To many firefighters in NSW, the past week has flown by in a blur. It has been an extreme start to the bushfire season and so many have done what seems so ordinary to them, but extraordinary to others. They’ve put aside their own lives to go and help others in need and often from some distance away.
With large fires, it’s not uncommon for this assistance to come from interstate. Quite often we see specialists including Incident Management Team members flown in from other states. It’s also fairly common for bush fire brigade volunteers to send firefighters and tankers to assist at these large fires.
This week though, we saw something a lot less common. Melbourne’s MFB sent a number of pumpers to Sydney, and they weren’t tasked to the actual bushfire incident. Instead, they were sent to a number of City fire stations to standby and respond to run of the mill calls, allowing Fire & Rescue NSW to utilise their urban crews and appliances in the bushfire efforts.
As I understand it, 10 MFB Pumpers were sent to Sydney. Their crew of 4 on each pumper were split into a day and night shift. FRNSW joined them to create a crew of 2 MFB and 2 FRNSW firefighters on each shift. They responded to all calls as normal and these are reported to include at least one structure fire.
I managed to catch a few of these around shift change, as the FRNSW appliances were returning to station. The MFB crews should be heading home today, as the intensity of the bushfire crisis eases.
More images available here
1 City of Sydney
3 The Rocks
19 Silverwater
22 Leichhardt
23 Gladesville – the MFB Pumper was hiding behind the closed roller door
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