2009 Victorian Bushfires Royal Commission

Letters Patent issued 16 February 2009

Witness Statement of John Joseph Williams

I, John Joseph Williams, agricultural engineer, of Mitcham in the State of Victoria say as follows:

1. I am an agricultural engineer consultant to Gauri lnternational Corporation Pty Ltd.

2. Gauri International Corporation Pty Ltd (Gauri) is the owner of a vineyard property "= 3. This property is situated on the dead end section of Road on land rising up to the

Christmas Hills plateau. The landscape to the north and west is open forest, presenting an

area of very high fire danger.

4. The vineyard is at the end of a road about four kilometres out of town to the west of the Yarra

Glen township. The property has frontage to the Yarra River where it winds its way across the

Yerring Flats. The vine trellises run up the slope from the river to the foot of a range of

wooded hills, the Christmas Hills. These quite steep hills provide wind protection from the

west and the north, but also present a severe fire hazard.

5. As the woodlands continue further behind the hills, it would be expected that a fire moving up

the far slope would put us in extreme danger from ember fall out from fire on the far side of the

ridge. Wind from this quarter swirls over the ridge and becomes very turbulent. Any fire

bearing down would not maintain a constant direction but would swing around and progress at

differing rates.

6. The residence adjoining the vineyard is mostly solid brick with some brick veneer. The roof is

galvanised iron. The vineyard office and workshop building and the machinery shed are

located some 250 metres to the east of the residence. These buildings are steel framed and

galvanised iron clad. The office section is lined and insulated. Mown grass and an orchard

are between these locations. The widow of Gauri's founding managing director, Angela Dhar,

normally resides in the residence, but she also has a town house in Melbourne.

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GPO Box 4358 Melbourne VIC 3000 Tel: 1800 243 650 www.royalcommission.vic.gov.au

7. Located some 120 metres south east of the residence across mown grass is an in-ground wine

cellar also housing the 45,000 litre water tanks for the residence. This building is fully

insulated, recessed into the hillside and is considered totally fire-proof, but is usually securely

locked. Some 400 metres south east of the residence and adjacent to the embankment of the

larger of two dams on the property is a pump-house and propagation greenhouse. In the

pump-house are the main vineyard irrigation pump, two electric high pressure pumps and a

backup diesel engine and high pressure pump. Attachment JJW-I to this Statement is a

photograph showing the vineyard property - Fire Plan

Gauri directors and I rewgnised that the property was on a dead-end road, and that late

evacuation should a district fire occur may not be possible. As well as this, chances of

receiving CFA assistance would also be slim for the same reason. For these reasons, it was

decided when developing the property, that any people on the property during a fire had to be

securely protected.

We were aware of the very high risk to the properly. We decided that I should incorporate fire

prevention and protection measures into the development plans for this vineyard property.

These measures included:

Two large capacity water storage dams (one used also for vineyard irrigation and

garden and lawn watering);

Household drinking water tanks totally enclosed underground;

Mown grass areas around all buildings, with those to the north and west watered and

kept green;

A high pressure water system, supplied from the dam storage, reticulated to all

buildings and the northern face of the vineyard;

An uninterruptible high pressure water supply from twin electric pumps backed up by a

diesel engine equipped with an automatic start up system triggered by a power supply

interruption;

Each major building was provided with an externally located standard fire hose and

cabinet to CFA standards;

Supplementary pressure hose reels to the farm buildings and the residence for use by

a single person;

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Long range high mounted sprinklers of 24 metre diameter throw on and around each

building structure. When these sprinklers were running they provided curtains of water

streaming over every building on the property to provide protection;

Sprinklers on the pump house are automatically activated whenever the diesel pump

is running to ensure it is safe from fire damage;

A simple method of disconnecting the rainwater tanks from the fire protection water

runoff, so preventing contamination of the drinking water; and

There was also a large fire resistant insulated underground wine cellar with a tile

paved roof able to hold about 10 people indefinitely.

In order to back up this infrastructure, I drafted a manual titled "FIRE ORDERS" advising staff

and residents of;

(a) actions and precautions to be observed during the summer fire period;

(b) actions to be taken on days of extreme fire danger; and

(c) actions to be taken should there be a fire in the district.

I developed this manual by looking to a CFA publication as a basis from upon which I built and

applied specifically to the property. I also got feedback on the manual in draft form from my

son-in-law who is in the CFA.

At the beginning of every summer, I pinned a copy of the manual up on the board at the

property so people could refresh their minds about it. I have also amended the manual

occasionally from time to time to take account of experience or additions to the installation.

There were no amendments expected to come out of this year as I felt that everything worked

well on test runs. The performance of the system on Saturday, February 7'" was most

satisfactory. All the sections were judged under the extreme conditions experienced,

especially the strong north west winds, to be as expected. However, on Tuesday, February

17'~, extreme weather conditions were again encountered. Strong north east winds were

experienced: these are quite rare. On testing the system, I observed that the east face of the

house was not being satisfactorily wetted, the wind deflecting the water away from the roof on

that side. I recommended an additional sprinkler mounted high above the north east fascia.

This was installed the following week. Opportunity was taken at this time to affix large sized

instruction signage alongside each control valve. All this consequently required a review of the

Fire Orders. Attachment JJW-2 is a copy of the revised Fire Orders dated 6" April.

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Lead up to 7 February 2009

14. 1 heeded the weather projections given early in that first week of February. The previous week

had three consecutive days of temperatures in the forties. As the week progressed the

forecasts issued ahead for the Saturday started to include warnings of extreme conditions. My

concerns were at a high level by Thursday. I heard a warning given on Friday 6 February

stating that "tomorrow could be the worst day ever. Check your fire plans and if in doubt, leave

now. Leaving late is more dangerous. It is too late if you see flames." I also knew from the

public warnings that the emergency service organisations were to be on the highest possible

alert. I heard and saw these warnings on TV, (I recall the Premier of the State gave a personal

warning) particularly ABC television, radio, specifically 774 and 621, and in The Age

newspaper.

15. On Friday 6th I rang Chris Dhar, Managing Director of Gauri, and was informed that Angela

Dhar, his mother, had departed for the town house on the Thursday 5" February 2009. 1

discussed with Chris the situation that as the 7th of February was a Saturday it meant that

normally no vineyard staff would be on duty. At that time of year, irrigation was happening

'regularly but it is fully computer operated. A three day program can be set so that no one

needs to come and do any service work on the property during the weekend. However, as the

property engineer, I wanted go on duty at the property as a precaution and to ensure the fire

service was operational.

16. Chris Dharwas worried that it would be dangerous if I was on the property alone, and so I

contracted with him that I would only test all the water based protection systems for all the

buildings, isolate the rain water tanks from roof run off and remove potential fire starting items

like door mats. I promised to not fight any fire, but to start up the systems if required and then

sit in the office and wait. I would also make a phone call to him if there were changes in the

outlook. I told him I was glad his mother had already departed as her presence on the

property would increase my potential responsibilities.

Preparations on 7 February 2009

17. 1 arrived at the vineyard at about 9:00 am and came prepared with food, battery radio, mobile

phone, camera and appropriate long sleeved and trousered clothing. I carried out all testing of

the water system and checked around the buildings for potential ember hazards such as piles

of leaves. I opened all property boundary gates. I also put out all of the pressure hoses for

others to use, checked the hose cabinets for spiders, but did not deploy the hoses.

18. One test I carried out was to see that the standby diesel water pump started automatically after

a power outage. It did. I exchanged the drum of fuel for topping up for a smaller container

which I could easily handle without spilling. The tank holds about two hour's supply, so

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topping up may be necessary, and spilling fuel on a hot engine may defeat the whole purpose,

and, in fact initiate a disaster on its own.

19. 1 also placed buckets of water and mops in both the office and the workshop.

Approaching fires

At about 1:45 pm, I recorded on the notice board the temperature at 47.5"C, taken from a wall

mounted thermometer, The vineyard has an automatic weather station which records

information every five seconds. The information from this station is used by the vineyard staff

to deternine the best time to spray the crop and attend to other husbandry. The station covers

temperature, humidity, wind speed, wind direction, sunlight strength, relative humidity, leaf

weakness, and par (photosynthetically active radiation level). All of this data is recorded at the

station every five seconds. However, the radio aerial to the station had been damaged, and so

while the station was still working, the information was not recorded in the office computer on 7

February. This disappointed me.

I noticed a faint whisp of high altitude smoke coming from the north west. I could see that it

came from a very long way off and was therefore of no concern. I went back into the air-

conditioned office and continued working on some documentation.

From time to time, I checked that the computerised irrigation program was cycling correctly.

About fifteen minutes later (at approximately 2:10 pm) I noticed it was getting dark and went

outside to investigate. There was no smell of smoke, but overhead and to the north was

developing a very dense cloud of smoke. Attachment JJW-3 to this statement is a photo I took

at this time. The pall moved quickly to the south east and joined the smoke plume from the fire

in the Bunyip State Park clearly visible 50 to 60 km away. The 774 radio information

mentioned a fire at Kilmore East and warnings being issued to people further east and south

east. This smoke pall soon became very dense, eventually blocking out the sun. Attachment

JJW-4 to this statement is a photograph I took of this.

I noticed that a line on a map from Bunyip State Park carried through my obselving point

projects across Strathewen, Kinglake West and on to Wandong, Clonbinane and Kilmore East.

I rang Chris for his comment. He lives about 15 kilometres away to the south west in Wonga

Park. He could see the smoke source away to the north from him and felt that it was no

problem.

Low on my horizon over the hill was a new plume of smoke. I estimated this to be west of

Kinglake. A new fire had started to the north east and from the large smoke plume I estimated

it to be well to the north of Castella, or beyond Mount Tanglefoot on the Dividing Range ridge.

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Attachment JJW-5 to this statement is a copy of a photograph I took of this about 2:32pm.

This fire was visible for nearly an hour before the radio information mentioned a fire at

Murrindindi. By then it was huge and I estimated that it was heading for Narbethong. I heard

no warnings though for the people of Narbethong until much later.

27. Thirty minutes or so later I noticed fire running up a grass paddock at Tarrawarra about 5km to

the east. Attachment JJW-6 to this statement is a photo I took of this fire about 3:IZpm. I also

note that this fire was identified on 774 radio as "Train Track', a place name not on the map

and so very confusing to anyone outside the immediate vicinity. 'Train Track " is a vineyard

between Yarra Glen and Tarrawarra.

28. 1 rang Chris again and reported that fire and advised him that, as it was down wind, there

would be no problem for us. I also rang Allan Larkins, the vineyard manager who lives further

east at Healesville, to warn of the fire and of danger when the expected wind change occurred.

While speaking to him, he went outside to check. He saw the smoke and told me he would

drive out towards Tarrawarra and assess the situation. He phoned back about 20 minutes

later to say that the fire was mainly in grass and appeared to be under control.

29. While speaking to Allan the smoke pall became ominous and pieces of charred bark began

falling all round. Attachment JJW-7 to this statement is a copy of a photograph I took at this

time.

30. 1 was able to calculate later that these charred pieces of bark, some a metre long, probably

came from around Strathewen, some 20 kilometres away, straight back along that map line I

referred to above! The fall out consisted of blackened leaves, long pieces of singed ribbon

bark with charcoal and ash ends and, alarmingly, huge chunks of bark from stringy bark

eucalypts. Some of these stringy bark pieces were really pieces of charcoal retaining the

texture of the bark. Some were like a network and shattered when hitting the ground. Other

quite large ones (hand and forearm sized) contained a solid charcoal core. I wondered

whether such pieces could be the source of the spot fires so far ahead of the ground fire storm.

31. I immediately activated all the sprinkler systems. All started up perfectly; water was raining

down on all buildings and all around them. The hoses were tested and all worked at the same

time as the sprinklers, so the pumps were not overloaded. Attachment JJW-8 to this statement

is photographs I took of one sprinkler system and the machinery shed about 4:OZpm.

32. After turning on the sprinklers, I received a phone call from Chris to say that he tried to come to

the vineyard but was stopped at a roadblock south of the vineyard on Maclntyre Lane. As he

spoke, I noticed that yet another fire had started on Gordon Wheelefs farm only a kilometre

away to the east and I mentioned this to him. This was about 4:20 pm. He said he could see it

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and we watched it as it streamed across farmland, over the Yarra River and out onto the flat

grazing land on its way towards the Lilydale airfield.

33. Chris then said that behind me was an even bigger pall of smoke. It was largely not visible to

me, being behind the line of the wooded Christmas Hills. I felt that it was well away from the

wind direction and would be no danger. I told him to look behind him as another fire had

broken out near Mount Evelyn. Chris told me at this time that he thought he had better return

home to his family.

34. On the radio I learned that Kinglake and St. Andrews were in trouble. By my estimation that

meant that the fire had travelled some 40 kilometres in probably an hour. It then became very,

very dark.

35. 1 returned to my elevated observation point outside the office to watch the fire that had started

on Gordon Wheeler's farm, less than a kilometre east. I observed that this quickly engulfed

sheds and trees, jumped Yarraview Road and ran across country, over the Yarra River and

along the old railway embankment. As I watched, a fire started near the centre of the block of

Yering Station's vineyard property at the corner of Glenview and Yarraview Roads. I

considered that this had to be a spot fire rather than a deliberately lit fire as I would have seen

any person who could have lit a fire as they moved across the vineyard. Attachment JJW-9 to

this statement are photos of these two fires and a map of the area.

36. At this stage, I realised I was trapped on the property, but did not feel endangered. My plan

was to stay in the office. The cellar would be safer, but I needed a key for that! Under the

verandah of the office I would be able to see what was happening. I felt safe there under the

water curtain. I made further phone calls to advise Chris and Margaret, my wife, that I was

safe and that there was no fire up wind of me, but that I was witnessing a disaster as our

neighbours bumed. I told them I was trapped on the property and would probably have to stay

the night but I was quite safe.

37. After this, I saw that to the north, and largely hidden by the line of hills, a further heavy pall of

smoke rising up. I estimated this to be around Kinglake township. A very much closer smoke

plume soon after suggested to me that the distant end of the Skyline Road North ridge was

burning. Steels Creek, Dixons Creek and Yarra Glen would be inline of that.

38. One CFA tanker showed up briefly at the crossroads, turned round and disappeared into the

smoke. I cannot recall the time, but by the time it appeared the fire front had crossed the Yarra

River. The only other vehicles I observed were a white pick up truck and a tractor with a spray

tank trailer. I recognised both of these as belonging to Yering Station. By then the building

which stored their bird netting was well alight, sending up a column of dense black smoke.

The water from the spray tank was of no avail.

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The expected gusting turbulent wind change was mentioned on 774 radio as it was

progressively drawing closer. This information was given by people phoning in to say that it

had reached them. In a phone call to my wife at home in Mitcham she gave me a timely

warning that it had just arrived there and it was very strong.

I decided to immediately drive up to the homestead and check on the sprinkler system. It was

working well. Everything round about was thoroughly wetted, including the vegetable gardens.

I had turned on the garden sprinkler at about 10.00am and forgotten about it. The veggies

were fine and showing no sign of stress. Very soon after checking the house situation and

only 15 minutes after speaking with Margaret the wind change arrived. The south west wind

came in furious gusts, tearing material from the trees and garden. The time was 4:48pm. The

fire to the east of me was greatly stirred up and changed direction. Y a m Glen was totally

obscured by smoke.

Certain that the house was safe, I returned to the office. It was apparent to me that more

buildings, hay stacks and tree lines were burning in the area. A large explosion occurred near

one burning shed as a drum or tank of fuel ruptured. I felt the 'crump' of the explosion.

By now, smoke plumes were erupting away to the north, then additional ones getting

progressively closer. I estimated these to be at Steels Creek and then Skyline Road ridge

near the Yarra GlentEltham Road. This was alarmingly close, but as the wind had changed,

considered to be of no danger to me. Attachment JJW-10 to this statement is a series of

photos I took of these events.

Trying to evacuate

At about this time, I had seen an occasional vehicle show up at the cross road at the far

boundary of the vineyard on the fire edge, so I decided to try to get into the township. I drove

one of the property's 4 x 4 light trucks with diesel fuel. There was fire all along the roadside. I

stopped about 100 yards beyond the crossroads in a cutting: considered it too dangerous to

continue and backed out.

I went up the side road far enough to see that Gordon Wheeler's house was standing, but

fence posts nearby were still glowing. One of his sheds was still a blazing inferno. I took a

photo of that, but I felt I was intruding on another person's disaster and took no more pictures

at that time. Attachment JJW-I 1 to this statement is a copy of this photograph taken about

5:50pm. I felt that trying to get to Yarra Glen appeared too dangerous, so I returned to - As I drove back, smoke columns rose from buildings on fire. The black smoke from

the burning bird net store rose up and disappeared into the murk overhead. As I watched, a

bolt of lightning came down the smoke column. Attachment JJW-I2 to this statement is a

copy of the photograph I took of these at about 6:24pm.

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45. Back at the property I resolved to take no risks and so prepared to stay the night. There was a

stretcher bed in the store room to sleep on, some biscuits in a jar, yoghurt in the fridge and a

banana on a lunch table.

46. 1 rang Chris to tell him of my decision. He told me that he had spoken with our south western

boundary neighbour to tell them I was on the farm. Shortly after, Keith Broadhouse, the

neighbour, drove in and invited me to a meal, but firstly, he was going to try getting into town

and find if it was possible to leave. He had a house guest who was anxious to get back to

Healesville. He came back and said it was not possible and so I joined him and his wife and

guest for a late meal.

47. Dining on his balcony looking across the still burning river land as the evening started to close

in was a very strange, almost surreal experience. Hay bales burned brightly. Flashing red and

blue lights were moving back and forth, occasionally in convoy. The fire edge in the grass had

been stopped before it reached Lilydale airfield. But beyond towards Healesville was only

smoke. Over the hills to our north towards Kinglake and Steele's Creek, the still billowing

smoke was underpinned with an eerie orange glow. After dinner Keith drove me back to - 48. 1 set out to drive to Yarra Glen again and this time got into the town safely. Sheds, gate posts,

tree trunks and hay bales were burning all along the way. I reached a road block on the Melba

Highway and the police attending the road block were not able to give any forecast as to when

the road could be opened. They told me that "it may not be until morning." I then drove back

to the vineyard and phoned Margaret again.

49. 1 set up the stretcher, rolled up the change of clothes I keep in the car as a pillow and settled

down to try to sleep. However, I could not sleep because of various noises around the

vineyard.

50. After midnight, I was able to monitor the irrigation cycle which was programmed to commence

at ten minutes to twelve. It had failed to initiate, probably due to the power interruption during

the afternoon, so I aborted the remnant of the three-day plan and set up a single day cycle to

commence immediately. It kicked in on the computer screen and indicated that the pump had

started. To confirm, I drove into the vineyard and found water dripping.

51. From the high ground in the yard, and I looked for but could no longer see flashing red and

blue lights over at the roadblock way over the river on Macintyre Lane to the south. I decided

to try and leave again as I thought that if I could get through Yarra Glen, I could get home. I

left a note of my intention on the floor of the office, locked up and set out. I finally left the

property about 12:30 am Sunday, 8May.

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Power and Communications

At some point in the aflemoon I had noticed that the power had gone off. I had been outside

and when I came back into the building the air-conditioning had gone off and the computer had

collapsed. However, at no stage did the landline or my mobile phone lose power or get cut off.

I have noticed that putting power supplies underground has been advocated in the press.

Caution is required here as standards require upgrading. I know that there are some

underground supply points along Yarraview Road, Yarra Glen. When I was leaving-

for home after midnight, I had been intrigued by a group of people shining torches

down a hole in the ground, but I was too intent on the danger around to stop. I found out on

the following Monday that they were looking at burned underground electric power cables put

there for safety away from the trees.

However, the junction boxes were fitted with moulded plastic lids. These melted in the fire,

collapsed into the pit and fuelled sufficient heat to melt the cable insulation and the nearby

conduit, resulting in a short circuit. The replacement work required was quite expensive as an

entirely new system had to be installed underground. All pits and fittings need be non-

combustible.

I was also monitoring ABC radio 774 closely during the day. I have very high praise for the

calm and professional manner with which they disseminated infomation provided by those in

command and citizens phoning in. However, I noticed that official warnings of ember attacks

to a specific area made on 774 were behind real time. I heard warning of an ember attack on

Yarra Glen when there had already been embers falling for approximately an hour starting at

before 4:OOpm.

Radio warnings issued by central control seemed to be unaware of the pace of advance of

particular fires of which I had knowledge. For example, I saw smoke coming from the

Murrindindi fire for the best part of an hour before I heard any mention of it on the radio. As I

was watching this fire I was estimating from my knowledge of the mountain peaks in the area,

wind speed and direction, even without a map in hand, that the fire was going to hit

Narbethong. However, I did not hear any warnings about Narbethong until very late in the day.

I could also tell that with the wind change coming, Marysville was going to be next.

The forecast wind change for late in the afternoon could be tracked easily as it moved from

west to east by the automatic weather stations strung across the state and the consequences

of the change could have been factored into the warnings issued. People were phoning in to

774 giving the wind change information which would have reinforced the information from

meteorological stations. Marysville would be down wind of problems in Narbethong afler the

wind change, and a warning could have been given for them as early as 3:30 pm. (I had

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already warned by phone my work colleague of impending danger to his residence near

Healesville as soon as I noticed the 'Train Track' fire and had factored in the wind change for

him.

58. 1 noticed that the time of issue of radio warnings was not given as part of the radio reading.

Warnings were read out many times, but I had no way of knowing whether it was a new threat

or a repeat.

59. 1 also found the messages to be too long and to require a great deal of concentration on my

part to see if it applied to me or not. There were many other things requiring concentration at

the same time.

60. 1 suggest streamlining the announcements as follows: "Timbuctoo residents. Warning timed

at 2:45pm. Timbuctoo residents are warned of etc" then at the conclusion, state "That warning

for Timbuctoo residents was timed at 2:45pm." This enables people to focus immediately on

messages important to them. Giving the area name first does that. Giving the time of issue

indicates relevance. Repeating the district name and time confirms focus. Repeating the

warnings after the fire has arrived is no longer relevant and wastes limited time for issuing

other warnings.

61. At no stage during the day did I feel a need to call 000. 1 always felt quite safe and I was in

regular contact with Margaret and Chris, to assure them I was in a safe place.

62. Since the events of the 7Ih of February I have had opportunities to share experiences with

others. At the break during the Community Consultations in Yarra Glen one lady told me that

when she did make contact with 000, the person responding could not find Steels Creek on the

map and kept suggesting other "neighbouring" towns from which she could get her bearings,

but all these towns were hundreds of kilometres away. Another gentleman from Steels Creek

told me about hiring a helicopter to evacuate him and how subsequent phone directions were

given to the pilot who was using 'Google Earth' to find that rural property. I asked him why he

could not use GPS references to guide the pilot in. He told me that he did not have a GPS

reader.

63. 1 know that most top of the line mobile phones now incorporate GPS technology. However, if

all residents were informed of the GPS co-ordinates of their property, perhaps as a municipal

service, they could put these near their phones in a prominent place. When it was necessaly

to call 000 to request emergency services, they could pass the GPS co-ordinates on to the

operator so that a map of the relevant area could be brought up on screen. This would avoid

problems arising from unusual place names or operators not being geographically sawy. The

GPS co-ordinates would be translated by the 000 data base into a street address which is

passed to the emergency service requested.

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Protection systems

Although under very dense smoke pall, charred material falling all round and fires burning only

hundreds of metres away, I felt no personal danger under the curtains of water. I was able to

ascertain that the systems installed worked as expected.

All buildings and their surroundings were thoroughly wetted despite strong winds and very low

relative humidity. Even the hens in the poultry run were making contented 'chooky noises' as

the spray enveloped them. The power supply did fail for a while, but the diesel pump

functioned perfectly. Grass, either kept green or mowed right down to the ground, gave little

opportunity for an ember to start a fresh outbreak. The property suffered no damage, and

fortunately for the grape crop, not even smoke damage. It all went over the top!

I saw one fire tanker come from the direction of Yarra Glen during the height of the local fire,

turn around at the Glenview Road crossroad and disappear back into the smoke and flame.

By then the main fire front had crossed the river and was no longer accessible. There were

just too many places needing assistance simultaneously. The value of fire tankers in a

combating situation such as this is questionable. In that wind, nothing could stop the fire as it

was spotting in leaps and bounds. Concentrating on individual assets seems a better

approach.

lnbuilt protection systems such as that at w o u l d enable fire crews to bypass

those properties and assist elsewhere. If all residences and important farm buildings had

approved protection systems not reliant on electricity then the fire services would not be so

strained and crews put into potential danger.

Stay or Leave

68. In this instance leaving late from could have been disastrous as the only way

out along this dead end road was cut by fire within a few minutes of the first visible smoke and

long before an ember attack warning was given on the radio. I lefl the property briefly in the

late afternoon just before 6pm and turned back near the crossroads, considering it

unnecessarily dangerous to continue, took a short detour up R o a d and saw that

Gordon Wheeler's house and Styx Winery were intact, although the fire had advanced very

close to both. I did get into Yarra Glen about 10:OOpm but could not proceed homeward any

further, so returned to the safety of the vineyard and bedded down for the night.

Emergency response

69. 1 mentioned seeing the spot fire at the neighbouring property of Gordon Wheeler. He had

tripped and fallen backwards into the fire as it approached his house. He received very

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serious burns. He was not released from the Alfred Hospital until April 2nd and is still receiving

treatment.

70. He has related to me that calls to '000' were unsuccessful. First, his wife tried to call 000 but

was too traumatised to do so. Gordon told me that he himself then tried to ring 000 from the

swimming pool for about twenty minutes. He had crawled out of the fire and staggered into the

swimming pool to douse his bums. After this, a neighbour, who heard his calls for help, rang

directly into Yarra Glen and was told that the ambulance was not permitted to leave the town.

This neighbour canied Gordon from his swimming pool to a car and drove the two kilometres

to the ambulance station where he was given emergency treatment. The route was along

Glenview Road North and King Street, both untouched by the fire!

71. However, he told me that the ambulance with him and three other patients was not permitted

to pass the Melba Highway police road block until after 9:00pm, even though CFA tankers,

police vehicles and CFA area controller vehicles were passing along the highway and along

Macintyre Lane. (I observed the flashing lights of many such vehicles from my elevated

observation point). Gordon Wheeler was not admitted to the Maroondah Hospital until over

five hours after calling for assistance. He was assessed as serious and moved on to the Alfred

Hospital towards midnight. His treatment, or lack of it, was shameful.

72. Who was responsible for the blanket order holding the ambulance in the depot? Did anyone

check what roads were unaffected by the fire? Are not emergency sewices personnel trained

to be imaginative and resourceful in an emergency? Adjacent to the Wheeler property to the

west was smoke free flat ground suitable for a helicopter pick up. A kilometre away, I was

obsewing the fires fmm an area eminently suitable for a helicopter set down - smoke free,

concrete and flat gravel surface with trees well away. There are closer suitable areas along

the r o a d frontage and grassed pipeline easement.

Dated: June 2009

................................................ John Joseph Williams

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