Ryan

“I always had my own unit because you need it for your own farm anyway and can’t rely on everyone else to help you at a drop of a hat. You are better off having your own. 2020 was a fair bit more hectic than the ‘07 fires. Uncontrollable; didn’t matter what we did, it just couldn’t be controlled. It didn’t matter what the CFS did or didn’t do, or what farm units did, it was always gonna end up the same way. I started heading out as soon as the Duncan fire started on the 20th of December—five days before Christmas—and through the holidays ended up fighting fires every day. I didn’t get very much sleep. Not very much at all. We had a team roll in here on the day it started on our place. First just family, then the neighbours between here and Shorty’s, Graham’s plus everyone else that came out. It went on for weeks and weeks. I helped out as far as Mays’s out West but went from here to Foggy’s, Carly and Buzzy’s, Millsy’s—all that way east. Communication was good via UHF and talking to neighbours but phone range was hopeless for weeks after the tower burned and until they got it working again. After we lost our place, we just kept on going and fought the fires until it was through Millsy’s and everyone else was pretty well burned and it was time to turn around and go home to fix up our own mess. Our joint shouldn’t burn this summer now, it should be pretty good. Hopefully if any other place east of us or even down in Penneshaw burns, we just go down there and give them a hand. I am not really worried about it though, should be right, it always generally starts out our way anyway and that is all burned now. I am hoping there is no fire this summer, that’ll be a good start for everyone. With a bit of luck, we won’t see too much this upcoming season. I am hoping to actually enjoy summer. I also think everyone will upgrade their fire gear this year and there may be a few more private units ready to help out. Everyone should make sure their units are all going, get some more firefighting gear. I still have my unit but I need to buy some more hosing, hose reel and stuff.”