🔗 Share this article

As Garry Morgan arrived home on the end of the week, his home on the coastal fringe was surrounded by a “big plume of smoke”. Less than twenty-four hours later, a pair of homes on his street were destroyed, and the surrounding forest would be reduced to blackened skeletal remains.

A Community at the Centre of Tragedy

The community of Bulahdelah, approximately 235km north of Sydney, has become at the centre of a tragedy after a veteran firefighter died on Sunday evening when he was hit by a falling tree. This signals a “foreboding start” to the fire season.

Four structures have been lost in the broader Bulahdelah area, comprising two on Emu Creek Road, where Morgan lives, one on the Pacific Highway and one south of the township.

“It's beyond description,” he said. “My canine companions remained close, it was terrifying.”

Landscapes of Loss and Fortitude

Bulahdelah is a frequent rest stop on the Pacific Highway for holidaymakers on their way up the mid-north coast to coastal destinations such as Seal Rocks, Forster and Port Macquarie.

On Monday afternoon, the highway south of town was blanketed in dense, ochre-hazed smoke. Aircraft conducting water drops hovered overhead, assisting ground crews who were battling a fire that had burnt 4,000 hectares since Friday.

Passing trucks reduced speed for traffic cones and reduce-speed signs, the charred eucalypts and burnt grass on each side of the highway evidence of how far the fire had burnt through the adjacent Myall Lakes national park. It remained at a 'watch and act' alert level on Monday evening.

A Hub of Emergency Response

In Bulahdelah, though, it would appear as another ordinary day if not for the aircraft overhead and acrid odor lingering in the air.

A refuelling station for aircraft has been set up at the town’s showground, turning it into a base for around 300 fire crews and volunteers who have travelled from across the state to help.

On Monday afternoon, cartons of water were being offloaded from trucks and sweets were being packed into zip lock bags. One firefighter estimated that they needed a water bottle every 20 minutes when on the frontline.

Personal Accounts from the Fireground

Clouds of smoke were still rising from glowing hotspots on Emu Creek Road, a meandering country road that hugs a creek bed south of the township where two houses were lost.

On a boundary post outside a destroyed home, a charred teddy bear remained pinned to the log, still wearing a Christmas hat.

Further along, Morgan was on his veranda with his two dogs, a little patch of grass surrounding his house the only remaining sign of how the landscape used to look. Miraculously, his property was spared, despite his neighbor's home burning to the ground.

He recalled receiving a call from a friend at lunchtime on Saturday, warning him “you have roughly 30 minutes and then a fire’s going to hit”. His timing was precise.

“We hosed down the property and shed down, wet the perimeter,” he said, and then his reaction turned to “panic”. “I said to myself, ‘this is overwhelming’,” he said. “I decided to stay.”

Thankfully, crews protected the home, and succeeded in defending it. The bushfire passed over in about half an hour, sounding like “a thunderous blaze”.

An Environment Altered

Morgan, who has resided at the same house for around 30 years, has not witnessed the land so dry.

“It once rained rain every week,” he said. “Fires of this magnitude are unprecedented. But you’ve got to take the good with the bad.”

On the same street, Jeff Curley was caring for his friend’s property which had also mostly been spared Saturday’s blaze, other than a damaged light on a car and a barrel of firewood stored for winter that had burnt to ash.

“I am very familiar with this area,” he said. “Previously a fire almost approached a nearby ridge and that was pretty scary then, but the wind changed.

“It’s just so much drier this time. It came from everywhere, and the firefighters essentially protected it [the property].”

This was not a novel situation for Curley, who came close to losing his home in Wattle Grove when fires came through in 2019.

“You see people on the news say, ‘I can’t believe how fast it came’,” he said. “You think it’s over there, and all of a sudden it surrounds you. I know what it’s like. I told my friend to evacuate immediately, and he did.”

Fire Service Update and Continuing Danger

Kirsty Channon, spokesperson for the NSW Rural Fire Service, said crews from various services had come from “across the coastal region” to assist in the containment effort and had done an “amazing job” protecting houses from being destroyed.

She said all agencies had “united” after the tragic loss of one of their own.

“The firefighting community is one big family,” she said. “But we’re definitely not out of the woods yet.

“There have been instances of the Pacific Highway closing and reopening a few times, the fire jump backwards and forwards. It’s still not contained, it will continue to grow.”

Channon said work in the immediate future would focus on the small community of Nerong, which was anticipated to be impacted by the highway fire on Monday evening. Residents had been urged to evacuate if unprepared, and have a fire plan.

“Little fires are popping up from lightning strikes a few days ago,” she said.

“Tomorrow’s weather is mid 30s with variable wind, and that has been difficult - wind swirls in the area.”