The Black The City Knows Not – Cameron Alexander

The Black The City Knows Not

Cameron Alexander

2006 Coopers Creek Smoke, The Polar Express, Burnt Houses, Flames We only had a few days left of the school year. Since it was our final year in primary, we were enjoying it. Dad was off fighting a fire to our east, but that was rather normal. However, during the lunch break, a few of us noticed the smoke growing from white to black. All of us, being country kids, knew it wasn’t a good sign, especially since many of us had some form of association with the CFA. We heard the bell even though we knew it wasn’t the end of lunch yet. Everyone was gathered into their classrooms and movies were put on. The Polar Express was the movie chosen for my class. The classes of grade four/five were joined with us filling the room with forty-five kids. I did say it was a country school, right?

I was chosen, along with a few school captains to go to the younger years and try to keep their spirits up. We had to make sure they weren’t too scared. Student after student left, often in groups of either relatives or people whose parents were close. Then my mother arrived. We got home and got everything ready, packing up the important items. Ash and embers blew over our house and we would later find out that houses in town had actually burned from this.

A few days later, I attended a friend’s birthday. We stood out back talking and having fun as the bulk of the danger had passed, looking up to the hill where the smoke was coming from. The flames stared at us, sitting at the hilltop, filled with hate and threat.

We watched and waited.

2009 Black Saturday Sweltering Heat, Like Curtains It Spread, Twilight, Fire Radio I was in the pool with my brother, sister, and a few of their friends. Mum and Dad were off fighting fires. I had gone to fight one a few days earlier, despite being underage. But these flames were a bit bigger, so I was to stay home and relax as well as be the person in charge of any fire safety of the house.

It was a swelteringly hot day. It had been a hot summer. We could see the plumes of smoke to the south. Slowly we noticed the smoke grow and move. Like curtains, it spread east and west. The smoke crept around the sky until it reached a point north-east. As soon as the two blankets met the light disappeared and twilight took us. It was around 3 pm, yet after the two smoke points left it could have been 8 pm. We knew this was bad. I can still remember the worry that gripped us. Ash fell despite us being forty kilometres away as the crow flies. We covered the pool with the blanket to try to keep the water clean, went inside, and turned on the news and the fire radio.

We waited.

2013 Aberfeldy CFA, Paddocks, The Sword and The Fire, Racing Through Flames My cousins had to leave their house as the fire threatened them. It actually burnt their shed and melted their pool. I had been called up. It was my fourth year officially in the CFA, so I had seen some action before, but this was a proper bushfire. It jumped rivers and raced through forests. I wasn’t on a truck this time. I was on an old ute that had been in service since the Ash Wednesday fires in 1983. We were amongst a small scrub with fire around us, since the ute could get to the spots the trucks couldn’t.

I was on the back of the old Toyota as it bounced through paddocks driving alongside the fire. I was trying to put out as much as I could, with the only communication between me and the driver being a bang on the roof. For those of you not familiar with the fire services, there is an alarm that sounds on the trucks when the water level reaches one-fourth, so that should we require to retreat to save our lives, we are able to. It’s basically the truck saying to go fill up. This old truck had only a drum on the back and a pump. A rather large fire was currently contesting with me as I felt its heat singe my face. Then the hose ran dry. The fire laughed at me as my sword vanished, the hilt held uselessly in my hand. I smashed my hand onto the cab, and we sped off having to actually drive through flames.

Racing through blackened fields to the fill up point, I waited.

2015 Orbost Calm, Smoldering Spots, Crack, Ration Pack It was rather calm, albeit smoky. Or maybe it was the cigarette I had as we crawled along the burnt-out plantation. The main fire had been taken care of, so we were on mop-up duty. When you are out of the fireground you are never meant to be alone in the cabin or on the back of the truck. But then again, we technically aren’t supposed to do Santa runs—so regulations be damned. Small smoldering spots were put out as we went along. It was an easy strike team and nothing too intensive, instead it was mainly making sure it didn’t flare up again.

I heard a crack to my left. This wasn’t unusual as the amount of trees and branches falling was enormous. This one however sounded larger and closer. I turned to see a tree falling. It came at me, so I stepped aside. Where I had been standing, there was now a length of wood as wide as my head. The driver was rattling off through the comms. Fear was evident in his voice. I called out as the tree blocked my path and told him that I was okay. I took a photo and sent it off to my mother. We were called back to the main area so the truck could be looked over. The steel had been heavily dinted and a hole punched in. I was forced to remain for half an hour to make sure I wasn’t in shock. The driver seemed to be more shaken than I was. I was given a can of creamed rice from a ration pack to placate me.

I waited and I wondered. Was my lack of fear a sign of something worse? It was, but I refused to acknowledge it. Instead, I waited to be sent back out.

2018 Melbourne Home, Harsh Orange, Fires, Waiting I had left Gippsland and was now living in Melbourne. I knew there were fires back home and part of me wanted to go home and fight them. However, I had to merely accept that I would get updates from my family as time went on. The light on the ground was a harsh orange from the smoke in the sky. One hundred and fifty metres away my family was fighting fires and as I sat doing nothing, I wished to be out there.