As you know, Sydney has been surrounded by devastating bushfires this week. Fortunately, we haven’t been directly affected.
Sadly, hundreds of people have lost their homes and all their possessions and our thoughts and prayers go out to them. And it’s not over yet.
The fires through the Blue Mountains are substantial and still raging. The area has been declared a state of emergency and there’s talk of needing to evacuate large areas.
This is just the beginning of Spring and already we’ve had days with very high temperatures and strong winds.
As I said, Danita & I haven’t been affected. However, I did have a rather confronting experience of how quickly things can change.
On Wednesday, I went into the city for the Network Central members lunch. These events are always wonderful to be part of and, on a lighter note, Network Central is celebrating its 15th birthday – an amazing achievement for Kim McGuinness.
Leaving home around 10am and travelling into the city, listening to the radio, it was a normal day with interviews and other interesting things to listen to, learn from and be part of.
3 hours later I was on the way home and the situation was very different.
The radio (channel 702 in Sydney) was now the emergency station with constant traffic and news updates with reporters describing incredible situations: a field burst into flames just behind one reporter, there were reports of burning embers landing all over Sydney with the potential to start new fires and more. One person called in to say they were surfing at Bondi Beach and burning embers were hitting the water around them – a distance of at least 100 kilometres from the fires.
On my way home I went through Galston Gorge – a beautiful bush setting in the northern suburbs of Sydney. I was concerned about getting trapped there but all went well.
Arriving home I could see a lot of smoke and the sky was becoming redder and redder, making me think the fires were getting closer. Calls to the local RFS (Rural Fire Service) assured me that what I was seeing was the effect of the fires in the Blue Mountains and there was nothing close.
While this was reassuring there was still the risk from embers. The house we’re in is set in a semi rural environment which is particularly dry at the moment having had very little rain for quite some time. Also, the roof gutters were full of dry leaves – just the conditions to create a disaster.
Added to that are the 14 dogs at the house (we’re back in the doggy hospice I’ve talked about before).
Feeling anxious about the situation I got out and started hosing the roof areas around the house, hoping that if I could soak the leaves in the gutters they would hold the water and would be less likely to burst into flame if embers landed.
All in all nothing happened but it did make me realise a number of things:
1. How quickly things can change – we went from a normal spring day to a disaster of major proportions within a few hours.
2. Worrying about things doesn’t really help. I was worried about things happening but they didn’t. So, the worrying was pointless.
3. Taking action helps. While I’m not sure how much difference it would have made, the act of hosing down the roof, keeping in touch with the news station and finding out about what was really going on by contacting the RFS made a difference to my ability to respond and gave me something to focus on, which I found helpful.
One thing that always comes out of situations like this is the amazing selflessness of some people. The Sydney Morning Herald told of Sergio Rosato, the Principal of St Thomas Aquinas Primary School in Springwood, who did an incredible job of evacuating the school, knowing that his own home had been destroyed and never mentioning it.
So, in these very challenging times, we wish everyone all the very best for a safe summer.