ocean grove cfa 2009 annual report

Ocean GroveOcean GroveFire BrigadeFire Brigade

Annual ReportAnnual Report20082008 –– 20092009

Fire Fighter Thatcher on Black Saturday

Ocean Grove’s 2.4C Tanker

OGFB Annual Report 2008-2009

Table of Contents 2

Captain 3 - 5

1st Lieutenant 6 - 7

2nd Lieutenant 8 - 9

3rd Lieutenant 10

4th Lieutenant 11

Community Education 12 - 13

Competition Team 14

Junior Brigade 15

Secretary 16

Black Saturday 7th February 2009 Pictorial 17

Turnout Statistics 18 - 19

Brigade Turnouts by Years 20

2007 - 2008 Annual Dinner Award Presentations 21 - 25

This Years Award Recipients 26

Ocean Grove Fire Brigade Core Values 27

Table of Contents

The 2008 –2009 Annual Report Book has been produced by Lt Wayne Noble.Many thanks to all those who have contributed information and have assisted with the compilation of this report book.

Many of the photos in this report were taken by Alan Barber from the Ocean Grove Voice. They have been published with Alan’s permission. We are very thankful to Alan for the ongoing support he gives to the brigade.


CaptainBob Smith

Brigade & Membership

I would like to thank the brigade officers and members for their support over the past year.

I would especially like to thank the BMT members and those members that offered their sup-port to me in November and December, as I went through the most trying time I have been through in my time in CFA.

Special thanks to those members that made themselves available for strike team duty over the past summer, especially those members that gave up their time during the Black Satur-day Fires on 7th February and the on going weeks

We have had a large number of new members join the brigade. I extend a very warm wel-come to them and hope they have a long and happy association with the brigade.

As well, a number of people have departed from the brigade over this time and we wish them well in their future endeavours.

Congratulations to Paul Smith on his graduation as a Career Fire Fighter in October last year.

I offer my condolences to those members who have lost loved ones over this time.

Brigade OfficersI would like to thank the officers of the brigade for their support over the past year, through the highs and lows.

A special thanks to John Wynn. Without John’s support and counsel my job would be far more difficult than it is, he is always there to offer his support.

Thank you to Wayne and those members that supported him in continuing the high standard with brigade training. He has brought a breath of fresh air to the Brigade.

A big thanks to Mathew Geerings for his on going support and good work in-conjunction with Sandra, Acting BSO with brigade PIP, as well as his efforts with the new members and sta-tion fit out.

Steve, a special thank you for all your hard work and effort. Especially your work, guidance and support to Mat with regard to the new station.


Matt, thank you for all your efforts over the past year. Again thank you for your help and in-put to the new station.

Jess thanks for taking up the role of secretary with such gusto. You have big shoes to fill.

This year for the first time the brigade treasurer has become a separate position. I would like to thank and congratulate Martin Geerings on taking up this mantel and providing a very high standard of service to the brigade.

Cindy a special thanks for all your efforts and for keeping your end up with Community Edu-cation with some support from others.

A special thank to Mathew for all your efforts with FEM. It is a thankless task but you keep it on track and the money coming in and keeping us living in the manner we are use to.

Thanks to Adam, Jess, Paul and Greg for all of your good work with the junior brigade. With-out your hard work the juniors would not exist. It provides great opportunities for younger members of the community to experience some part of fire brigade service.

Community SafetyOver the past twelve months, John, with the assistance of Cindy, has continued work on the brigade’s Community Safety Strategy insuring that we maintain our high standard in this area.

As well as the “Living with Fire” meeting conducted for Woodlands and Ocean Grove Resi-dents in March where some 100 people attended, they also provided representation at all MFPC meetings.

Training Once again a very high standard of training has been maintained within the brigade, mainly thanks to the hard work of the Brigade Training Officer and the support he has received from other members of the brigade.

There has been an on going high standard of training delivered to new members under the guidance of Ivan, Adam, Jason and any one I may have missed.

Vehicles & Infrastructure Once again the brigade has maintained a very high standard with its vehicle inventory.

The brigade also purchased a Stihl Quick-cut and chainsaw with assistance of Ocean Grove Rotary Club

The brigade also purchased two additional Self Contained Breathing Apparatus with the as-sistance of Club Grove.

The work load will increase on all members with the move to the new station.


Competition Team I must congratulate Matthew Walker, as the team coach, for his efforts and endeavours to have a team on the track at the State Championships at Warrnambool this year. I can only reinforce my thanks and congratulations for all of his efforts. Thanks Matty.

In closing, I would again like to thank all the members of the brigade for their on going sup-port and other groups and organisations. Thanks also to GM Paul, Op’s manager Bob, Catchment Officer & BASO for their support to the brigade over the past twelve months

Bob SmithCaptain

1st LieutenantJohn Wynn

2008-09 will certainly be a milestone for Ocean Grove Urban Fire Brigade when viewed in the future. We have moved to our new station, completed the fitting out and equipping of it, taken delivery of a new 2.4C Tanker and participated in an ex-tremely busy and demanding summer season.

After many years of frustrating disappoints, the C.F.A. has delivered an outstanding facility for our Community and Brigade. It was a little later than anticipated but it is certainly worth the extra time and I feel compelled on behalf of the Brigade to ex-press our appreciation to Regional Manager Paul Stacchino, Catchment Officer Graham Lay and our Brigade Committee for their devotion to the project and for the many extras they have provided.

Perhaps the challenges of change in our attitudes to Community Safety is the greatest challenge we face as a Brigade after the Operational challenges. How can we engage the wider community, form partnerships and have them assist us in producing a safer Community? The Prevention, Preparedness, Response and Recovery continuum provides a real challenge for all Brigades. There are indeed opportunities currently available in the community climate created by “Black Saturday” that will assist in this challenge.

It has been most gratifying to see the new faces of recruits and transferees. Our recruit-training program has been refined on a group basis and the new recruits have compensated for our membership losses. Indeed our community support is still very strong considering that we are one of the largest urban areas along the Victorian Coast. The opening of our new station provides an opportunity for us to build on this and to strengthen this community engagement.

My thanks to all Brigade members for their contributions in so many ways, to the increasing Community awareness of safety issues and the necessity for public awareness and reporting. Special thanks to Cindy for her significant commitment to the Bellarine Group Presenters Team and the Bellarine Community Safety Committee that is being used as a pilot for the area and the C.F.A.

We still have (and always will have) a long way to go with Community Awareness of our Voluntary Community Service Role and attracting new members to ensure our coverage responsibility and community safety objectives however, as a Brigade we are constantly addressing these issues as witnessed by the significant recruitment of new members during the last two years.



To quote Area Manager Paul Stacchino from recent edition of Brigade – “We are a people organization delivering emergency management and community safety through our people who are the community. The wellbeing of our people is our core business”

Ocean Grove Fire Brigade members can be justifiably proud of our Brigade – Our high standard of service delivery, the role that we are fulfilling in our Community and the “family” culture that has been maintained within our membership.

John H. Wynn1st Lieutenant

2nd LieutenantWayne Noble

The brigade has been so busy over the last 12 months it is hard to know exactly where to start. As training takes up the largest component of my time I shall begin there.

Training has been very diverse and taken many different forms since I wrote in last years report. We purchased a quick cut saw and have been going through the process of training members how to use it. I thank Mathew Geerings for putting together a training & assess-ment package, and for delivering it to the brigade. I also thank Mathew for the assistance he has given me in delivering and assessing various topics including pushing a large number of fire fighters through the Urban & Wildfire Thermal Imaging Camera Course.

With the delivery of our 2.4C Tanker we have all had to go through the training and assess-ment package for it. The greater majority of the membership managed to complete this prior to the fire season. With the season we had, I am grateful you put in the effort to complete it.

Another tool the brigade purchased was a chainsaw. Members have been putting in the effort to attend the Region’s Chainsaw course to ensure we have accredited personnel to use it. Thankyou to those people and thankyou to those with their names on lists for future courses.

Courses members have been attending are;

Class “A” Foam, Fireline Leadership, Wildfire Crew Leader, Urban Crew Leader, First Aid, Basic Level 1 Fire Fighter, Hazmat Awareness, Recruit Course, Group Exercise, Chain Saw Course, Driving Courses, Breathing Apparatus, Low-Structure, and I am sure there are a couple more I have failed to mention. It is a big commitment to give up your weeknights and weekends to attend these courses and I thankyou for your commitment.

We ran a very successful recruit course last year and what a great group of people we have been able to welcome to our brigade. The course would not have been able to be run with-out Ivan, Adam and Jason putting in the time and effort they did, to get everyone through. I thank the three of you along with anyone else you seconded to help you along the way.

Our pre-summer training was a bit different last year with everyone working in syndicates to present a topic to the rest of the brigade. Those of you who put the effort into researching and conducted those session did a fantastic job. The sessions were informative and enter-taining, but most importantly clearly did the job they were designed to do. I think the profes-sionalism shown over the fire season, along with the fact we all returned safely home from the jobs we attended (both far and near) is a testament to that training. Inline with continu-ous improvement we will be doing something different again this year.

I take this opportunity to offer my thanks to Susie Thatcher for the effort she has put in as a valued member of the training team. Susie has spent many hours keeping the brigades training data base up to date, giving us an accurate picture of the training events each of us participates in throughout the year. Being an administrator by heart I have introduced a lot of initiatives to the brigade which generate quiet a bit of paper work / computer processing. Without Susie's assistance I would struggle to keep up with it all. Thanks Susie.



Another training initiative we have introduced is the Audio visual library. There are now doz-ens of Videos & DVD’s that have been catalogued and are available for loan to members. The brigades old VHS tapes have also been converted to DVD. I encourage you to borrow from the library as another way of furthering your knowledge. This year our reading library will get underway adding another dimension to our training resources.

In line with the CFA’s ‘safety first culture’, we have adopted a return to duties policy. Any member that has been away for a lengthy period of time is now required to complete a re-turn to duties plan, prior to returning to their role again within the brigade. This is to ensure they are up to date with any changes that have occurred in their absence and they refresh their skills in a safe environment.

Once again I thank the brigade for their commitment to training and encourage you to keep up your enthusiasm levels high.

This year saw the introduction of the IT Committee, made up of myself, Andrew Cooper, Alan Bartle & Scott Andrews. It is the committee’s role to oversee the IT requirements of the brigade and make recommendations on how we can do things better. With the committees recommendations the brigade has purchased another computer, turned the old one into an internet kiosk, networked the station, upgraded our broadband plan, purchased a wireless router and set up electronic files for all members to store their electronic information on. The biggest enhancement has been the creation of the new Brigade Web site. This has brought a whole new communications medium to the brigade. A big thankyou to Alan & Louise for generously hosting our site through their Web Based company free of charge.Without a doubt Andrew has put in a phenomenal amount of time and effort setting up both the infrastructure at the station as well as creating and maintaining the web site. Thankyou Andrew for putting in all that time and effort and to Natalie and the kids who have had to put up with you spending all that time on these projects.

As chairman of the annual dinner committee this year I would like to thank Peter Baxter, Anne Geerings, Kellie Geerings and Jess Dickson for making the night so successful. Plan-ning for the evening takes place many months prior to the night to ensure everything is just a prefect evening. Without them there would be no annual dinner.

I would not be able to do all the things I do without the support of my wife Nicole and two beautiful daughters Isabelle & Madeline. CFA has a habit of stealing you away from your families for many, many hours during the year and they have not complained about it at any time. In fact they have only offered me encouragement and support. I thank them for this.

On Black Saturday I found myself on the tanker with Matthew Fisher, Susie Thatcher, Martin Geerings and Matthew Walker near Drouin in Gippsland. On that day this crew worked tire-lessly for many hours saving houses, sheds, windrows, farmland and animals. I take this op-portunity to publicly thank them for the most professional manner in which they conducted themselves on that day, as ambassadors of the Ocean Grove Fire Brigade. In particular the saving of the rose eating goat who was surrounded by fire and saved with only inches to spare, that then went onto eat his owners roses at his new safe location.Well done to “The Goat Savers”!

Wayne Noble2nd Lieutenant

3rd LieutenantMathew Geerings

The 2008/2009 year has provided many opportunities for the Ocean Grove members to become involved in CFA activities, ranging from emergency response, training to community based and brigade activities. It has also provided opportunities for mem-bers to display leadership qualities under some of the functional areas of the 3rd Lt.My role this year has seen the update of the constitution and brigade position de-scriptions, mapping and the brigade operating procedures, training and emergency response amongst other things.

Over the past year we have seen a number of new recruits enter the journey of be-coming firefighters, progressing through theory and practical training packages pro-vided by the CFA and Ocean Grove members. We also welcome the current recruit firefighters who have just started there basic level of training.

Over the past 18 months the brigade has made some purchases of equipment with money donated by the community, businesses and the local service clubs. This in-cluded a quick cut saw, a chainsaw and an upgrade of the thermal imaging camera. With the introduction of this new equipment comes the need of specialist training and with the exception of the chainsaw training packages and assessments have been developed and delivered to ensure that the equipment can be used safely and effi-ciently. Well done to the members that made themselves available to complete this additional training.

A very big thank you to the members who provided assistance at, and prior to the markets over the summer period. It was the most successful year so far and it has provided additional funding for the brigade to use where it is required.

Fire Equipment Maintenance has also provided a large amount of funding for the bri-gade, and I thank the members ongoing support for allowing me to continue on with the FEM contract. Currently there are over 200 clients contracted to the Ocean Grove brigade and we are always seeking more at every opportunity.We have now completed our first year within the new fire station and it is a credit to the members that were part of the new station committee for all the work they have done to make the station functional and user friendly.

Finally a big thank you to my family, partner and all the brigade members for their support over the past year and I wish them all the very best for health and happiness in the future.

Mathew Geerings3rd Lieutenant


4th LieutenantSteven Gibbs

We are very fortunate to have such a wonderful group of people that we call the ‘Ocean Grove Fire Brigade’. This Brigade provides a vital service to our community and I am very privileged to be part of it. Whilst the Brigade has gone through some difficult times during the past twelve months, I strongly believe that we have gained strength and unity by these experiences.

The wildfires of Saturday February 7th 2009 and beyond resulted in a loss of life by fire that Victoria has never experienced before. Our Brigade responded to a number of these fires, the first being on what is now known as ‘Black Saturday’. I was comforted by the fact that we have excellent equipment that provides us with the best ability to safely manage fires whilst maintaining the highest degree of fire fighter safety and I am pleased to say this equipment never let us down. This day will remain in my mind for some time as the hottest and deadli-est day in Victoria’s history. Let’s hope that as a community we all learn and change as a result of this significant event.

The past twelve months have also seen significant changes within the Brigade, none more that the relocation of the Brigade to a new multimillion dollar fire station on the corner of Grubb and Shell roads in Ocean Grove. The extensive planning and work committed to oc-cupying this new station has certainly paid off and I would like to thank the CFA, Brigade Of-ficers and Members for all the energy they have put into making this new fire station a GREAT fire station that the whole community can be very proud of.

Within the new station we have been fortunate to receive a brand new 2.4C four wheel drive Tanker. This twin-cab tanker has safety features never seen on our previous Tankers such as a water spray system that protects the vehicle and occupants in the event of a wildfire entrapment as well as a twin-cab for all the crew. The tanker has also been equipped with two new Breathing Apparatus (BA) sets and a Stihl chain saw. The purchase of the chain saw and BA was made possible by the kind donations of community organisations within Ocean Grove.

We have also purchased a Stihl Quick Cut Saw for the Pumper that we will use to gain quick and safe access to a fire or other emergency. Most recently, the saw was used to gain ac-cess to the seat of a fire in a building within the Industrial Estate of Ocean Grove. We have also purchased two portable battery operated high-intensity flood and spot lights. These lights provide intense white light and are totally portable. The spot light shines a bright spot of light over 1000 metres which has attracted much attention when used on jobs with other agencies such as the Ambulance.

In closing, I sincerely thank my wife Tracey and children Matthew and Amy for allowing me to dedicate valuable time to the Brigade and community. And finally, a heart felt thanks goes out to the Officers and Members of our Brigade for their continued support.

Steve Gibbs4th Lieutenant


Community EducationCindy Harrison-Roberts

The past year hasn’t been as busy for me as past years were. However a number of pro-grams and activities have still taken place.

Advance Program

Bellarine Secondary College once again came on board with the Advance Program in con-junction with the Ocean Grove Fire Brigade. The students came to the station for a visit & tour as well as getting to know the “History of the CFA” through a PowerPoint presentation. Unfortunately, this was one of only a couple of sessions this year due to school activities clashing with Advance/CFA dates. The school still conducted a fundraiser with the pro-ceeds being donated to the Ocean Grove Fire Brigade to purchase equipment. Once again the College has continued on, for the forth year, with the program in 2009. Hopefully it will be a little more successful this year.

Brigades in Schools

Brigades in Schools wasn’t conducted in Ocean Grove last year.

Summer Awareness Presentation

Tuesday 13th January saw the Ocean Grove Rotary Club hold their meeting at the station with brigade members putting on a BBQ with fruit for dessert. A station tour and history/awareness session, as well as a Quick cut saw display was conducted with some great & positive feedback coming in.

A Fire Ready Victoria (Summer Awareness) presentation was conducted by CFA & DSE staff, at the station for the community on Wednesday 11th March. With over 100 people at-tending, hopefully some of our key messages, as in cleaning up & preparing for major wild-fire, have prompted community members to complete some work around their properties be-fore next summer. There was quite a lot of concern and misconception that the Nature Re-serve is not being cleaned up and the meeting got quite hot at one stage. Thankfully DSE were able to calm them down and put them back at ease by answering some of their ques-tions.

Santa Runs

Santa runs to clubs, groups and kindergartens in the past few years haven’t been as plenti-ful as in previous years. We still conducted a few including Woodlands Preschool where Santa is always welcomed with smiles & a song.

Christmas Eve last year saw our Santa Run continue on in the new format. With set loca-tions and times put in place, it made the evening a lot safer and more structured for both our Santa’s and the public. The children knew exactly when to expect their favourite fellow to come & visit them and, of course, give them a hug & a lollypop.


Media

As of this year, my portfolio now encompasses “Media Liaison”. Every fortnight a list of calls we have attended goes to the Voice for publishing. This is a great way for the public to keep up with what type & how many calls we attend. Also any other activities the brigade may be involved in, Alan is always there with his camera ready to take photo’s and do a story, whether it is Santa runs, Summer Presentations or Good Friday Appeals. I would like to ac-knowledge Alan Barber from the Ocean Grove Voice for his fantastic support to the Ocean Grove Fire Brigade this past year and hope we can continue this great relationship into many more years ahead.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the members whom have helped me out over the last twelve months. Without your help, the school programs, both Advance & Brigades in Schools, wouldn’t happen and wouldn’t be as successful in our brigade area as what they are.

Cindy Harrison-RobertsCommunity Education Officer


Competition TeamMatthew Walker

I would like to take this opportunity to thank all the members for their support and commit-ment to the competition team over the past year.

The past year has seen the brigade participate in the new updated version of the bail of straw event at the Geelong show grounds. This year has also seen us compete at the state championships held at Warrnambool. Due to the running of limited events, we were con-stricted to the two pumper events and the dry work including the hydrant race and the ladder race. Although we did not do as well as I had hoped, considering the limited amount of train-ing we had, we did quite well.

Training is now underway for the winter competition. We are competing in the Geelong and District competition at the show grounds for the first time in about four years. Looking into the future, we are looking forward to the Australasian fire fighter champions later in the year.

Matthew WalkerCompetition Team Coach


Junior BrigadeJessica Wakeling & Adam Wakeling

Another year has passed quickly again. Early on during the last year we had about 8 Juniors regularly attending our fortnightly sessions. Our juniors participate in social fun activities as well as basic fire ground training using our appliances and equip-ment. Since the start of this year we have approximately 14-17 who are attending regularly. We must be doing something right!!

The junior brigade would struggle to operate without the support of a lot of other bri-gade members. Thank you to Paul Hull, Jason Greenwood and Cassie Dickson for their continued assistance in running the program. Also a big Thank you to Susie Thatcher, Sue Partridge, Graeme Ferguson, Mat Geerings, Steve Gibbs, Matthew Fisher and Matt Walker who have helped at different times of the year. Thanks also to anyone we may have missed.

We look forward to another action packed year with our Junior Brigade. We are look-ing to include many new activities and challenges into our program so as to keep our kids interested. Any members who wish to be involved or have any program ideas please speak to Jess or Adam as any assistance is invaluable when you are dealing with over a dozen, often rowdy, teenagers.

Jessica Wakeling & Adam WakelingJunior Brigade Leaders


SecretaryJessica Wakeling

I wish to open my report by thanking the Brigade Management Team and my fellow brigade members for their support over the past twelve months. The time has passed quickly and I thank you all for your patience and understanding as I have undertaken a steep learning curve to fulfill my role as Brigade Secretary.

As we all know, I have big shoes to fill and appreciate that I never will.

A big thank you to Susie for being my willing assistant, and for assisting the other of-ficers as required.

Thank you to the Captain for guiding me when I was unsure, and reminding me when I may have forgotten something.

And to Cindy for chasing up paperwork and printing out the meeting minutes and re-ports for me.

Once again thank you to all the brigade members and I look forward to another year of secretarial duties.

Jessica WakelingSecretary


Black Saturday7th February 2009

Pictorial


The Goat Savers

Turnout Statistics

Type of call for 12 month period ending 31st May 2009

Day of the week statistics for the 12 month period ending 31st May 2009


Time of Day statistics for the 12 month period ending 31st May 2009

The above statistics show the following interesting facts about our bri-gade turnouts:

Our total turnouts for the 2008 – 2009 Financial year (less June’s statistics due to dinner being held earlier this year) were 138. This is the same amount of calls as the entire 2007 - 2008 financial year, which included June.

Type of Turnout

The brigade turned out to 64 reported fires & explosions, making this the major type of call the brigade responded to.

Day of the Week

The busiest days of the week for the brigade were Monday’s & Friday’s. The brigade responded to 24 calls on each of these days which represents 17.39% of all our turnouts on each of these days.

Time of the Day

The busiest time of day for the brigade is 1500 - 1600 hrs with 22 calls re-ceived at this time of day over the twelve-month period.


Brigade Turnouts by Year

1997 - 1998 158 2003 - 2004 132

1998 - 1999 120 2004 - 2005 147

1999 - 2000 150 2005 - 2006 164

2000 - 2001 171 2006 - 2007 172

2001 - 2002 143 2007 - 2008 138

2002 - 2003 152 2008 - 2009* 138

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Turnouts

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Brigade Turnouts by Years

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* 2008 - 2009 statistics are as at 31/05/2009, with 1 month still remaining of the reporting period.

2007 - 2008 Annual DinnerAward Presentation

Fire Fighter of the year2007—2008

John Dickson


Brigade Encouragement Award2007—2008

Martin Geerings

Recruit Excellence Award2007—2008

Paul Smith


45 yr Long Service Award2007—2008

Maurice Barry

Competitions Award2007—2008

Paul Smith & John Koronui


Captains Award2007—2008

Jessica Dickson

Keith Fisher Full Flush Award2007—2008

Doug Pearce


2008 - 2009 Awards PresentedAt the New Fire Station Opening

22nd June 2008

20 yr Long Service AwardCindy Harrison-Roberts

25 yr Long Service AwardJohn Wynn

40 yr Long Service AwardDoug Pearce


Ocean Grove Fire BrigadeAward Presentation

At the 2009 Annual Dinner

Use this page to record the names of this years award recipients

Fire Fighter of the Year

Captain’s Award

Brigade Encouragement Award

Recruit Excellence Award

Competitions Award

Longs Service Awards & Clasps

Life Memberships

Keith Fisher Full Flush Award

Other Awards


Ocean Grove Fire BrigadeOcean Grove Fire BrigadeCore ValuesCore Values

Family & Friendship

To provide positive support, and value family & friendships above all else.

Trust & Integrity

The ability to be trusted by our fellow brigade members and the broader community.

Teamwork

To recognise and respect the role & responsibility of all team members, whilstworking towards a common goal.

Commitment

Putting in 100% of what you can.

Professionalism

Pride in the job, uniform and organisation.

Respect

Treat others as we would like to be treated, in accordance with our core values.


ocean grove cfa 2009 annual report

Documents

brigade pip

brigade turnouts

junior brigade

brigade treasurer

brigade officersi

brigade training

brigade core values

bmt members