THE Taumarunui Volunteer Fire Brigade was sent on a pointless three hour round trip on Monday because a roadside burn-off wasn't called in to Fire and Emergency NZ
Unreported agricultural burn-offs were called in as fire emergencies, wasting brigade time at Taumarunui and Ōtorohanga on Labour Day.
At 8.16pm, the Ōtorohanga Volunteer Fire Brigade sent a fire truck and tanker to a property on Happy Valley Rd, near Maihiihi, where an entire hillside was ablaze.
Meanwhile, a burn-off of about 100 metres of blackberry on a rural roadside near Ohura led the Taumarunui brigade on a fruitless journey, lasting more than three hours on Monday.
Ōtorohanga fire chief Neville King said a fire had been set across two hectares to burn off forestry slash on Monday night.
“The owners of the property hadn’t notified anyone that they were burning it and the whole hillside was on fire,” Neville said.
“Of course, people driving past at night called us, but we couldn’t do anything as it was on the side of a hill.
“Landowners need to be aware, firstly they need to check it’s alright to do the burn-off and secondly register their intention to do so.”
Neville said just across the road from the massive slash fire was another landowner burning a large tree stump.
“He said to us, ‘what’s the problem’?
“We said, we’d just been called to the other one and were only checking that his fire was okay.
“He also had not reported his intention to have a burn-off. But people burning stuff at night is always going to draw attention – they need to let us know before they do this.”
The Taumarunui Volunteer Brigade went on its a fruitless journey after being called out to an unreported burn-off at 2.43pm, in Waitaanga Rd, Ohura.
This resulted in a round trip journey of 75 kilometres over winding rural roads to attend the fire, which was out upon arrival.
Deputy fire chief Gary Jacobs said it was disappointing that whoever decided to spray and then burn-off the blackberry did not let the brigade know their intention in advance.
After the fire was called in, Gary’s truck and a second rural fire crew based near the town’s airfield were called out. A fire truck from the Ohura Brigade was unable to attend as the brigade could not muster sufficient staff.
“My truck had six volunteers and we all spent more than three hours on this job on our Labour Day afternoon,” Gary said. “That kind of destroys your holiday weekend.
“Also, I am self-employed and can’t really afford the time for calls of this kind, but I am not the only one – several of us in the brigade are self-employed.
“It would have been so simple to have avoided this drain on staff and resources; it just would have taken a phone call in advance.”
With dry conditions forecast this summer, he is concerned about the likelihood of more serious callouts to vegetation fires in the coming months.
The brigade needed to conserve resources for incidents that threaten life and property.
“One way of doing that is to hear in advance when somebody decides to do a burn-off of this kind.”
