Protecting Melton with fire

There are a number of ways this grassland fire risk can be mitigated;

Burning.

Chemical use.

Slashing and making mineral earth boundaries.

But it’s not just a case of getting a crew or two together and lighting up a paddock.

SOP 9.39 – Procedures for Planning a Prescribed Burn or Burn Off, detail the tasks to be carried out before a prescribed burn is to be undertaken.

Senior Station Officer Michael Masters and Station Officer Jayson Hirt, in conjunction with Phil Bongiorno, the Municipal Fire Prevention Officer from the Shire of Melton, and Ron Cole, the Vegetation Management Officer from District 14, established a burn plan for the shire in conjunction with the Municipal Fire Prevention Plan, which included this area in Melton South. And due to the size of the area, it was deemed more efficient to perform a prescribed burn.

Next step was to write up a “Burn Plan” detailing aspects of the burn, such as;

Location and date of burn.

Physical site features eg: slope, fuel load, hazards, etc.

Identification of risks and their mitigation.

Notifications to various other services.

Weather conditions eg: temp, wind direction.

Resources required to complete the task.

With the extremely large area of the burn, smoke impact on the township of Melton to the North, as well as the area South of the burn (Strathtulloh Estate) was considered. So, in the days leading up to the burns, members of the Melton Fire Brigade did a letter drop to all houses bordering the area, erected signs detailing what would happen during the burns, as well as a door knock of the businesses directly to the South. But being right before Christmas, a lot of the businesses would thankfully finish up early for their holidays, just before the first blades of grass were to be set alight.

This also proved to be a perfect opportunity to utilise the Social Media aspect of CFA Notifications. Through the Regional Duty Officer, an ‘Advice’ message was sent via the CFA website, through to Facebook, and Twitter where it detailed the day’s burn, and explaining to people that smoke in the area would most likely be from it.

Notifications were also sent to Vicfire, in case they started receiving 000 calls for the smoke in the area, Vicroads (a major interstate freeway is close by), VBIL, the Shire of Melton, and Victoria Police (Police Media and the proposal of road closures if needed).

On one of the days of the burn, Vicfire had received five 000 calls to “smoke in the area”, and the fire station received three of the same. Goes to show you should always give Vicfire a “head’s –up” before “lighting-up.”

Would there be a need for extra resources such as more Tankers, Quickfills, Slip-On’s etc? Yes. So neighbouring brigades were offered an invitation to attend to lend a hand. And due to their being some unstable ground, unfit for traversing in a Tanker, the DSE were invited with a number of Slip-On’s to access those areas. An invitation was also extended to the new Level 1 Firefighting Staff located at Point Cook and Sunbury, who took up the opportunity to see how a burn is conducted.

That’s a lot of work to do before a firelighter is even lit!

On the day of the burns, the work starts early on. Spot weather forecasts are requested for the day, as well as a number of days after. Firelighters are filled, radios are checked, crews are hydrated… And once everyone is assembled at the fire station, the all important SMEACS briefing is held by Station Officer Cory Woodyatt.

“Our mission today is to reduce the fuel and create a buffer in order to prevent fire running into the northern boundaries of Stathtulloh Estate” explained SO Woodyatt.

Crew and appliance allocation is vital. With all Melton appliances at the burn, the town still needed it’s fire cover. So Melton Pumper and Rescue were situated in such an area that it would be easy to respond if needed (in which they did a couple of times).

Once “mounted-up”, appliances all met up at the burn site at the Southern End of Ferris Road in Melton South. Before any burning is to be started, everyone was required to drive around the perimeter of the paddocks to make sure appliances could make it through safely, and that the ploughed breaks that the Shire had put in, would hold up. Water points to fill up Tankers were also located, with Bacchus Marsh’s new Big Fill appliance put to excellent use.

Once completed, and weather taken into consideration, a “wetty” was put down from one of the tankers, followed by the firelighters who would put in a 30m strip burn into the North West corner of each paddock to secure up the edges, preventing it from jumping the ploughed breaks.

Tankers would always be keeping a watchful eye to make sure it wouldn’t jump if the winds picked up. The fire would be left to burn itself out, with a large 30m barrier from the edge of the ploughed break, halting the fire once it was let go.

Once breaks were put in, and it was deemed safe enough to do, weather conditions permitting, the area was “lit up”, throwing smoke hundreds of meters into the sky. Crews constantly kept vigil over the fire to make sure it kept in check, not jumping containment lines or not running up trees.

All in all, nearly 150 hectares were set alight to mitigate the risk to the community over two days. There was even a visit by he crews from TV’s Channel 10 news who saw smoke in the area and decided to investigate. Even doing two live crosses to the 6pm bulletin.

With the large size, an overwatch was placed onto the fire for a number of hours after everyone had returned back to Melton for a well earned BBQ dinner put on by the brigade.

Appliances in attendance were;

Melton – Tanker, Pumper, Pumper-Tanker, Rescue, Car, Van.

Sunbury – Tanker, Car.

Hoppers Crossing Tanker.

Caroline Springs – Tanker.

Werribee - Tanker .

Bacchus Marsh – Tanker, Big Fill.

Toolern Vale – Slip-On.

Point Cook – Car.

DSE – Slip-On’s.

Many thanks go to the members and various brigades who participated and gave up their time to provide this very necessary part of Community Safety.

Pictures by Blair Dellemijn – CFA Strategic Communications.