Fleeing Callignee by Rebekah Jennings - © Copyright (any book recommendations txt) 📕

with any of those thoughts. He leaned his head against the steering wheel and held back his tears, squeezing the steering wheel in both hands as hard as he could.

Rick thought of Ruth, Mandy’s mother. He dialled her number. If Mandy couldn’t get through to him, she might have contacted her mother instead.

“Ruth? It’s Rick.”

“Oh, thank got you’ve phoned. I was so worried. Are you all okay?” Ruth’s voice was shaky; Rick had never heard her like this.

“I’m okay Ruth, but Mandy and the kids aren’t with me. She tried to phone earlier but we were cut off. I had hoped she might have tried to contact you instead.”

“No. No, I haven’t heard from her. Oh my god Rick, I’m so worried. I knew she should have come and stayed earlier. I knew it.”

“It’s okay, Ruth. Everything will be alright. I’m confident they’re safe. When she phoned I was sure she was leaving work. I couldn’t make out the rest but I thought I heard her say she was following our plan.”

“What are you going to do?” asked Ruth.

“Well, I wanted to go and get them but they’ve blocked the freeway. Apparently they’ve blocked all roads into Gippsland. Our plan, as you know, was to get out and head to your place Ruth, so I’ll head down now. Hopefully it’s just poor service and we’ll here from her soon.”

Rick did not hear from his wife soon. He did not hear from them all night. Ruth had sat with him in front of her television watching the fire updates. He continued ringing Mandy’s number every hour and was rewarded with the taped operator’s voice telling him the cell phone could not be reached.

“The 2009 Victorian bushfires are predicted to be the worst natural disaster in Australia’s history,” Peter Hitchener stated on the National Nine News. “The death toll is expected to exceed that of the previous bushfire tragedy ‘Ash Wednesday’ in 1983, where forty-seven Australians died.”

Rick watched the scenes played out in the distance, behind the news readers on site, at locations where the fire still burned. All he could do was cry as he sat transfixed to the television screen.

On Sunday, 8 February, 2009, police could confirm four deaths in the fires that raged through Callignee. There had been many more deaths in other rural townships, Kinglake and St Andrews held the highest so far with twelve confirmed deaths to each.

By Tuesday, 10 February, many towns had been declared crime scenes, Churchill being one of them. The police were investigating leads but there was strong suspicion of arson. The death toll in Gippsland was now believed to be nineteen. Rick still had no word on the whereabouts of his wife and two children.

Residents were not allowed back into the fire zones. Ruth had phoned through to as many local hospitals as she could, on her desperate search to find her missing daughter and grandchildren. She knew she wasn’t supposed to but she’d had no luck when calling the Red Cross Family Reunification service.

It was several days later when the West Gippsland death toll was published. Fifty-seven of the sixty-one homes were destroyed in Callignee. Rick was allowed to return home on Thursday, 12 February, 2009, six days after the Churchill fire began, though he saw no point.

Mandy’s car was located approximately one kilometre from their home. The bodies of Mandy, Steph and Toby were found huddled together, their four pet cats dead in their travel cases in the back of car.

There were no words to describe Rick’s sense of loss over those days and weeks after the fire. He did not want to rebuild their home and had already decided he’d never live in the country again. He carried the weight of his loss; and the guilt buryed his body in fatigue, pain, grey days and the feeling of hopelessness.

Memories flooded his consciousness.

“Why? Why do you want to move to the country?

He remembered her saying.

“I told you when we first got together that I had no intention of living in the country. It doesn’t suit my lifestyle.” Mandy had said to him when he’d told her he’d found a property in Callignee that would be perfect to raise their family.

“You won’t have any trouble making friends Mandy or finding work. They have loads of welfare places in the country.”

“I know they do, but I’ve always wanted to live near the beach and I like being close to shops and cafes.”

“They have cafes in the bush, just not right round the corner,” he’d cajoled. “So what if you have to drive?”

She’d brought up the threat of bushfires and he’d allayed her fears.

"Nothing would ever be as bad as Ash Wednesday. That type of catastrophe was well behind Victoria. Everybody had their fire plans and I'll make sure we have one too. We'll do it the right way."

He’d cut the grass around the house and clear the land he thought. They’d be perfectly safe. He planned to follow all recommendations made by the council and he had friends who volunteered for the CFA.

"Don't forget Mandy, I know what to do, I grew up in the area. My family have lived all these years comfortably out there, even through the risk of fires, and there had been some since Ash Wednesday.

Mandy had finally relented having researched the work options for herself in the area. She was surprised to find that she’d only be thirty minutes from home if she worked in Morwell, which had several foster care agencies, child protection and other services.

It, however, did take her several years to establish a supportive network. She had felt lonely and isolated for much of the early years at their Callignee home. She found it colder than she'd liked living in the Strzelecki Ranges and though it was calm and tranquil on their property, she was after more of the hustle and bustle she had grown up with, plus she missed her friends.

“I’m okay now, Rick,” she’d soothed several years after their move. Her commitment had meant the world to him.

How could he live with his grief? He couldn’t face Ruth once he’d found out for sure that Mandy and the kids were dead. She knew how reluctant Mandy had been to move in the early days. He couldn’t face the sadness that filled her eyes, the stooped contour of her shoulders that seemed to grow rounder with everyday.

Even Ruth’s voice had changed; aged. Unsteadiness marking her utterances, an elderly shake normally reserved for later years.

Ruth, however, did not blame Rick. She too knew a few people in the country. Not in Gippsland, but in Marysville and she’d encouraged Mandy to move, to go. Marysville had also been gutted by the fires. She’d lost a few friends and Rick had lost many in Gippsland.

All in all, the states bushfires had taken the lives of a 173 people. According to news reports, the cool change, which hit the state in the late afternoon on 7 February, 2009, brought with it south-westerly winds exceeding 120 kilometres (75 mph) per hour. Towns that had previously escaped the fire were thrust back into the path of the massive fire front, which burned fiercely with incredible speed.

A year later, Rick still finds it hard to speak with Ruth. Channel nine will be airing their story ‘One Year On’ on A Current Affair tonight. Ruth contacted Rick and invited him for dinner; she wanted company while she watched the program.

Rick accepted. He thought that seeing and hearing from people who had successfully moved on might make it easier for him and Ruth to move on or perhaps provide further closure for them. He spent the evening with Ruth, enjoying a lovely dinner that reminded him so much of Mandy’s own cooking. They watched the program together and then talked for many hours afterwards about what’s now known as ‘Black Saturday.’

REFERENCES:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Black_Saturday_bushfires#Gallery
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/02/08/2485338.htm
http://www.latrobevalleyexpress.com.au/news/local/news/news-features/callignee-described-as-sticks-and-ash/1432085.aspx
http://www.theage.com.au/national/death-toll-rises-from-bushfires-20090208-80jv.html

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Publication Date: 02-07-2010

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