Grampians bushfire update

Australian Community Media

VicEmergency provide an update about the fire situation in Grampians (Gariwerd) National Park on January 21 at 8.20pm. Video by VicEmergency - Grampians

Transcript

00:00It broke a lookout fire, spurs picked up on Sunday night, small fire below the lookout.

00:11Crews went in on Sunday night and did some work as much as they could given the terrain

00:15so difficult and dangerous to work in.

00:18We resumed on Monday morning and we got in some fire bombers and some helitacks to try

00:24and knock down the flames with the aircraft and they did a great job in doing that.

00:29We put a line of retardant which was spread out by the fire bombers and able to put the

00:35edge right around the fire.

00:37With that, we then had ground crews coming in behind that and running out canvas hose

00:41down a steep hill to help out with the mopping up work.

00:44We also went in with rake hoes and axes and cut a trail all the way around the outside

00:49as well.

00:50The retardant won't actually stop the fire, it only slows the spread of the fire so the

00:55fire can eventually burn underneath that retardant so we needed to go in behind that

00:59and put a mineral earth break in.

01:01So the crews worked all day yesterday and into the night last night to put that rake

01:06hoe trail in which was unbelievable given the extremely hot conditions and extremely

01:11steep terrain.

01:12It's so steep in there it's even difficult to stand up, let alone walk and work in there

01:17so the crews did a magnificent job yesterday to be able to get that containment line around

01:22it.

01:23In that terrain there, the fallback is a long way back, there are very little places we

01:29can put control lines in so we've been falling right back to Halls Gap and up to Roses Gap

01:35to the north.

01:36Potentially another 30,000 hectares of park could have been burnt.

01:41There has been detected a campfire here in the area of origin where this fire started

01:47from so we have investigators there at the moment trying to link that up just to ensure

01:52who actually is the cause of it but it's difficult for the fire investigators at the

01:56moment because there's hazardous trees burning in there so it's not safe for them to be able

02:00to investigate it fully at the moment.

02:02That will continue on but it does highlight just how dangerous campfires can be at this

02:08time of year.

02:09There's certainly stringent conditions people have to have if they're going to have a campfire.

02:14Make sure it's in a properly constructed fireplace, a purpose built fireplace and it's attended

02:19at all times because one little spark that can be blown out can easily start a bushfire.

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