FIRES across Victoria are spreading faster as firefighters battle with sudden changes to conditions, according to CFA district six operations officer Mark Gunning.
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"We're seeing more fires with climate shift and we're seeing hotter fires building faster with climate shift so we need to explore all the technology and all the available tools that are available to meet those challenges but they've got to be balanced with the safety of firefighters," Mr Gunning said.
His comment comes after Opposition Leader Bill Shorten promised $101 million to set up a national aerial bushfire fighting fleet of aircraft, with up to six large air water tankers and 12 helicopters.
Mr Gunning said helicopters and rappel crews were already being used successfully across the state in remote areas.
"We have aerial insertion capability in Victoria that has served us well and continues to," he said. This is the practice of a crew being flown into a remote area via helicopter and abseiling down to the ground.
Mr Gunning said a rappel crew was recently used in Gippsland, where firefighters abseiled to the ground to cut out three helipads to allow the helicopter access.
Mr Shorten's fleet will include a team of "smokejumpers" - firefighters who would rappel from helicopters armed with chainsaws, hoes and other tools to set up containment lines around fires in remote areas.
The units are used in the US, where firefighters parachute in to remote areas.
Mr Gunning said Victoria already used the practice of rappelling from helicopters, but he was unsure whether the type of smokejumpers used overseas would be needed across Victoria.
"They probably wouldn't have helped us during the St Patrick's Day bushfires," Mr Gunning said.
"Smokejumpers are used to put crews into areas that have very little or limited road access and we certainly didn't have that issue on St Patrick's Day.
"I could only think of a few remote spots in the Grampians where you might need them."
Mr Shorten said Australia's firefighters and emergency services did an excellent job but needed more support from the government to support the community.
"At the moment, Australia doesn't have a government-owned fleet of water bombing aircraft - making us reliant on borrowing from private companies domestically and from overseas," he said.
"The bushfire season in Australia is lengthening and already overlapping with the northern hemisphere, increasing the risk that we won't be able to access aircraft we need at times of peril."
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