Over the weekend of the 8th / 9th
November Rivers held it’s first, and hopefully
annual, combined training weekend. The idea
came from one that RFS did around 6 years ago at
Camp Sturt.
On the first day there were four training
activities that the 3 combined teams of RFS /
SES personnel folk completed. Ben organised a
search and rescue exercise that was very
informative and fun. Tony and Grant did a pumps
and pumping exercise utilising the portable dam,
quick fill, portable pumps and tanker. A useful
exercise that both sides learnt a lot from.
Graeme set up a prussiking exercise and from
the photo’s below, RFS quickly learnt that it is
quite a challenge that is definitely harder than
it looks and Allan and I had the pleasure of
running everyone through driving and guiding a
tanker. People quickly realised that when
reversing, if you can’t see the guide it makes
it very hard. (Tony, I believe Rivers 11
needs a new clutch and gear box!!)
Thankfully we only had one near miss on the
first run of the day. Matt ran everyone through
a theory scenario to get everyone thinking of
what is required when we are first called to an
incident and things we should be thinking about.
The catering courtesy of Jennifer, Louise and
Jennifer’s friend was absolutely outstanding and
greatly appreciated!! It was so nice to have
lovely freshly cooked meals as opposed to the
usual minute steak and sausage sandwich.
When we arrived back into the hall we found the
tables were all set up for us to enjoy a
delicious dinner followed by a scrumptious
desert. During dinner people were paired up by
finding their matching nut or bolt and these
were the teams for the team building activities
for the evening. With 4 teams competing, all
with the last part of their teams ending in ‘gasm’,
the winners were awarded their chocolate almonds
and some folk stayed up with a few bevies and
had a yarn.
The following morning saw us all responding to a
report of a fire on the next property Riverview.
When we all arrived there were numerous fires
being lit by an arsonist along with a snake bite
victim, MVA with two casualties still in the
vehicle with fire approaching it and then we had
a burnover!! A very busy day in the office for
any emergency crews J Thank you Stephen for
coordinating this incident. It kept us all on
our toes!!
Thank you to all that attended the weekend and
hopefully we will be able to do it bigger and
better! J
Rohan Samara
