Windellama Rural Fire Brigade - General Notices

You can monitor the latest Windellama weather on your mobile @ www.windellama.bushfirebrigade.com.au/mobile

Windellama Community Engagement Day

At Windellama Bushfire Brigade Shed Saturday November 26th -
Please arrive at 10.30am for an 11am Start


Right at the start of the Bushfire Season the volunteers at your local brigade, want to assist the community..

PREPARE . ACT. SURVIVE

A very important community engagement day will be held at the Windellama Fireshed on Saturday 26th November at 11am. The day will directly assist locals to help Prepare. Act. Survive this fire season. Some of the topics will include detailed information on the new Neighbourhood Safer Places, a step by step guide in completing your "Bushfire Survival Plan" information about the new AIDER program (which is an RFS funded program to assist people who feel they are unable to prepare their homes adequately).

The brigade would also like to discuss the plans we have in place if a large fire were to occur, regarding communication the message to the wider community. (including information on the new alert levels - ADVICE- WATCH & ACT - EMERGENCY WARNING )

We will be displaying some of the technology we are using along with the appliances we use (our big red trucks) to help inform and protect people against the threat of fire.

If you could please bring a plate of cakes to share afterwards - tea & coffee will be provided..

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The Simple FDI Calculator is now available as a Free iPhone App : Search "Simple FDI" in App Store

All the guys at last training day undertaking some important fire trail clearing for the upcoming fire season

THE NEXT BRIGADE TRAINING DAY

will be January 28th at 1pm followed by the meeting at 6pm

 

ELECTED POSITIONS 2011/2012
Captain Rex Hockey Snr Deputy Captain Lynton Roberts Deputies Jim Meehan Marten Schutterups Dave Edworthy Sam Daniel Paul Alessi Ashley Armstrong Noel Sylvester Graham Kinder Wayne Back	President Graham Kinder Secretary Ellen Sylvester Treasurer Keith Scorrar Other Positions: Equipment Officer/s Allan Martin Doug Gurney Community Liason Officer T.B.A. (newly Created position)	Training Officer/s Wayne Back Ashley Armstrong Health and Safety Officer Peter Pokorny Communications Officer Bev McGaw Information Officer/s Bev McGaw Catering Officer Cathy Meehan Assistant Catering Officer Jacqui Gurney

A Big Thanks to Jim Meehan for being a great Captain over the past few seasons & congratulations
to Rex Hockey who has been elected Windellama Brigade Captain at the AGM.

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You can also download your blue forms here

Graham Kinder has also prepared a comprehensive pre-insident plan for the Windellama Brigade
This is available as a PDF file. (2.2Meg) Thanks Graham for your efforts..

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THANKS FOR THOSE WHO SUPPORTED THIS YEARS FUNDRAISING AUCTION
"THE MONEY RAISED GOES TOWARDS HELPING THE BRIGADE MAINTAIN
IT'S ABILITY TO SERVE THE LOCAL WINDELLAMA COMMUNITY WELL."

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Dave Edworthy from the brigade recently attended the 2011 Australasian Community Engagement & Fire Awareness Conference. Talking about how the Windellama Brigades Website Provides up to the minute weather & fire information,
Including Dynamic FDI to both the community members and frontline bushfire fighters.

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Scenes from the 2011 Windellama Country Fair

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Click Here for the Shoalhaven River Monitor for Live Time Data from Hillview Near Oallen Ford .
According to observations, when the monitor indicates being over 2.2 mtrs,
water will be level with the cement causway at Oallen Ford crossing

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Looking at the edge of our Windellama Bushfire Brigade Boundry - The Shoalhaven River Gorge

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Graham Kinder Driving Windellama 1

Windellama has at last taken delivery of an RFS Cat1 Tanker to add to our appliances. We have retired the old Cat 1
tanker and Graham Kinder had the first test drive at our last training day. Graham Kinder is the latest driver in the brigade
to gain his MR licence. The Windellama Bushfire Brigade now has a full compliment of trucks including 2 Cat 7's a Cat 2
and the Cat 1. So with all our drivers and crews, we are well prepared for the fire season.

 

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BRIGADE OPEN DAY 2010

Our Annual Open Day was September 25th which also saw additional Plaques added to our new
Memorial Wall, there are approximately forty plaques on the Wall now, commemorating past
members who played an active role in our local Bushfire Brigade. A considerable number of
families attended and partook of our sausage sizzle.
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A Recently attended Motor Vehicle fire on Windellama Road.

You can Click Here to see further video footage

"Bush Fire Survival Plan"
Prepare. Act. Survive.

CLICK HERE to Download a PDF copy

Thanks to a great deal of hard work from Brigade Deputy Captain, Paul Alessi. Windellama 9 Bravo has been purchased by the National Museum in Canberra. There was a feature article on Canberra Stateline.

Click Here to View the Stateline Footage - October 2009

The new look FDI Sign - Released September 2009
" CLICK HERE -- New FDI Ratings"

A BIG thank you to all those who attended our Brigade Open Day & the official opening of our memorial wall. Over 120 people attended this event, and was another fine example of the Windellama community supporting local events.

The memorial wall - Officially opened 26th September 2009

2009-2010 - ANNUAL DUES BLUE FORMS  Click Here To Download a Printable PDF Copy

Windellama Public School - Hazard Reduction Burn

Windellama Public School - Lending a helping hand !

Tree-changers and bushfires target of new study
Last year our brigade was part of a study by Christine Eriksen form the University of Woolongong.
Click Here to View

The following shots are from the Claypit Road Fire in January. The fire was the largest in our brigade area this year. Other local brigades were also quick to respond & help in the efforts of stopping & blacking out the fire. For those interested in the mobile broadband antennas that we have been using [Click Here]

Capturing Live images to send back to Fire Control

One of the images transmitted (3 images per min are uploaded to the website)

Paul Alessi attended the Victoria Bushfires earlier this year - just CLICK HERE for an online preview of some footage of the aftermath of such a large fire.

The RFS have a new TV commercial. You can see this commercial on this website - just CLICK HERE for an online preview.

Tree-changers and bushfires target of new study
2 Jun 2009 | Bernie Goldie

A PhD student at the University of Wollongong is investigating the dynamics between bushfires, tree-changers and the Rural Fire Service in several NSW rural areas comparable to rural landscapes hardest hit by the devastating Victorian bushfires.

Despite the recognised bushfire hazard in many new rural landscapes, Ms Christine Eriksen a geographer from UOW's School of Earth and Environmental Sciences, said little was currently known about how local environmental knowledge on bushfires is produced and/or shared among diverse landowners in changing rural landscapes.

"And also how this influences the dynamics of NSW Rural Fire Services brigades and local natural resource management," Ms Eriksen said.

She is focusing her research on the three new rural landscapes of Kangaroo Valley in the Shoalhaven; the Nattai-Oakdale/Orangeville-Werombi area of Wollondilly Shire; and Windellama in the Goulburn-Mulwaree region.

[A new rural landscape is a rural area experiencing population growth as a result of its proximity to major urban areas or its high amenity value. With the influx of tree-changers (lifestylers), the ageing and/or decline of more traditional rural populations and the subdivision of farmland, lifestyles and values more commonly associated with urban areas are being brought into rural places, while conflict over land use and management practices in increasing]

The basic aims of Ms Eriksen's research are to:

• Identify landholders' attitudes and actions (or lack of) towards bushfire and bushfire management in new rural landscapes

• Identify what factors are significant in influencing the stance rural landholders take towards bushfires

"The study examines how landholders manage their land and prepare for bushfires and how people learn about bushfires and bushfire management," Ms Eriksen said.

Ms Eriksen said her project has revealed that many women do not engage with bushfire prevention, preparation and response.

“Instead, women tend to rely on the knowledge and ability of men which places them in a vulnerable position when a blaze approached their home.”

She has learnt this through a survey of about 350 rural landowners in the three new rural landscapes her project is targeting. Of those surveyed, only 24 per cent had fought a bushfire on their property or had helped a friend or family member protect their property.

Ms Eriksen said rural women she has spoken to have identified the need for female-only bushfire training courses as women discuss issues on a different level to men.

"Men are much more focused on fighting the fire rather than having strategies in place to get children and pets out," she said.

Ms Eriksen recently presented her findings to the Rural Fire Service and hopes to have her research published. The Rural Fire Service presentation was as part of a group from Professor Ross Bradstock’s Centre for Bushfire Risk Management.

Ms Eriksen's PhD supervisors are Dr Nick Gill (Earth and Environmental Sciences); Professor Lesley Head (Earth and Environmental Sciences) and Professor Ross Bradstock (Institute of Conservation Biology).

Her project has received funding from the UOW Research Partnerships Grant with the NSW Rural Fire Service; Bushfire Co-operative Research Centre Project Funding; and from GeoQuEST Small Grants.

Further Information on this story visit http://media.uow.edu.au/news/UOW060276.html

To Download the full report in PDF- 466kb [Click Here]