On Saturday 21 September a planned burn for hazard reduction near Oxford Falls on Sydney’s northern beaches escaped containment and spread rapidly south-east to a much larger area.
At times the fire behaviour and flame heights were severe. This was two days after the first total fire ban for the season in the Sydney area. During the afternoon the threat to life and property was deemed imminent and an emergency ‘too late to leave’ alert was issued to local residents. The response to the emergency involved hundreds of firefighters and a number of aircraft.
The ‘Meatworks’ hazard reduction was reportedly planned to be 24 hectares in size. The larger fire was succesfully contained on 23 September at 147 hectares (Source: Fires Near Me).
The breakout fire was prominent from many parts of Sydney, and provoked much commentary. Not all of it was well-informed, but many volunteer firefighters expressed dismay and anger on the Rural Fire Service facebook page.
On 24 September, the Commissioner of the Rural Fire Service issued a memo to the RFS saying “We will be conducting a local After Action Review along with a formal internal inquiry to assess if any improvements can be made to avoid such occurrences in the future“.
Continuous improvement is key to ensuring our firefighting efforts remain effective and safe for
both our members and the community.
– RFS Commissioner Rob Rogers, RFS memo 24 September 2024
Media coverage
Mainstream media reported on the crisis as it unfolded and, to a lesser extent, on the context and aftermath:
ABC News, 21 September 2024: ‘Bushfire burning in Sydney’s Northern Beaches downgraded from Emergency warning to Advice’
The Guardian, 21 September 2024: ‘Bushfire risk on Sydney’s northern beaches downgraded’
ABC News, 21 September 2024: ‘RFS falls short of target for hazard reduction burns ahead of bushfire season’
Sydney Morning Herald, 21 September 2024: ‘Bushfire downgraded on Sydney’s northern beaches after planned burn jumped containment lines’
Sydney Morning Herald, 23 September 2024: ‘ We are way behind’: Race against time to reduce fire risk in Sydney suburbs’
An IBG opinion article related to this event was published in the Sydney Morning Herald online on 25 September and in the print edition on 27 September:
Sydney Morning Herald online, 25 September 2024: ‘Hazard reduction shouldn’t be hazardous. So why the escaped fire at Oxford Falls?’
IBG Comment
- The Sydney Morning Herald article includes some IBG comment, but there is more to say. IBG has written about many of those issues before, much of it on this website. Planned burns are a complex management task, with many risk factors and opportunities to go wrong. All risk factors need to be considered for each burn, but not all risks can be controlled.
- Planned burns (both prescribed burns for hazard reduction and backburns for controlling wildfires) have escaped in the past and more will escape in the future. IBG members have themselves lost burns in their firefighting careers. In 2020 a burn by Fire and Rescue NSW and the National Parks and Wildlife Service escaped prominently at North Head in Sydney. The important response is not to assign blame but to analyse why these events happen and identify and act upon the lessons learned.
- Past experience and analysis has shown that firefighting agencies have insufficient commitment and capacity to properly examine and learn from negative outcomes. And the same applies to good outcomes, where it is just as important to learn how these were achieved. Identifying lessons is not enough; lessons must be documented, promulgated to firefighters and built into practice. There is a vast literature with guidelines and policies on lessons management, but they are insufficiently applied.
- Whilst an After Action Review (involving those involved) of the Meatworks incident is a welcome commitment, it should have been routine and has to be well managed, while the internal review is also welcome but inadequate. Any agency investigating itself has a conflicted and impossible task. This is not the best way to produce a report that will be seen by the community as thorough and objective.
- Some may say that backburning (which requires much the same planning and skills as prescribed burning) has been well examined, and point to the 2020 NSW Bushfire Inquiry and the 2024 NSW Bushfires Coronials. But this is incorrect. The inquiry did not look at any backburns in detail. The coronials examined only a few, and left many questions about those few unanswered. Most backburns from the 2019-2020 bushfires remain unexamined, whether successful or unsuccessful.
- Expert research on backburn and prescribed burn escapes has to date been minimal, and it is essential that more happens to provide better guidance to firefighters. A new project being run by the new NSW Bushfire and Natural Hazards Research Centre (see IBG post of July 24 below) should help to fill this gap, but it comes nearly five years after the 2019-2020 fires which provide such a strong evidence base. The project “Evaluating backburning and fire-break operations” will take two years and more than $200,000. Such evaluation needs to be ongoing.
- Reviews, inquiries and research should be routine, expert and independent. These are some of the reasons the IBG has been pushing for an Inspector General of Emergency Management for NSW. This is the only way to ensure the right lessons are learned and acted upon for continuous improvement, while also reducing controversy and the ongoing cycle of one-off and inadequate reviews.
- Review bodies for many other public safety industries have shown the way. Police, health, the military, even the intelligence services, have independent oversight bodies. They should be welcomed by agencies and government as a positive boon to continuous improvement, safety for all and transparency.
- Burning for hazard reduction is another very complex issue (see IBG post of 21 July below: “Shortfall in planned burning”). Public and media understanding of the costs, benefits, challenges and technicalities is often poor. Fuel reduction can be useful, especially close to assets and to strengthen natural fire barriers. But, as several RFS Commissioners have said, burning is no panacea. Burning is a useful tool when used well, and partly a numbers game. That is, each effective burn will offer some assistance and protection to a limited area for a limited time, but only if a wildfire threatens within that period.
- IBG does not support area-based ‘targets’ because the focus on strategic burning for specific benefits can be replaced with a focus on hectares burnt. ‘Properties protected’ targets are better, but still somewhat fraught. As pressure to burn increases, and as burns perhaps are pushed into more marginal opportunities, the community needs to understand that escapes may become more likely, with increased risk of impacts.
- Educative and constructive public discussion is essential to optimise the use of limited burning resources (and weather windows to do burns) and also to maintain some kind of consensus within the community. IBG will continue to contribute to this discussion.
(Post updated 27 September 2024)
Independent Bushfire Group 