Bushfire

Silverback file
Enzo’s asleep. It’s 4 am. It’s been an unusual couple of days for the sparrow and I. I’ve been lying awake reflecting as you do...

Back on the Sunshine Coast our village has been under bushfire attack. The two photos show a bushfire approaching from the west. They are taken from the balcony of our neighbours apartment. The extra was taken just before the village was evacuated. You can just see a firefighting helicopter carrying a large bag of water on a long rope. It looks very insignificant compared to the size of the fire. At that stage it’s out of control and the first house has just burnt down in the village.

Amazingly when the fire was 500metres from the main village the wind changed. The fire passed north around the village and no other houses were lost. Very many firefighters spent two days bringing the situation under control. People were allowed back to their homes last night having spent two days either with friends or in evacuation centres

As you can imagine, the news reports emails and social media have been a deluge.

The pub announced it would serve dinner last night. I imagine that turned into quite a community event! Meanwhile the women’s clothing shops are advertising ‘smoke damage’ clearance sales. The chair of our body corporate thinks our major problem is that the swimming pool is full of ash and soot and we need the pool man asap tomorrow!

At the other end of the scale, one family has lost their house and everything in it. Several places have lost back fences or garden sheds. Three teenagers have been arrested for starting the fire, so somewhere in our little community (where everyone is connected by one degree of separation) three family’s are trying to figure how to manage the consequences of their kids nearly wiping out the village. I hope the trolls can show them some compassion!

Meanwhile we’re 1000km away in the dessert, taking photos of water birds and dinosaur footprints.

Life is fickle, it all changes in the blink of an eye. The vast majority of our village dodged a bullet this week. A handful of people’s lives have changed forever.