Kinglake-350

PRAISE FOR ADRIAN HYLAND
AND KINGLAKE-350

‘This is a masterpiece of storytelling about the most terrifying natural disaster in Australia’s recorded history. Even those for whom Black Saturday 2009 has already become another distant tragedy in a landscape of disasters will find this heart-wrenchingly compelling. Of its type, I have read none better. If the Victoria Cross represents our peak measure of valour, then the central characters in this special book emerge as Victoria Cross heroes in the heart of a bush community.’
KERRY O’BRIEN

‘Every Australian, both rural and urban, should read this book. Adrian Hyland pulls no punches in describing the harrowing consequences of living on the planet’s driest and most fire-prone continent, and his account of the disastrous Black Saturday fires is a story of courage, dread and fallibility that will never leave you.’
CATE KENNEDY

‘I’ve been waiting for a writer to look Black Saturday in the eye ever since the flames died down and, finally, Adrian Hyland’s done it. In this utterly moving book, Hyland has captured the character of a town caught, quite literally, in a fireball.’
ANNA KRIEN

‘
Kinglake-350
is about more than Black Saturday. It’s about families and communities, the vital nature of ecology and geology; it’s about the genesis of life itself. And while there are too many deaths in this saddest of tales, for the lucky ones the outcome was redemption.’
LINCOLN HALL

Adrian Hyland lives in St Andrews, in the foothills of the Kinglake Ranges, and teaches at La Trobe University. His novels
Diamond Dove
and
Gunshot Road
are also published by Text.

KINGLAKE-350
ADRIAN HYLAND

textpublishing.com.au

The Text Publishing Company
Swann House
22 William Street
Melbourne Victoria 3000
Australia

Copyright © Adrian Hyland 2011

All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright above, no part of this publication shall be reproduced, stored in or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior permission of both the copyright owner and the publisher of this book.

First published in 2011 by The Text Publishing Company

Cover by WH Chong
Maps by Guy Holt

National Library of Australia
Cataloguing-in-Publication entry

Author: Hyland, Adrian.

Title:    Kinglake 350 / Adrian Hyland.

Edition:    1st ed.

ISBN:    9781921758263 (pbk.)

Subjects: Wood, Roger.

Police—Victoria—Kinglake—Biography.

Black Saturday bushfires, 2009.

Wildfires—Victoria—Kinglake.

Forest fires—Victoria—Kinglake.

Natural disasters—Victoria.

Dewey Number: 363.37099453

Primary print ISBN: 9781921758263
Ebook ISBN: 9781921834738

This project has been assisted by the Commonwealth Government through the Australia Council, its arts funding and advisory body.

For the invisible heroes
and for those who are still suffering

Contents

People who appear in the book

Abbreviations

Map

UNCHARTED TERRITORY

HOME FRONT

FIRE PLAN

NEIGHBOURHOOD WATCH

BALANCING ACT

INCIDENT CONTROL

RED WIND

CFA

MAYDAY

ARSON

CAR ALARM

FIRST STRIKE

ROADBLOCK

FIRE FRONT

RED FLAG

COOMBS ROAD

SCRATCH CREW

GODSPEED TO YOU ALL

THE BOSS

TANKER TWO

HOME FIRES

SURVIVAL ARC

PHEASANT CREEK

SNAPSHOTS

FIRE: AN ILLUMINATED HISTORY

THE SCHOOL

FIREFIGHT IN KINGLAKE

KINGLAKE: INSIDE THE SHED

IN EXILE

YOU HAVE TO KEEP BREATHING

UNDERWORLD

SILENT NIGHT

SAVING PEOPLE

DOWN THE MOUNTAIN

CONVOY

ON AND OFF ROAD

BITTER HOMECOMING

NIGHTMARES

BUSHFIRE BRAIN

RESURRECTION

A REFLECTION

UPDATE

Notes

References

Acknowledgments

People who appear in the book

Kinglake police

Leading Senior Constable Roger Wood (acting sergeant on February 7)

Senior Constable Cameron Caine

Sergeant John Ellks

CFA: Kinglake

Captain Paul Hendrie

Linda Craske

Trish Hendrie

Kelly Johnson

Di MacLeod

Phil Petschel

Carole Wilson

Kinglake Tanker One

Dave Hooper (crew leader)

Paul Lowe (driver)

Rod Elwers

Aaron Robinson

Steve Nash

Kinglake Tanker Two

Steve Bell (crew leader)

Ben Hutchinson (driver)

CFA: Kinglake West

Captain John Grover

Deputy Group Officer Chris Lloyd

First Lieutenant Karyn Norbury

Kinglake West Tanker One

Karen Barrow (driver)

Kinglake West Tanker Two

Frank Allan (crew leader)

Department of Sustainability

and Environment (DSE) firefighters

Tony Fitzgerald

Aaron Redmond

Sean Hunter

Natalie Brida

Abbreviations

This awful catastrophe is not the end but the beginning.
History does not end so. It is the way its chapters open.

St Augustine