Firefighters battles blazes near Gazette, Victoria

ABC NEWS (Australia)

Fire fighters are dealing with blazes in Gazette, Victoria.  Elle Moyle has been a volunteer firefighter for 6 years in the area and says this summer will be tiring for all.

Transcript

00:00Yesterday was, we knew it was going to be a horrific fire day, so we were all planned

00:08and ready to defend properties and help out whoever needed it, but early in the day when

00:15the winds got quite bad and very gusty, fire started up about 30 minutes south at Gazette,

00:24we had to leave here and head down there for a fairly significant fire on a property just

00:32surrounding the Gazette area, so there was two bushfires happening on both sides of us

00:39yesterday.

00:40There's been people there overnight, so it was fairly quick, there was very rapid response

00:44from the local CFA, huge amount of effort from the volunteers there and the local farmers

00:52with their private units as well as aircraft immediately attending, which really helped

00:57out getting it under control and protecting the assets, so yeah, we were hugely thankful

01:03for the response there and particularly the volunteers, the Gazette, the Gazette CFA volunteers

01:10are extremely good.

01:12We knew it was going to be a bad day and we tried to prepare as much as we could, it brings

01:16back a lot of memories of really severe fire days we've had in the past where we've had

01:21to fight fires, so there was a lot of anxiety and stress leading up to yesterday knowing

01:27how bad the conditions were and I think everyone just tried to be as prepared as possible being

01:32home on Boxing Day to try and defend and help whoever needed it.

01:37Everyone's checking in on everyone, doing as much as they possibly can, whether that's

01:41just supplying some food or emergency hay or housing or anything for the livestock or showing

01:49up and putting out the fire, it's really good, the community around here is amazing.

01:53It's going to be a really long, long summer, I'm only a few minutes from the mountains

01:59here at Dunkeld and there's smoke all day every day and I've got friends who are at

02:06massive risk at the moment with the current winds, so every time there's a wind change

02:11there's a new risk and it's going to be an exhausting summer staying on watch.

02:19For more UN videos visit www.un.org

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