it can always be worse

(photo by ben merrick - found on facebook. showing the sheer size of the fire against the horizon from perth, taken tuesday evening)

just when you think things couldn't possibly be any worse... don't. cause they can. 

at 1:47 tuesday morning, we received a text message telling us to evacuate our home, because of the threat of an out of control bushfire burning in the perth hills. it had started in woorooloo and rapidly spread along to become a threat to the people in our area. we found ourselves packing our car with irreplaceable items, then moving to dougs mums house which was in an act and watch zone, compared to our evacuate zone. we arrived there at 4am, after filling both cars with fuel (in case we had to move again! not that we could go too far, the regional borders have been raised again to assist with the current lock down situation so we couldn't even go to my mums which would have been the most logical solution) only to have alex think we had arrived at grandma's for a play. it took hours to get him back to sleep again. 

i must admit i had barely thought of the fire until almost midnight, i had seen it started half way to my parents so had messaged them to check in, not realising it was headed our way! i'd even asked one of my nieces how they were... before finally looking it up and noticing where it stood in relation to us. bit silly of me considering the amount of smoke and dark skies it was causing over our way.

i won't lie. i was so freaked out when we got that message. what to do, where to go... the only thing i was truly certain of was what to pack as we had had a similar scare the summer we moved into our house, just not nearly as close. i carefully moved documents, jewellery, photographs, hard drives, baby books and other things to boxes and put them in the car - i had made a list and saved it, in case we ever found ourselves in this situation again, and i am so glad i did! before we left our home i asked doug to place his hand on the door and bless our home. i was so worried for what would be, but in that moment, i felt confident that our home would be okay. i was still nervous, but i felt confident in another way.

all day tuesday the light was crazy. a dark yellow haze fell over the area, it was so quiet, other than waking to the sounds of the choppers going back in to drop assistance retardant and water on the land. it started to rain ash everywhere and all we could do was wait and pray for the best. i kept praying and hoping and wishing that ll would be okay with our home and the homes of friends and loved ones within the area.

we returned home wednesday around noon, even though our home was still in the red evacuation area, we felt confident it was safe as our neighbours and a few others nearby were home. a few hours later, our home was moved into the yellow watch and act zone. we still await news from the school, due to being in a red/yellow emergency zone they have to have the school inspected and cleared to reopen monday. fingers crossed!

even now, friday night, (lockdown has been lifted a few hours ago with no further community cases coming to light - yay!) the fire is not completely under control. there has been erratic winds this entire time causing it to be unpredictable and out of control. it was more than 75kms in length at one stage, 85 homes have been lost and thousands of acres of land. but. the response of the firies and the public has been phenomenal. even during evacuation, people wore masks, socially distanced and gave the best of themselves. help has come from everywhere. hundreds of fire fighters were and still are fighting for people, homes and property. not a single life has been lost. 2 aerial tankers were sent from the eastern states to help. and people have prayed, for a miracle. rain is forecast for tomorrow and a few days after and i still hope it will give them the last of the relief they need to get this fire out. 

 

australia is burning

australia is on fire and it is terrifying. since june 2019 there have been fires burning in our country without a break. there are dozens of huge bushfires burning in the eastern states and millions of hectares of bushland and farmland have been burned. homes have been destroyed, people have died and millions of animals have died and lost their homes. these numbers are just unbelievable and are growing by the day as there just seems to be no way to stop them. they are so big and spread out that even with all the efforts they keep burning.

then, last week the smoke made it to new zealand 2000kms away, turning their skies yellow and the rest of the world finally started to realise the size of what we are dealing with! it is just unfathomable that it is so huge, but they are still going. 

an australian comedian celeste barber made a fundraising page via facebook on january 3rd hoping to raise $30000 towards relief efforts , but by earlier this evening it was almost at $30 million dollars, from donors worldwide. people everywhere are trying to help.

we have been praying that there will be an end to this and will continue to do, as they continue to burn, as this is so scary - there just seems to be no end in sight!

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(update - total burned was 18.6 million hectares, 2779 homes destroyed and 34 lives lost - with an estimated 500 million animals killed and the smoke ended up reaching south america! andddd the fundraiser wrapped with $51.3 million dollars!)

summer in the brook

you know there's danger when church is broken up early and you're all sent home... we had a lovely welcome to summer in ellenbrook today, when the first huge fire for the season threatened homes in ellenbrook and people started to be evacuated. we raced home and got into our estate without any issues, but being that our suburb was on "watch and act" i was not risking anything and proceeded to pack all the things we can't replace into the car, ready to leave. 

thankfully the fires were contained and our home was never in any danger but i am thankful for a practice, to know where everything is that i would grab in an emergency. (also for home and contents insurance!) and to know that even if things weren't safe that we have plenty of places to go... and family who love us. ♥