Ten bushfire incident management experts from Western Australia have been deployed to Queensland this morning to assist in battling multiple fires across the State.
The five officers from the Department of Biodiversity, Conservation and Attractions’ Parks and Wildlife Service and five from the Department of Fire and Emergency Services are highly skilled and experienced in a variety of incident management roles, including incident control, planning, logistics, operations and public information.
This adds to the 28 DFES career and volunteer firefighters that arrived in Queensland yesterday to bolster frontline firefighting efforts.
More than 100 bushfires continue to burn across Queensland, and while weather conditions today are expected to provide a reprieve, there are still multiple bushfires threatening communities in the central and northern regions.
As stated by Emergency Services Minister Francis Logan:
“We are proud to join New South Wales, the Australian Capital Territory, Victoria, South Australia and Tasmania in assisting our Queensland counterparts during this challenging time.
“Highly skilled DFES incident managers and frontline firefighters, as well as volunteer firefighters, will provide a much needed reprieve for local crews as these fires continue to burn across Queensland.”
As stated by Environment Minister Stephen Dawson:
“Western Australia has a long-standing and proud history of providing frontline and incident management forest and bushfire experts to other States and overseas in times of crisis.
“The Parks and Wildlife Service personnel deployed this morning will draw on their decades of experience to provide specialist incident management expertise.
“Queensland personnel were among the many who flew west to assist WA during the fire season in 2015 and 2016 and we are pleased to be able to return the favour.”
