MPS bus stop and fencing on Monday Morning, 10th February.
It’s 1:41am Wednesday morning and I have awoken to write after another coughing fit. I woke up to write the interview the paper did with Harden Fire and Rescue Unit Commander, Wal Leonow.
We have also interviewed SES Unit Commander Tom Hogg and his story and perspective will be in this week’s edition dated, Thursday February 20. Wal’s story was extensive and at more than 3,700 words, we hope it does this man justice and highlights the efforts of his crews and the work our first responders do.
Social media has been kept up to date this week with one video at the time of writing having received more than 200,000 views, for a total in excess of 300,000. Even though I regard most of what is on Social Media as complete rubbish, it is a necessary evil in modern times. Highlighted this week by trolling, pile ons and people ill-equipped to run a community page.
Over to Wal.
I’ve known Wal Leonow for years. Wal is called a first responder and the Harden Fire and Rescue Unit Commander. It’s a term that we as Australians and indeed Twin Towners’ have become more familiar with. They include Fire and Rescue, Ambulance, Police, SES and RFS in the bush, where we live.
Murrimboola Creek in flood on Monday February 10.
If people haven’t forgotten, we live in the bush, located geographically an hour and 15 mins from Canberra, and an hour and a half from Wagga, two much larger centres that our very ill or those normally involved in serious car crashes, end up in hospital. We see our specialists there and we shop for major items that we can’t get in surrounding towns there.
Wal is the sort of person I would like to see if ever involved in an accident or needing a first responder. Heaven forbid that day comes. His gleaming smile when having a joke or the knowledge he imparts about his career when you can coax some history out of him, puts you at ease. He doesn’t name names, he is professional. He knows he can’t save everyone. He is a realist, but he will try his hardest. He is here for everyone in the community, both town and rural and those travelling through it. He has attended too many incidents to count in a career heading towards 30 years of service.
Sometimes in a town this size, he knows the victim of the MVA, very rarely he won’t. If they are travelling through, they get the same care as a loved one who lives here. He has arrived on scene to find those in accidents he has known intimately and he has been unable to do anything such has been the severity of the crash. Wal is human, he is not a machine. These incidents take their toll. Even battle hardened first responders like Wal and many of his crew are impacted both short and long term, but like our first responders a switch appears to flick in his head when his pager goes off, or a call comes in from one of his ‘brothers’ and ‘sisters’ at Fire and Rescue Harden. It’s time to get to work.
Bunyip Preschool continues to be flooded out every couple of years due to the fact it is built on a natural flood plain, however, this is by far the worst weather incident to happen to the organisation.
Wal works for Andy Stewart. Another man who is generous with his time and his assistance. Andy loses Wal like other employers do whenever there is the need for Wal to help the townsfolk. On a property like Andy’s, he looses his right hand man for anywhere from a couple of hours up to a day. He knows it’s his part of being part of a small community where those in it are trained to save their friends and family, townsfolk and complete strangers. Thanks must go to all of the employers who allow their first responders to up and leave and help us.
Wal spent Tuesday attempting to right hundreds of metres of fencing and in doing so he came across dead sheep who had been washed up against fences and killed. The deaths of mainly sheep across the district has gone under the radar. It’s dozens if not hundreds. Many of them young lambs who couldn’t withstand the ferocity of the storm, or who were swept away near swollen creek beds.
He said, “We are not the only ones in the boat, it’s happened across the whole district.”
Wal knows when he sees our number that a couple of things will happen. We will try and arrange a time on his terms, as the importance of his work comes first. We will be respectful, having grown up in the town and knowing what he and others in their roles do. We will talk frankly about what has happened, words are rarely minced, there’s no need after 11 years.
Wal didn’t arrive home until around 8:30pm Tuesday night and we made it clear that a chat could wait until Wednesday morning, maybe after breakfast. He texted back and was insistent that although a little tired he could chat then. We spoke with Wal for nearly 40 minutes. When we picked the phone up his voice was a little coarse and a little tired, but once he got going he gave us a run down of his two days of most recent work. Tuesday likely started very early in an attempt to help survey the damage on Andy’s property where he works. You see first responders are often out helping others while damage needs attention on their own property. He was back up at 5:00am yesterday to go again. Fencing alone will run in to the kilometres. The property is by no means small.
Wal was part of an animal rescue where three cows where stuck in a dam. It was just ice and mud. One could be saved. Not only is it disheartening and heart breaking to lose animals of that size, it’s not cheap, worth a couple of thousand dollars each as breeders.
Wal had SES Animal Rescue come from Yass to assist. “We ended up saving one. It took over half an hour to get her out and she is going well.”
Wal’s Monday started around 3:00am with the first sounds of rumbling thunder. He is a notorious light sleeper something which no doubt frustrates Margie. She knew what she signed up for though when her husband is the Unit Commander of Harden Fire and Rescue. She is there to support him and at times to help feed him and others to keep them going.
The Mechanic’s Institute Harden.
Wal unable to really get back to sleep, stirred when at 4:00am there was some light hail and more thunder.
By 6:00am the eye of the storm hit the Twin Towns and the neighbouring area.
No one was really sure what was about to happen. Rain on a tin roof can be soothing but this sound quickly changed to the more unfamiliar but immediately damaging sound of hail. Some of the stones were golf ball size or bigger and others were the size of peas with everything in between, but it was to be the quantity that did the damage. Reports of 50mm in town, 75mm at Cunnningar and reports of over 100mm in other areas around town in different directions. Much of it fell as a mixture of hail and rain with flash flooding pushing the heavy ice towards fences with debris and knocking them flat.
He said, “We started about 6:00am on Monday morning with the smell of a gas leak call, it just progressed from there and it was call after call after call. I jumped in my private vehicle and did a reconnaissance (recce) We had to prioritise major assets, supermarket being one, Kruger Medical Centre, the Nursing home, it was flooded, the Hospital was ok in that it was running on back-up power. The Bowling Club was gone, it will be closed until further notice. The Country Club had alarms ringing. And we had no power in town. It was a very unexpected storm.”
Knowing the area so well, “It was imminent that Murrumburrah was going to get flooded again, local creek crossings. I saw along the Currawong Road and the creeks flowing in to that from the creeks east of town, that it was going to be a mess. It looked like Tumut in winter when I got to town, it was white, it looked like snow. I got to the station and we just did job after job after job.”
“My crew, the Police, SES and RFS made it happen. The local Council. I spoke to Glenn at the local Supermarket. He couldn’t get in because there was a metre of ice and water at the back and over half a metre of water and ice at the front. Council cleared the drain and the front of the shopfront. We got in and saw the carnage. It’s a major asset as it’s our food and water supply for the town.”
ABOVE: Water flooding across Albury Street near Thompson’s Rural Supplies. BELOW: The Harden Skate Park turned in to a Skating Rink for a brief period and east of Harden, hail built up next to the railway line.
Flexible Care will be going to Cootamundra Supermarkets on Thursday to take people shopping and residents are asked to make contact via 63 863 561 as Supabarn will remain closed for a period of time. There’s those in our community who are often aged and don’t drive anymore let alone drive out of town. They are our most vulnerable.
SES went to Young yesterday and will be going this Friday, then Monday, Wednesday and Friday of next week. Pick up will be from Supabarn Harden at 10am. Return is 1:00pm from Woolworths. Contact SES on 132 500.
Our very own Gino’s Fruit and Veg was set up between 1:00pm and 4:00pm yesterday and will no doubt be available again. The Twin town Time Facebook page can help here.
Wal continued, “Staff were told to go home and bunker in. I drove up near Kennett Rural and saw the amount of water flowing. Two residences were heavily impacted by the water with the flood shifting a car and pushing the hail up more than 4 feet in front of the shed at the home. The resident couldn’t get out and I called to check to see if they were ok. As the water started to rise we got her out in time. It wasn’t actually mud everywhere, it was ice and grass, something that I’ve never seen before. We were then called to a flood rescue in Galong but we called off to attend to another job while SES looked after Galong. We came back to Harden. It was madness, power here and there, we went from block to block getting to as many as we could. The Pharmacy was a big concern because it is relied on heavily by the town. The Laundromat had about half a metre in it. We got crews in there and shovelled it out. The Mechanic’s Institute was as dry as a chip but next door where there was a cellar, it was full of water. We tasked an RFS pump to pump that out.”
The Mechanic’s did suffer damage with several windows in the historic building broken by the hail.
“We were dealing with entrapment, people couldn’t get out of their homes and go to work. Ice piled up at door and roller doors. It became everything from assisting someone to sweeping floors out to rescues.”
“We went to the Bowling Club where the ceiling had already fallen in across parts of the club to find that the inundation had resulted in further damage with whole sections having collapsed. It will take months to rebuild and will be shut.”
Wal highlighted his disappointment in some residents getting in the way of emergency workers which makes the job tougher. It’s something that occurs regularly and it’s often the same people. They hear a siren and follow vehicles to a crash site at Galong or get in the way when too close in town at an incident.
He said, “When there are SES, Fire Trucks, and Police getting around we need people out of the way. The roof on the Ambulance Station was damaged and the SES quickly attended to that. It was smashed in.”
The Local Emergency Management Committee the LEMC was run from the Rural Fire Service where information is spread between departments. “We give information and receive information to better run the jobs. We and others can be tasked to run the jobs. People of our era haven’t seen it this bad. Billy Graham said, ‘I haven’t seen anything like it.’
“I don’t have leaves on trees at my place, pasture is gone, fences down, we are just lucky that we didn’t lose any livestock but I know a lot of farmers have lost a lot of livestock. It’s still quite difficult because the area is still quite wet but in a couple of days that will be cleared up. But Friday we are looking at another rain event or down pour according to the forecast. The rain that we had, the water that we had, didn’t sink in to the ground, it didn’t have a chance. It was heavy run off. The next down pour needs to be nice and steady and needs to soak in so that we can prepare for the next cropping season.”
“The area has lost a lot of topsoil in parts and hopefully the government looks after the farmers and no matter how big or small assists in fixing things up.”
“A lot of our emergency services crews were on trucks and in vans and hadn’t even got the chance to check on their own properties or re check in with immediate family during the day.”
Wal said that when 6:00pm came around it was time to check on some of those properties, they had already put the town first and had ascertained that there were no major injuries or loss of life which is always their biggest fear.
“The thing that really hits us is that, we get the page, we get on the truck and go.”
The general public can often overlook this aspect of the role of first responders. The first instinct is to help others.
Wal highlighted that on Tuesday he received a lot of messages and calls asking him how he was going. Something that was appreciated.
“I do encourage anybody that has any sort of storm damage to report it to the SES.”
The Harden District Bowling Club green is in a mess and the club is closed indefinitely with severe damage internally.
If residents don’t report issues to the SES, small problems can turn in to big ones, especially with mould presenting itself further down the track in walls and carpets and flooring. The number of reports also correlates with the figures the state government uses to ascertain how much funding the areas gets to repair roads and causeways and to future proof the town.
Hilltops Council has put an application in for a natural disaster. If it is accepted by the State Government, millions of dollars can be allocated to fix damage and future proof infrastructure. If not the township could miss out on vital funding. Calling the insurer and not alerting the SES does not help gather the required statistics needed to be passed on to the State Government.
You need to do both.
Wal highlighted that some dirt roads won’t be looked at unless the right amount of funding comes in. Gloaming Road is a fine example, where it now needs a pretty handy 4 wheel drive to navigate. It could deteriorate further.
“A lot of people are now having their ceilings collapse as the glue lets go and the screws become loose and it collapses on their heads. It’s often a couple of days later, a lot of the jobs were that on Tuesday. Call triple 000 if you’re think it’s going to happen and have us look at it, you don’t want to be sitting in your lounge room and have the whole roof come down.”
“We are all exhausted, we are all tired but we are ready for another job if you needs us. That is what we are there for. I’m here for the town, all our community and everyone who passes through it. It’s not just us, the whole community got together.”
Some residents still didn’t take notice of barricades, just to get a photograph for their own records. Wal made it clear that people shouldn’t go where they are not needed, inside shops or if it puts them in the road of emergency services.
“A lot of people didn’t realise there was help available. I saw one lady and I said I was here to help. She had two metres of ice at the back step. She was crying and had water coming in through the roof and water had gone in the back of the premises and out the front. There was water everywhere, it was a mess”
Emergency services did have to break in to some premises as they couldn’t safely get in to premises where there was ice and electricity involved and the building needed to be made safe.
A dead Galah which was holding on for its life. A large number of birds including Galahs, Pigeons and Magpies were killed in Newson Park or succumb to hypothermia after laying down in the hail. Many were treated at the Murrumburrah Showgrounds by Wildcare staff and Vets from Boorowa. Harden hasn’t had a resident vet practice for approximately 10 years.
Later in the day Council staff used front end loaders and excavators to remove the ice from Neill Street. It filled nine tippers. They had the mess removed in a few hours of non stop work.
Late on Tuesday afternoon the hail stones were still present when Wal was back working on the farm. “Those fence lines had hail stones covered in grass and they were as hard and as cold as they were when they fell. Insulated by the grass cover. It’s just odd and eerie.”
“It will be interesting what will happen with that park down at Murrumburrah when the water recedes. I’ve noticed some of those big pretty blocks have moved as we all thought they would.”
“A lot of businesses and homes have been impacted, we jut have to look after each other, especially our elderly and our neighbours and get through this and be on the general look out for anybody. It doesn’t cost anything to say are you OK?”
Wal highlighted the fact the job is very challenging but also very rewarding.
“There were no injuries that I know of and no fatalities which is a brilliant thing based on what we have just had.
Times like this it’s really good to be a Firey to help out. I’m very proud of my crew.”
“There’s damage to cars everywhere and to wild life and stock. Some farmers have lost a heap of lambs it just looks like someone has gone out and shot them.”
Wal had to feed his own sheep at 7:00pm on Tuesday before he eventually hit the tub after a day in ice, mud and debris.
He highlighted that the farm work will ramp up again and joked there will be no “rest for the wicked”
“All that stuff that was sitting on the surface ready to be worked in to the ground has now ended up in a gully or a creek.
Topsoil lost, means money lost to farms and the community. People have had stuff on Facebook about the lost birdlife.
It’s also destroyed dams, the gullies aren’t the same again, it’s changed the landscape.”
“The hay fork on the loader has had the paint torn off them. I did drive passed houses today and where some of the rooves have been re sprayed they have now been peppered.”
In finishing up the yarn Wal said, “I love my little community, but we probably don’t want to see that again.”
The Twin Town Times would like to thank all of our first responders. Those from our area and further afield. Without their efforts, Monday could have been very different.
