Saturday 14 February 2009

Bushfires

So, everyone is worried about the bushfires. With good reason, the official death count was 181 yesterday, with lots of people still unaccounted for.

Guess where I was on that Saturday? I was at a wedding!

Guess where the wedding was? It was at Heidleberg-Kinglake rd.

That would be THAT Kinglake. (It isn't however, the wedding that was in the newspaper.)

We (meaning me and Adam) missed the turnoff to the winery and ended up right where the police were busy turning people back. One of them was like, "You have to go bak! There's chaos all around!" Which was true, but that's not what you tell people who are driving looking for a wedding. One of the most important things in a bushfire situation is to remain calm.

So, we turned back, found the winery a few km way, had the wedding, where the water went off, the power went off, the police turned up looking for two kids who had gotten cross withh their parents and run away from home (right near a bushfire situation) (they found both kids at the winery, skulking in the driveway.) To show how oblivious I am to all this: I thought the lights went off for atmospheric purposes.

Guess I am calm in bushfire situations.

Everyone left safely, and presumably soon after we left the winery was engulfed in flames. It is in that area. It don't know.



So, part two.

I had a mum very panicy as she was picking her daughter up at work. Because we could see masses of smoke, quite near. Turns out it was from the Ivanhoe fire. I calmed her, told her in the unlikely event it got near to Kew, then to make sure you had plenty of water, and meds, and stay in your house. Houses are far safer than outside them for bushfires.

I got to feel like an expert for this. My family are prepared to survive pretty much any natural disaster that comes. Except flood. We only have two life jackets in the attic. But we have plans for all contagious diseases (ie SARS) house fires, and bushfires. Earthquakes don't happen in Australia. And, as my mum says, we're not too likely to have a flood either.

So, who else has bushfires stories?

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