It was the summer of 1994 and the weather forecasts for Sydney were dire. Hot north westerly gale force winds with no relief in sight. There was a lot of tinder on the ground (branches and leaves) and the valleys run perpendicular to the wind so that the flammable eucalyptus fumes (from the trees) build up and don’t get blown away.
Like most extreme forecasts, this one was accurate and a small fire, to the northwest of Sydney, suddenly turned into a fast moving fire front that jumped a major river and a six lane highway to threaten Sydney’s northern suburbs.
I was working in the office remotely testing and processing fault reports on our customer’s telephone lines. We were understaffed as a few of our colleagues were in the Volunteer Bushfire Fighting Service and had been called up for duty.
This wasn’t work in the usual sense – it was trying to maintain sanity in an insane world. Pleasant ‘leafy’ suburbs became flash points, color coded maps showing ‘no go zones’ to protect our field staff, the press ringing us and pretending to be customers wanting updates on the fires, real customers demanding a fault restore date on their phone line (when they no longer had a house), sleeping under our desks as we were on 24 x 7 shifts.
I managed to get a break from the office by volunteering to drive a group of workman to a waiting boat at a pier on the most northern Sydney suburb of Palm Beach. The workman all lived north of Sydney and would commute up and down the (now closed) highway. They were worried about their families so a boat was arranged to bypass the fire and get them home.
We left at dusk and had a smooth trip north, as the fire had not yet reached the coastal suburbs. We got to the point where the land splits into a peninsula (like a tapering finger pointing north) with the ocean to the east and a long narrow bay (one to two miles wide) on the western side. At this point, we were stopped by the emergency services and told we could go no further. The fire had reached the shoreline on the other side of the bay and they were worried that it would jump the width of the bay and burn out some very exclusive suburbs.
After some very quick talking, we got permission to keep going and we even got a fire engine escort. The road turned from the ocean to the bay side of the peninsula and you get a view of the western shore across the water.
Evening had turned to ruddy night and the view reminded me of those surreal river scenes out of the movie ‘Apocalypse Now’. The western shore was on fire, in places right down to the water line. Every now and then we would see a massive fire ball roll upwards into the sky. At one stage, I heard a workman mutter ‘S**t, that was a house’. On our side, there were pockets of thick smoke and the sky was filled with glowing red sparks, always coming from the western shore to land on our side of the bay (what is known as ember attack).
We reached our destination and the workmen walked slowly to the awaiting boat. In the red glow I could see both relief and anxiety on their faces. The trip back down the peninsula was via a very narrow and winding road that hugged the ocean cliffs but this route did not give complete protection from the fire. Black, smoking gum leaves were still landing on the windscreen and the wipers wouldn’t clear them. An hour later found me back in the relative safety of the office – a lot older and a bit wiser.
The fire lasted for days hitting the coastal suburbs bordering bushland, before a wind change from the south brought some relief for the northern suburbs but at the cost of causing the same problems for Sydney’s southern suburbs.
In closing, my friend came back to work after his Volunteer Bushfire Fighting Unit saw action on the major river, north of Sydney. He told me of the team arguing whether to cross the river and set up containment lines to try and save a small township. They all felt a shock wave and looked as the whole valley (filled with eucalyptus fumes) exploded in a huge fire ball.
If they had been in that township, they would have had no warning, couldn’t outrun it or escape over the water, as a fireball of that size sucks all the oxygen out of the air.
This may give you an idea of the incredible courage displayed by all emergency personnel when attempting to save lives and property in these extreme situations.
There were plenty of other experiences during the '94 Sydney Bushfires' but these were 2nd or 3rd hand accounts (embellished with every telling) or were first hand but not associated with work.
For instance, I got a day off (when the fires had started to calm down) so I arranged to go 'rock fishing' with my friend at North Head. Statistically, rock fishing is THE most dangerous sport in Australia, so you always go with someone you trust (never alone). We hiked down 200 feet of bush track, then climbed down 100 feet of sandstone cliff and walked around the corner to the eastern facing rock ledge - ocean in front of you and 300 feet of cliff behind you.
We had been fishing for an hour when we started to notice (what looked like) black leaves floating down around us. One landed on my arm and I felt a warm sensation. To my surprise, I realized that it was a burnt leaf and was still hot. I took a closer look at the leaf and then yelled to my mate to pack up as we had to get out while we still could. This wasn't a gum leaf but something similar to an oak or maple leaf - in other words the leaf was not from a native tree, which meant we now had a fire somewhere in the suburbs!
Sure enough my 'brick' (work mobile phone) started to ring and I was recalled back to the office. On the way back up, we noticed that there was no fire in the near vicinity but there was black and brown smoke rising from a spot about 10 miles away in a northern arm of Sydney Harbor.
We rolled up at work and got out of the car to the sound of laughter from our work colleagues - we were still dressed in board-shorts, t shirts, life vests and rock shoes.
The fire was where we calculated but whether it was a 'spot' fire (these break out ahead of the main fire front) or arson (these sick puppies emerge from their holes when the weather forecast is ideal for fires) nobody knew.
