NSW RFS brigades have been supporting their communities for decades.
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The team from Kayuga Rural Fire Brigade operate from private property between Muswellbrook and Aberdeen, caring for the farmland and roads in their area, as well as assisting other crews at larger callouts.
In recent years, technological improvements have greatly upgraded their capacity.
“We’ve got alarms that actually come up as soon as [fire control] get the Triple Zero call that will actually alarm up on our phones,” senior deputy captain Stephen Lonergan said.
“So you sort of know where the area is and who’s going to get paged for it, which is good.”
“We haven’t had any really, big, disastrous fires in our own area here, but we back up Edinglassie and all the other brigades around us if there’s something in the area beside us,” deputy captain Jim Lonergan said.
“We’re close by, it doesn’t take us long to get to an incident and we know the area.
“If something happens we know how to get to it.”
Deputy captain Jayden Hollis said, while Kayuga was a relatively small brigade compared to those nearby, with around 13 members, it was an important asset for the locals.
”We’re 50 minutes to the last house and it is very important for the local area,” he said.
“We do get a lot of callouts actually, we’ve had about six in the last month.”
And, with the bush fire danger period starting on Friday, September 1, it’s unlikely the crew will be slowing down anytime soon.
“We cover the highway as well so we get a lot of car accidents and things like that,” Mr Hollis said.
“That keeps us fairly busy.
“If there’s anything we could tell the locals it would be to prepare now.
“Don’t leave it to an hour before the fire comes.”
The group said the state as a whole was dry, and, unless some rain arrived, it would be a hard summer.
“I don’t think we’ve seen rain like this since 2012, 2013, when we had those bad fires,” Mr Hollis said.
“But we train; we’re ready.”
“We’ve just gotta be all the more alert in this sort of weather that’s all,” added deputy captain Lonergan.
For more information on how you can prepare your property for summer ahead of the bush fire danger period, visit www.rfs.nsw.gov.au