still do.

I rushed straight up as soon as I heard the backburn had broken containment lines. My mother is a chronic asthmatic and couldnt get herself out for all the smoke. It was a devastating fire and the community was just so lucky to have crews out there who saved their homes.

[hawkgirl]

no thanks to National Sparks & Wildfire Service.

thats 2 fires these halfwits have started from incompetence

[The Yeti]

I wouldn't go quite that far, HR's are great preperation and pretecteion but they are not without risk

Ive bagged out National Sparks and Wild fires (they light em we fight em) plenty of times but I know of plenty RFS & FR NSW lost HR's as well

[79FordEsky]

Why don't we have burn off in winter like the Aboriginal people have done for thousands of years. This has been very successful.

[The Yeti]

We do

We but we also have to take other factors in to consideration such as temperature humidity, days since last rain, wind as well as a multitude of other environmental factors into consideration

People are quick to claim the Aboriganies did it the right way but the don't look at how simular our current practices are. Also take in to account there wasn't as much "stuff" to get in the way back before European settlement, so if it got away from them A/ it didn't take as much and B/ there was no national 9 news to tell every one about it

Personally I think in the most part hazard reductions are done very well

[hawkgirl]

also, nobody mentions the fact aboriginal fire farming completely changed the biological makeup of the continent (botanists know this) but i agree that RFS & FRNSW mostly get it right.

it would, of course, be a lot easier if the inner city do-good greenies stopped whinging every time hazard reduction was done.

[The Yeti]

Originally Posted by hawkgirl

it would, of course, be a lot easier if the inner city do-good greenies stopped whinging every time hazard reduction was done.

you can lock this thread now

This covers it all