There are 10 firefighters rostered on to every shift compared with only three just two years ago, station officer David Black said. 

That means four firefighters are rostered on to two of the appliances and two for the transporter each shift.

Overall, the number of professional firefighters stationed at Warrnambool has increased from about 16 to 45. “It’s a massive plus for the district,” Mr Black said. 

Fighting alongside them are about 30 volunteer firefighters from the Warrnambool brigade – about 15 who turn out to fires and another 15 who take on non-operational roles. “They’re an important cog in the wheel,” Mr Black said. “We need the volunteers just as much as they require our assistance as well.”

NEW FEMALE RECRUITS

Along with the influx of new staff is two women who arrived at the station about a month ago.

Women now make up three to five per cent of Victorian career firefighters.  “Diversity is a massive discussion at the moment,” Mr Black said. “Warrnambool hasn’t had a female for a long time.”

Both Linky Grimmer and Lisa Wadling decided to swap their careers as high school teachers for professional firefighters.

Mum-of-one, Ms Grimmer was sent to Portland when she graduated in December, and mum-of-two Ms Wadling followed when she graduated in July. Now they have transferred to Warrnambool.

“I wanted some new learning. I was feeling a bit stale and wanted opportunities to spend more time with my family that teaching didn’t give me,” Ms Wadling said.

Ms Grimmer, who comes from a family of teachers, also decided to try out for the fire brigade after a friend suggested it.

“They are trying to get more women in and I think a lot of it comes down to women just don’t think it’s something to do,” she said.

The women said the process to get into the brigade could take up to a year, or longer, from when you apply  with the benchmarks that have to be passed held sometimes months apart.

They said they had to pass the same physical testing as their male counterparts so everyone on the truck had the same skills when they arrived at a fire.

And the number of people who apply can far outnumber those that are selected. Mr Black said 3500 applied at the same time as him but only 280 were selected.

JUMP IN CALL-OUTS

The number of call-outs for Warrnambool fire brigade has risen to 700 compared with about the usual 400-500.

Firefighter Ben Wolff said the rise followed the arrival of a number of new appliances at the station that had capabilities beyond just fighting fires.

“With the new appliances coming on, we’re doing a different role which means we’re getting out the door a little bit more,” he said.

Those appliances include the new technical rescue vehicle which has been used more than a dozen times since it arrived in March, including to rescue a women who had been injured after falling down a mechanic’s pit.

It was also used when they were called to help recover the body of a man killed when a trench collapsed. “That was probably the most complex job we’ve been to,” Mr Black said.

The truck is equipped with both timber and air-operated speed shoring which pushes large panels of timber into trench walls and holds back the soil so it doesn’t cave in, Mr Black said. “The role’s changed a lot.”

The brigade has also recently taken on the Emergency Medical Response role supporting Ambulance Victoria.

“We’re pretty much out the door to all priority 000 calls. They are everything from respiratory problems, no  breathing, heart attacks, unconscious,” Mr Black said.

Now that the brigade is responding a more diverse range of jobs, the mental health of the officers has become a priority.

“We’re dealing with a lot of complex situations so the mental stability and strength we need to get through to the end of our career is pretty paramount,” Mr Black said.

“We’ve gone from just the run-of-the-mill car fire, house fire. We go, we put water on the hot stuff, we go home, to now dealing with the human factor. It’s a little bit more raw now.”

QUICK RESPONSE

The 24-hour station, which runs on a four-on four-off roster of 14-hour nights and 10-hour days, staffs three vehicles each shift.

Just which vehicle they take depends on the type of job – for some they use their relatively new aerial pumper equipped with camera gear, for others they may take the tanker that can be used by either career firefighters or volunteers.

Mr Black said that with the brigade out the door within 90 seconds of a call, firefighters would arrive on scene long before Victoria Police could fly someone from Melbourne. “That 90 seconds is the key. It’s where we come into our own,” he said.

The CFA volunteers have a response time of nine minutes.

“When the fire calls aren’t happening, we’re busy training for those fire calls,” Mr Black said.

Mr Wolff said each day starts with a muster to work out who is assigned to which truck, so when a call comes in they know exactly what to do.

Each truck is then checked and set up for the driver. Then it’s more training or simulating a potential job.

They might also be inspecting buildings, or walking though festival venues to do a risk assessment.

“We do that constantly. We might drive down a couple of streets and say: ‘This house is on fire at the rear, how are we going to play on the day’,” Mr Black said.

“You’d be surprised. I used to drive around the suburbs of Dandenong and Doveton doing the exact same thing and crazy enough you’d be back there at some point over the next five years.”

Mr Wolff, a plumber by trade, swapped careers and was stationed at Ballarat as a rookie but when a job came up at his hometown of Warrnambool last year, he jumped at the chance – mainly because of the specialist equipment they now have. The Warrnambool brigade is now preparing for the coming summer season and hoping there is no repeat of last year’s St Patrick’s Day fires.

Mr Black said it was a fire unlike any he’d witnessed before. 

“The conditions of that night and the behaviour of the fires were something I’ve never experienced,” he said. “The timing was perfect for absolute chaos.”