NSW Rural Fire Service volunteers call for equipment & communications upgrades

ABC News By Vanessa Milton, Kerrin Thomas, and Claire Wheaton 24 August 2020

• Some volunteers are using old trucks with sprinklers that can only be turned on from the outside

• Some firefighters were unable to defend their homes in the last bushfire season due to communications failures

• The NSW Cabinet has signed off on all 76 recommendations of the bushfire inquiry

Frontline firefighters from some of the state's smallest brigades are urging the NSW Rural Fire Service to fast-track upgrades to equipment and communications which were revealed by last season's bushfires to have potentially deadly failures.

Some crews feel they are being treated like "sacrificial lambs" being sent out in old and dangerous equipment. Their concerns are being raised ahead of the NSW bushfire inquiry recommendations being made public tomorrow. The State Government tonight decided to implement all 76 recommendations.

RFS volunteer Peter Heward from Rockton, on the NSW-Victoria border, said he was left unable to protect his own neighbourhood because the RFS failed to plan for emergency communications in a known blackspot. With no radio or phone reception, fire crews were forced to remain on the edge of Rockton as it burned.

Mr Heward, who also serves with Fire and Rescue NSW, said he could only listen to what he described as a "sonic rumble" as his house burnt down. "It hits you in your bones, knowing that it was my house and there was nothing I could do, because we weren't sending any firefighters down to protect my area," he said. "The RFS is responsible for this area, we're in their patch. They are aware that this is a communications blackspot, they knew the fire was coming." Click here to read the full article