IF you think we’re too smart in Port Macquarie for ‘dumb’ fires, think again.
Last week Chris Harris, of Bay Park Photos adjacent to Panthers, had an experience that emphasised to him just how easily one stupid act could spark a disaster, particularly if compounded by other less than intelligent acts.
Chris was on the phone one morning when he looked out the window and saw smoke billowing from the narrow strip of vegetation on a median strip about one hundred metres away near the multi-storey car park.
He and a fellow shop-keeper rushed to carry buckets of water to put out the fire. By the time the fireys had arrived five minutes later they had each carted buckets of water over twice. Thankfully the fireys stopped the fire spreading and the only damage was a couple of square metres of singed ground cover.
Chris and his fellow shop-keeper checked the area afterwards and there was no sign of any glass that could have magnified the sun’s rays, so they believe it was probably started by a cigarette butt being tossed out of a car.
Understandably Chris is full of praise for the fire-fighters, but not the person who tossed the butt, or the motorists who continued to drive right through the smoke, hindering him and his fellow shop-keeper in their attempts to put out the fire.
“For the sake of a few minutes they were willing to risk their safety and that of us putting the fire out,” he said.
“There was dense smoke, yet they were oblivious to the danger. I even had to dodge to avoid one car.”
Chris hopes that by publicising this incident he might make smokers think twice before tossing butts out the window, and also to think carefully about the best course of action in a potentially dangerous situation.
“I just cannot help thinking how the Homebush Bay fire in Sydney that destroyed hundreds of cars was started by a cigarette butt and how quickly the same thing could have happened here if the fire had spread to overhead trees,” he said.
