Lake Ohia fire calls staff from their beds. With three helicopters in use, likely expensive!

Well it’s been a hot few weeks over the Christmas-New Year period, with more people holidaying around my part of  Northland – the Tutukaka coast – than I’ve ever seen before.   Everyone’s been talking about how dry it is!   An inescapable truth when you look at the ever-browning grass.  It’s fantastic for getting out on the water but of course not at all good for wildfire danger levels. 

While travelling a bit over the break I’ve noticed a lot of new “Bernie” wildfire danger signs around the region, all part of the national rural fire authority’s work to raise awareness of the acute situation we’re in.  And Newstalk ZB rang me a few times around Christmas to get more info on our campaign.  I spoke to the breakfast programme just before New Year about the dangers of fireworks during New Year celebrations but guess some of our neighbours didn’t hear it!   There were at least three different displays in our bay, fortunately not leading to problems, but they didn’t help my peace of mind.

The escalating fire danger hit TV1 news recently as well.  Not the kind of publicity we really want, but definitely good for getting word out there.  You don’t want to be the person spending their summer paying a huge fine for starting a wildfire, rather than enjoying the season.

It would be great to hear from you about any of the publicity you’ve seen or heard!