Pilot dies while fighting wildfires
Print Edition
A pilot trying to fight one of several raging Australian wildfires died when his plane crashed yesterday, in the second fatality resulting from the fires that have ripped through the nation’s most populous state over the past week.
The 43-year-old man was the only person on board and was trying to drop water onto a blaze in extremely rugged terrain near Ulladulla, south of Sydney, when his plane went down, Rural Fire Service commissioner Shane Fitzsimmons said.
“He’s a husband with young children and we’re all acutely aware that there’s a family suffering ... because their dad hasn’t come home,” an emotional Fitzsimmons said, pausing to compose himself. “We’re also feeling for the firefighting community.”
More than 100 wildfires have killed one resident and destroyed more than 200 homes in New South Wales state this month. Sixty-one fires were burning yesterday, with 23 out of control, though cooler weather had decreased the fire threat and residents who evacuated had returned to their homes.
Officials were trying to access the crash site, but the steep terrain and wind was making it difficult, New South Wales police Superintendent Joe Cassar said.
Military training accident
Fire officials yesterday defended Australia’s defense department after investigators revealed a military training exercise with live ordnance ignited the largest of the wildfires.
The fire near the city of Lithgow, west of Sydney, has burned 47,000 hectares and destroyed several houses.
Fitzsimmons said the defense department’s actions were obviously an accident.
“It was a side effect of a routine activity, it would appear, and clearly there was no intention to see fire start up and run as a result of that activity,” Fitzsimmons said. “There is no conspiracy here.”
Air Marshal Mark Binskin, vice chief of the defense force, said the fire started after a demolition training activity. Defense personnel tried unsuccessfully to snuff it out and fire crews arrived within 30 minutes to help.
He apologized for the fire, but said the drill took place on a relatively cool day in which there was no fire ban in place. “This was not deliberately starting a fire,” he said. “This was an accident.”
Investigators are still looking into the causes of the other fires. Some were started by power lines brought down in strong winds. A few appear to have been deliberately lit, and police have arrested some children in connection with those.
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