Grassfire risk looking ‘grim’ mid season

FIRES: Yass Valley is in the thick of grassfire season and the outlook for the remainder of the summer continues to look pretty grim, according to Rural Fire Services.

Though no more so than other years, clarifies spokesman Superintendent Peter Dyce.

“It’s looking pretty grim at the moment, being dry and we haven’t had any rain; like any normal fire season actually,” he told Scoop.

“We’re right in the middle of it [the fire season] and people have just got to be careful.”

When Scoop spoke to him this afternoon he was returning from another small fire near Gundaroo which had burnt between three to four hectares. Initial unconfirmed reports suggest it may have had a mechanical ignition.

“All it takes is to get a thistle caught in the exhaust of a farmer’s motorbike without them noticing and next thing you know, you’ve got a trail of fire.”

He said the dry weather had increased the amount of fuel throughout the district, although he was pleased conditions hadn’t been too windy when fires broke out recently.

Volunteers from brigades at Bookham, Kangiara, Binalong, Murrumbateman, Gunning, Jeir, Oolong, Wallaroo, Dalton and Manton have been kept busy during the Christmas / New Year break attending several grassfires in the area.

On Saturday, 20 hectares burnt on Laverstock Road at Kangiara.

An earlier fire at Deepwater burnt seven hectares and is believed to have been ignited by a pump.

On January 10 a motorbike accident appears to have ignited grassland in the Kangiara region, burning 20 hectares of land after flames escaped into the hills. A larger fire three weeks earlier burnt 200 hectares.

Supt Dyce said, “There’s a lot of dry grass / fuel out there on the ground at the moment and it just needs a spark and we’ve got a fire.

“We’ve been very fortunate that we haven’t had a lot of wind when these fires have started, too. With windy weather they travel very quickly.”

The RFS advises residents to prepare for a grass fire by knowing your risk in the area where you live, pre-planning what action you will take in the event of a fire, preparing your home by performing regular maintenance and checking your insurance cover, being aware of what you need to do if there is a disaster in your area, and looking out for each other by sharing information with neighbours, family and friends.

A grass fire burnt 200 hectares on Wargeila Road on December 21, 2015.