Sean Skinner from Albury, Matt Mill from Riverina Highlands, John Russell from the Southern Border Team at Albury and Tyler Nicholson from South West Area Command.
Firefighters from the three NSW Rural Fire Service teams that cover the Southern Riverina were put to the test last week, all in aid of getting prepared for the fire season.
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Joining with other firefighters from across the state, they participated in a three day exercise simulating a major fire incident at Mathoura.
The event was hosted by the Mid Murray RFS which covers the Jerilderie district, at the Deniliquin Emergency Operations Centre.
Also involved was the Southern Border Team which includes Berrigan Shire, and the Murrumbidgee Irrigation Area team which covers other parts of Murrumbidgee Council.
There were 25 firefighters involved in total, with some coming from as far as Sydney.
The exercise simulated a fire which ignited in farmlands at Bunnaloo, with a fire front of about 24km consuming grassland, ready to harvest crops, killing small numbers of livestock and destroying at least one shed in the first 24 hours.
When the Southern Riverina News attended on day two of the three day simulation, the ‘fake’ fire had been held up before reaching the Mathoura township but was still not under control.
Embers had created five new spot fires in the Gulpa Island section of the Murray Valley National Park.
Albury's Andrew Bevan with Deni's Kerrie Godfrey.
All exercise participants were engrossed in their work as if the fire was actually occurring, taking updates from the ‘fire ground’, updating maps, updating forecasts, deploying firefighters to the most at risk areas, and even taking questions from the media.
At the time of leaving, the communications team was preparing to head into a simulated meeting with the Mathoura community on the potential risks.
Sydney-based operational officer Ben Albers, who was public liaison officer for the purpose of the exercise, said the multi-agency task was about being prepared for any possible scenario that might occur this summer.
“We have a large team in operations, in logistics, plant and public information,” Mr Albers said on Wednesday.
“This incident is a fire in the Mathoura area, and it is a three day exercise.
“As well as firefighters we have National Parks and Wildlife Service, government agencies like the Reconstruction Authority (formerly Resilience NSW), police and the SES taking part.
“It is all about preparing for the upcoming bush fire season, and testing the functions of the operations centre.
“The season starts on October 1 traditionally, but it could start a little earlier or later in some areas depending on conditions.”
Temora's Jason Bortolazzo (back) with Diane Lippiatt and John Eyles of Wagga and Deni's Wes Follett.
In addition to the 25 RFS volunteers involved in the training, another 10 to 15 volunteers from the varied agencies were running the exercise.
From another room, they were feeding information to the operations centre and implementing scenarios they had to navigate.
Communicating with the media formed part of the exercise, with three participants assessed on giving fire briefings to Southern Riverina News content manager Zoe McMaugh.
This included John Russell from the Southern Border Team, who is our media contact within the organisation already.
The Deniliquin exercise was one of several incident management training sessions being held across the state ahead of the fire season and concluded on Thursday.
SRN content manager Zoe McMaugh with Sydney-based operational officer Ben Albers (left) and Southern Border Team Inspector John Russell after the first simulated media briefing.
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