Report on Coopers Creek Fire

I was asked to see what number of people I could get for a team to respond to help the Salvation Army to help cater the fire fighters at the Coopers Creek Fire. I sent out a page to the team and I had three people that could attend, my self, Debbie Webb and Nikole Sample. We were deployed at about 1100 hrs. Jude Lathey and I picked up an Ecan vehicle and proceeded to Sockburn where we picked up Debbie and Nikole. It took up to two hours from the time of activation to be fully deployed. We dropped Jude back at Ecan and then left for Oxford Town Hall where the Salvation Army was catering for the fire fighters.

We arrived and started to work straight away preparing dinner for 60 people at 1800hrs. As we started to prepare the food we realised that we didn?t have enough pots so Debbie and I went to the Oxford Working Men?s Club and borrowed four pots to help us out. We used the Oxford Town Hall for all cooking and eating. The ICP for the fire was located at the Oxford Fire Station which was behind the Town Hall. We were asked to prepare lunch for 30 Fire Fighters for the next day. This was at approximately 1330hrs. We knew that the Local Super Value didn?t have enough rolls for us to do this so myself and one of the Salvation Army people headed to Rangiora to the Supermarket there to get supplies while Debbie and Nikole and another Salvation army person looked after the food that was being prepared. The Salvation Army used accounts already setup at the supermarkets to pay for the supplies. As we started to travel back to Oxford we were inform by radio that the Fire Fighter were arriving sooner than planned. We started feeding Fire Fighters from 1700hrs onwards to about 1900hrs.We also towed a small trailer to the fire ground for the night crew to be able to make them selves? cups of coffee for the night ahead. The Salvation Army didn?t have a vehicle right for the towing job. We cleaned up the hall and where asked to have breakfast ready at 0600hrs. The ICP had organised beds for us at the Oxford Tavern.

We woke at about 0345hrs and proceeded to the hall to start making breakfast at 0400hrs. We were met by a Salvation Army person and we started to make breakfast and lunch for the day. We didn?t make lunch the night before because it wouldn?t have been very fresh and there wasn?t any where to store it to keep it fresh. We made breakfast for 30 people and lunch for the same amount. Breakfast was served at 0600 hrs till about 0700 hrs. Between 0700 and 0800 hrs we cleaned the hall. At 0800 hrs we went and picked up the small trailer that we dropped off the night before. At about 0900hrs the next shift of catering staff arrived and we went home.

Paul (KILO) Davenport
Team Leader
NZ-RT11

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