Hi Gary,

Thanks for the update, that is extremely sad news. I do remember back in Jan 2003 during the Canberra bushfires climbing on the roof and slipping but luckily didn't come off, later on I read more people got seriously injured falling off roofs than getting burn't. Reading your post about Peter makes me even more scared about getting up on the roof but unfortunately the gum trees about here fill the gutters up pretty quickly.

I notice you are in a Yellow outfit, around 2004 I joined the Canberra Community Fire Unit that is the volunteer run part of the local fire brigade and we wear a blue outfit so we can be easily distinguished from the professionals. My outfit was tight during the fires last year and now that I have been working from home sitting in front of a computer do 50 hour weeks rewriting code trying to get some performance on our machines (I expect COVID has caused number of transactions to have increased over 500%) I am sure the outfit will be very tight or not fit at all, I should probably try it now and see if I can get a bigger one issued to me.

I remember last December/January with temperatures of around 43 degrees and smoke so thick I could only see maybe 100 metres, add to that the Hail storms, floods and Coronavirus this year is one I don't really want to repeat. I just hope we don't get fires like last year again.

Thanks
Chris

Congratulations well done. Could do with you and your fellow Firefighters out here in Colorado we have 7 wildfires blazing one at over 60,000 acres no containment another approaching 50,000 acres with no containment. It is very hot and dry the monsoon rains didn't happen and the snow is forecast to arrive later this year. Going to be a long summer.

Well done Gary.
May you always remain safe when on duty.
Thanks for the update on Peter. Such a shame. Please do pass on my regards when you next get to see him.

My brother and his wife are members of a CFU in the northern suburbs of Sydney. They find that wearing the full kit in Summer is tougher than fighting fires.

Graham & Richard,
I have managed to track down Pete this morning and have just got off the phone to him. He was delighted to receive your best wishes.
I have encouraged him to log on to TM now that he has a new computer and network facilities - hopefully we can expect a blast from the past soon.

Thankyou britmog.
Australia was very grateful for the support U.S. firefighters provide during the last bush fire season.
COVID will make this a more difficult season but all of us in Oz ask you to stay safe and well.

Good spot Chris. I have been using "hand me down" gear in training and have just received my complete new kit from helmet to boots.
I reckon there must be about A$1,200.00 worth of stuff.

Thanks Gary, it would be great to see him back on here posting

Yes the gear is very uncomfortable but would not be cheap. Mine is 6 years old and I have done a lot of training sessions but luckily only put it on for a fire once, I was told the boots wear in but not so yet. I have some steel capped boots I bought my self for working in the garden that I wore for the real fire and glad i did.

I was in the Mundaring shire bushfire brigade in WA in the 80s early 90s . I remember 1991 was a particularly bad year for fires in WA we had a great bunch of volunteers back then we bought most of our own kit and one of our crew built a pump run by an old Holden engine On the back of an old Bedford for knocking fires out in the tops of trees it was very affective . I have a picture somewhere of us playing cricket against the Conservation and land management Team on rare summer weekend off ,I’m sure you’ll enjoy the same great team spirit we had . Sorry to hear about your mate Take care and good luck