Trucks of hay arriving in Waroona from the Wheat-belt.
A convoy of trucks delivering hay donated to farmers affected by last week's devastating South West bushfire has arrived in Waroona.
About $100,000 was donated by Wheat-belt farmers for hungry sheep and cattle in the fire zone.
Yesterday it emerged Waroona farmers took the law into their own hands to save livestock at risk of dying of starvation and thirst.
A Waroona farmer, who had 123 cattle consumed in the blaze, said he had spent the weekend ignoring authorities to truck cattle out of properties with no feed or fences.
K.J.
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From Coast to Coast, We'll see it all.......One Day
KJ - I watched with interest the local news about the farmers and their being banned from accessing their livestock. What a load of BS - obviously some nervous bum warmer in Perth made the final call so DFES wouldn't get into even more strife.
Didn't hear a thing from the RSPCA or the Dept of Agriculture on the issue - I wonder if they were in there inspecting stock and conditions and issuing pieces of paper to farmers. Total news media silence from these two organisations.
I totally support what the farmers were forced to do to protect and keep their livestock alive - bet no welfare or govt agency tries to prosecute them. Great to see other farmers who were not affected donate feed to help out in the short term.
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Cheers Bruce
The amazing things you see when nomading Australia
G'day Bruce, Yes, it seems the Farmers were left to fend for them selves as far as looking after their Live Stock,
I did read somewhere that the authorities refused to give permission to the vets and RSPCA to enter the fire zone, saying it was to dangerous, !!
There seemed to be one Big stuff-up after another in the whole system, regarding this fire and the way it was controlled, or should I say Mishandled, how any organisation can run efficiently while there were 3-4 different groups trying to take control of the situation, has got me wondering, and to hear that were using radios on different frequencies is amazing,
There was another report that things were so un-organised that one group came in and put out one part of the fire, only to see another group light it up again, as a back burn !! there by endangering the lives of the ones who first fought the fire and stopped it !!!
Apparently there is now going to be a Parliamentary enquiry into the whole situation, at the end of the day, we will wait and see who gets the chop, or will it be covered up, like so many other enquiries ???
Another thing that shook my socks was, to hear that some group, who were supposed to arrange fire-fighting equipment, refused to accept an offer from NSW to fly a large ( 9 DC 10 I think ) water Bomber over here to the West, in support of the ground Troops, another stuff-up !!
"Good God" I sure hope they get some sort of an Organisation together and working properly before there is any more loss of life !!
K.J.
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From Coast to Coast, We'll see it all.......One Day
Its slightly Off Topic KJ - but its your post, so guess its ok lol
What WA needs is an Emergency Commissioner with perhaps 80-100 staff (to cover 24/7) who control DFES (who are the lead dept in bush fires IF it gets beyond the bounds of a National Park), National Parks, Environmental Protection, Rural Fire, Bush Fire, Police, ambulance, Dept of Agriculture and god knows the all other govt and other statutory depts. who are involved in major fires.
This will avoid the in-fighting and lack of co-operation between the organizations that was previously identified as a major issue by the Kelty Commission in two enquiries he made (and nothing has changed despite his recommendations). The emergency staff on the ground do an outstanding job, but the bum warmers based in Perth seem more concerned at critical moments to keep control for their dept.
It will require the State Govt to stump up $50M or whatever each year to run such a head body and maybe more money to get them in a situation where they can have R/Ts on the same frequency. But who cares - the huge damage done to our fauna and flora, farms and businesses - not the mention the 5 people who died in the last two major fires within a period of months.
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Cheers Bruce
The amazing things you see when nomading Australia
