Local knowledge

Editorial: Joel Peterson

Photography: Brendan McCarthy

Sgt Russell Brown and Ldg Sen Const Kellie Harris hone their skills in the Grampians National Park.

It was late December 2017, in the busy post-Christmas holiday period, when Halls Gap’s Sergeant Karen Bain was ordering a coffee at a local cafe.

She was standing in the line, off-duty and wearing plain clothes, when a man and a woman got her attention.

After explaining they weren’t locals, they asked Sgt Bain whether she knew the location depicted in a photo on their mobile phone.

Sgt Bain said she immediately recognised it as Lake Bellfield, at the southern end of the town.

“I thought nothing of it until they said their father had gone missing and they had come to look for him, and that was the last photo he had posted on Facebook,” she said.

“I told them I was the local police officer and invited them to come to the station, and the search began from there.”

The photo of Lake Bellfield was the last thing 50-year-old Julio Ascui had posted on Facebook before embarking on a hike in the rugged Grampians National Park.

Mr Ascui was born in the mountains of Chile and was a relatively experienced hiker, but had gone missing while trying to find a scenic location he had spotted from a distance.

He spent five days seeking shelter, drinking water from a creek and chewing eucalyptus leaves as his family, Parks Victoria and local police officers – from Halls Gap and nearby Stawell – searched for him.

The Victoria Police Search and Rescue Squad and Dog Squad soon joined the effort to form a more coordinated response.

Mr Ascui was found on the fifth day of the search and was reunited with his family. But the incident and length of the search raised a red flag for local police, including Northern Grampians Police Service Area’s Inspector Paul Bertoncello.

“We identified that we had variable levels of knowledge and physical ability among our officers in finding their way around the bush during the prolonged search,” Insp Bertoncello said.

“Something that came out of the debrief was that we could have covered more ground more efficiently if we had a core group of officers with better local knowledge who could more readily engage with the Victoria Police Search and Rescue Squad and external agency partners.”

The incident provided the impetus for a Victoria Police first – the Stawell Frontline Search and Rescue training package.

Insp Bertoncello said Stawell was the natural choice to assist in searches in the Grampians as it is the nearest 24-hour police station.

The Grampians National Park covers more than 1,700 square kilometres, reaches more than 900 metres in altitude at its highest point and attracts about 2.2 million visitors every year.

If the park was overlayed onto a map of Melbourne, the area would stretch from Werribee to Dandenong and down to Mornington, take in a good chunk of Port Phillip Bay and go as far north as Greensborough.

Vast valleys, dense and undulating bushland, huge areas of exposed rock, towering waterfalls and even snow in winter are among the many challenges the Grampians present to those performing rescue operations.

Making matters worse, since 2015 the number of missing and injured hikers and rescue operations requiring a police response in the park has risen by 55 per cent.

The Northern Grampians PSA responded to 43 incidents between July 2017 and July 2018 alone.

Insp Bertoncello said given those stark figures, it didn’t take long for the training to gain traction.

“The package consists of existing training supplied by the Search and Rescue Squad and Driver Training Unit, and then locally-developed familiarisation and exercises with emergency services stakeholders,” he said.

Sgt Bain said the extra support has already proved invaluable for herself and her colleague, Leading Senior Constable Kellie Harris, at the two-officer Halls Gap station.

“We saw that we really didn’t have the capability to undertake those protracted searches,” Sgt Bain said.

“We just had people coming back very fatigued and they didn’t have the knowledge of the rugged terrain in this location or any bushcraft skills, which made it so much harder.”

As part of the training, officers from Stawell are also seconded to work at Halls Gap to familiarise themselves with the local area.

Not only does the training lighten the load on those officers at Halls Gap, but it has benefits for police at Stawell who aren’t called away for rescue operations.

“For future ‘campaign’ searches, we will draw in officers to cover Stawell and Stawell police will be deployed to head into the bush,” Insp Bertoncello said.

Those who took part in the training have heaped praise upon the program, whether or not they have had to put their skills to the test.

Several officers have used the training, including several instances of hikers getting lost and the recovery of the body of a man who drowned at the notorious Mackenzie Falls on Boxing Day.

Senior Constable Nathan Barfus has had the chance to use the knowledge and said it had a positive impact.

“I have had opportunities while working within the Grampians to put my skills into practice during extraction and rescue events with the SES and ambulance,” Sen Const Barfus said.

“The skills and knowledge that I walked away with have become an invaluable tool to aid in my response to these types of jobs and have improved my own confidence when planning a rescue.”

The next time someone goes missing in the Grampians and police require assistance, they’ll know exactly where to look.