Originally Posted by
Sunfish
Either my medication is haywire or it’s crazy time at Pprune.
12000 Professional rural firefighters? You couldn’t even afford their annual leave costs. They get meals, rest breaks, allowances, annual leave and paid training. Furthermore, they only work eight hour shifts as far as I can tell. Then what do you do with these folk outside the fire season? 12000 wouldn’t be enough anyway. By way of example, an “easy” 300 acre bushfire absorbed about twenty five tankers and 150+ firefighters for about twelve hours before Christmas. You have no idea of the scale of the fire response required - community supported volunteers are the only cost effective solution when you consider the scale and logistics required.
A squadron of CL415’s? Firefighters would die of old age waiting for Canberra Committees to release them. ...And who decides when there are competing priorities/ ScoMo and Bridget Mackenzie? Marginal seat analysis?
I have two Coulson Sea Kings and a fixed wing water bomber ten minutes from here. They can most certainly beat our tankers to most fires. Would I replace them with a Canberra based squadron? We would all be incinerated before Canberra could get off its backside and react.
It is not coincidental I would posit that in SA the fleet of SEATS are operated by Aerotech First Response. The name gives a clue as to the rationale - hit the fires early often as a response to possible smoke sighting only. Many times this is a false alarm but more often the bombers have done multiple drops before ground crews even get there. It’s a bit like survival in the sea or ocean - it’s what happens in the first short period of time that’s critical.
I am aware of course that the game changes if fires have been going for any length of time or in forest or mountainous terrain.