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Brigade Training

December Highlights:

A Practical Exercise with Kaye and John from Area Office. On Sunday 5th December; crews were exposed to a number of practical exercises orchestrated by our visiting ATSO Kaye Healing. Practice included drills for crew leaders in incident control and well as general crew duties. Incident response to small rubbish fires as well as grass fires were scenarios undertaken.

The pinnacle of the day was when vehicles were used simultaneously to pump water from the creek; through a transfer unit to deliver the water to a unit protecting the station over 200 metres away.

Chucka bounding up the hill.

Success.

Dave started the training off in December with a run through of maintenance issues.

November Highlights:

November saw members get a refresher in the use of GPS and mapping. Amy organised a fun day in the wilderness for the crews to practice their skills and Chucka showed off the enhanced ISU Trailer.

Smiles all round; no-one lost. Team Tango One the race; just.

 

September Highlights:

The Brigade covered hand tools, pumps and foam application in the field at the September training day. We revisited the scene of the hazard reduction burn from a few weeks prior to see how the landscape recovered after a low intensity burn. The field was surprising green and yet there were still some hollow trees smoldering; an irony in itself.

August Highlights:

The Brigade tries to cover a wide variety of training through the year but on four occasions, we cover the basics. This is what we covered this month. These skills and drills days cover vehicle familiarisation, hose and nozzle drills and case drills.

A long distance case 1, putting water on a simulated fire direct from the appliance through the hose, or multiple lengths of hoses in this case.

Case 2, applying water direct from a stand pipe to the hose and nozzle. Case 3 is taking water from a stand pipe to an appliance and then out again through a hose / nozzle. JB running through the exercise with Jason and Michael.

Case 4 is drafting water from a static water source. In this case, the team found the nearby creek had plenty of fresh clean water to play with. In this shot, Matt and Neil get the plumbing on RV41 working.

Chucka, Matt and Daniel get the plumbing on RV51 a run through.

 

July Highlights:

The major training activity in July was a large hazard reduction burn at White Rock. To see the story, please Click Here.

June Highlights:

The Brigade covered structural protection in the IZone in June. Our guest trainer for the theory session this month was Gary a.k.a Chucka who did a great job for his first go. On the Sunday, the Brigade went into the field and looked at practical considerations and some hands on drills to cover property protection in our various situations within the Brigade's area.

Members were pleasantly surprised at how well the vast majority of property owners in the Valley have prepared their buildings in case of wildfire. For example, crews inspect a property selected at random along Wards Road.

The local water tank located on Bowles Road was visited. It was quite clear on inspecting paddocks nearby that those which have not had live stock on displayed a considerable build up of fuel in some areas.

Discussions were held on practical approaches to property protection and how to overcome situational challenges.

Some hands on skills practice also formed part of the day. Well done team, pity about the snake, but that's another story and a new set of pants.

The famous carport with a tree growing through it is still there.

The crews headed to Deebing Heights for the final part of the day.

Dave rounded off the afternoon with a practical run down on considerations in defending these newer acreage properties bordering onto scrub land. Thanks to all of those who came along.

May Highlights:

The brigade joined forces with Pine Mountain RFB in May to conduct a hazard reduction burn in their area and utilised the event as a great training day.

A sea of rural firefighters surround the Pine Mountain RFB Station.

A quick briefing and a further introduction of the Incident Support Unit trailer.

One section of the perimeter track needed tidying up and so it was a great place to practice on rake hoe work.

But when you are in a hurry; the blowers are a great tool.

Fire on the ground and members where given some pointers on fire behavior and safety.

Patrolling the edge and blacking out, Michael gives Jason and Peter a hand.

Peter and Jason at their first hazard reduction burn. Their yellows didn't stay that clean for long.

All smiles as the afternoon wound down. from the left, Jason S, Mee Mee G, Jason P, and Tony S.

Crews gather for a debrief to end the day. Thanks to all who attended.

March Highlights:

The team split into multiple streams for the training in March. A Volunteer Induction Course was held for our newest members and advanced maintenance was covered for senior members.

February Highlights:

The training for February included an area visit on a rainy day to look at IZone issues. The changing approach to fighting bushfires on the doorstep of suburbia has to be clearly understood by rural firefighters.

Night training covered firefighter safety and night skills such as silent signals for directing vehicles. Luckily all survived the class with-out and damage reported. Dave ran through theory associated with safety, risks, PPE and other issues rural firefighters need to understand as basic knowledge.

January Highlights:

Selected members from the Brigade participated in a chainsaw level 3 course on the 16th January hosted by Robin from Interlink Training Services. Three members from Greenbank RFB also attended.

Teams were set up with the aim of tackling difficult trees in a number of procedures. Generally the trees had to be brought down under control in a direction that they might not naturally lean towards.

JB, Squirt and George had to bring a tree down using a rope and winch. The first challenge was to get the rope over a high enough branch. The bad news was that none of us could throw the rope up accurately. The good news was that JB found a long stick.

 

Connecting the rope to the winch.

George doing the easy bit with the chainsaw.

Meanwhile; Chucka, Matt and Daniel tried out a T Cut utilising a wedge.

The guys from Greenbank tried other methods. No injuries reported so all must have went well.

There was one challenging tree identified due to interaction with another tree nearby and so Robin had to help out but it was a good lesson to make sure you get rid of any nearby trees that could ruin an ego. Not mentioning any names but needless to say, Squirt had to have another go.

Meanwhile back at Team Chucka; life was easy.

The gallery looks on from a safe distance as Squirt gets his next tree spot on.

Robin finished up illustrating how to cut down a triple sucker tree which could have easily gone all over the place.

Great day guys; thanks for your efforts.

To view last years training activities, please Click Here.