Emergency public safety services in Australia are provided by units of the national governemnt, the state governments, the local governments, and private agencies.
Australia has 18.6 million people (1998 estimate) living in an area of 7.6 million square kilometers (which is slightly smaller than the area of the USA).
The nationwide phone number for reporting emergencies is "000". Telephone company operators answer the caller, and then direct/forward/connect the call to the appropriate agency. There have been incidents in 1998 where calls have been mistakenly directed to dispatch centers which are thousands of miles away from the emergency incident.
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Good Overview of Australian Public Safety Agencies at www.techrescue.org/archive/aus-faq.html
Overview of Australian EMS Training at www.techrescue.org/archive/ausems.html
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News Articles
Article About Helo Coord Problems
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Australian Federal Police Force - enforces federal laws
National Forestry Service - protects National Forests
National Parks and Wildlife Service - ?
National ARFF - 550 firefighters protect the 16 largest civilian airports -Click Me-
RAAF Base East Sale in Victoria - FD by private company - May 2000
Natioal Railway Fire Service - there is a website for them - see firealert@egroups.com for October 2000 entry with jpg of rescue truck with checkerboard paint job
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Australia is divided into 6 states and 2 territories. The 6 states are - New South Wales, Queensland, South Australia, Tasmania, Victoria, and West Australia. The 2 territories are - Australian Capitol Territory and Northern Territory.
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Australian Capitol Territory - the city of Canberra
2356 square kilometers - 219,000 population (1979)
Police service by ?Federal Police of Australia
ACT FD - 4 stations - 170 firefighters (1979)
ACT Bush Fire Brigade - covers 900 square miles with ?10 bush fire brigades and 800 volunteer firefighters plus 200 state civil emergency workers - see SOPs at SOPs - works good 6/99 - lots of good SOPs on response, radio messages, urgent driving, forward command posts, etc.
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New South Wales
New South Wales Forestry Commission - ?
New South Wales Natl Parks and Wildlife Service - protects 300 park areas - operate 2 small planes and 1 small helo - 3 dedicated fire pumpers plus 246 FWD vehicles that can be equipped with slipon pumps and tanks - all rangers are trained in first aid and firefighting - a few lookout towers are used (1992)
New South Wales State Emergency Service - ?
New South Wales Fire Brigade - serves 5.4 million people living in urban areas - 330 stations - 2833 fulltime + 3026 vols - 4 people per engine - 2 people per ladder or rescue - in the Sydney area there are 86 stations with 7 of them being volunteer staffed
New South Wales Rural Fire Service - 2500 fire brigades - 70,000 volunteers - 1 VHF (76Mhz) radio channel per shire plus 406Mhz trunked radios - cover ?143 local government areas (shires) - 1997 renamed to the Rural Fire Service from the Bush Fire Service Link
Sydney area radio freqs websites - Site 1 and Site 2
Feb 2001 - from alt.firefighters - This is a link to Canoelands Rural fire brigade located in the outer north western suburbs of Sydney Australia. Photos and stuff - http://www.geocities.com/pptt1964/Canoelands_Brigade.htm
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North Australia
North Australia Fire Brigade - 7 stations (?1972)
1.25 million square kilometers - 150,000 pop - 131 FT firefighters + 300 vol firefighters operate 9E, 1L, 1R, 8 FWD grass trucks, 1 water tender, and 5 rescue trailers (1991)
1997 - 750 cops - 190 firefighters - PD getting
more UHF repeaters - Parks and Wildlife Commission
has 21 FT fire mgmt staff plus 1150/1800 bush trained
vol firefighters - new vol stations being opened
Link
(search for "fire" on NT Govt Website)
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Queensland
Queensland Care Flite Website
Queensland Forestry Service - ?
Queensland State Emergency Service - coordinates state agencies during disasters
Queensland Fire Service - 1 comm center which is located in Brisbane - Brisbane fire units use UHF radios - rural fire units use VHF radios with State Forestry and SES
Queensland Fire and Rescue Authority - www.fire.qld.gov.au - per 3/99 website - 9 regions - 244 stations + 1600 rural brigades - in 1990, 81 seperate Fire Brigade Boards were merged - as of 6/97 there are 64 fulltime stations + 28 mixed stations + 156 stations manned by auxiliary stations + rural stations - total staffing is 1842 FT, 1917 Aux FFs, 50,000 rural vols, and 89 administrative staff - aux ffs are paid per call - rural vols are unpaid - merged 1997
Brisbane Metro Region - 732 square miles - 736,000 population - 38 stations which handle 17,000 calls per year - 29 FT FS + 2 POC FS + 7 Vol FS - 1 officer plus 3 firefighters staff each of the FT 2250lpm engines / pumpers - fulltime staff (FT) work 42 hours per week with 10 and 14 hour shifts - 13 weeks of paid leave after 10 years of service - 29E + 5R + 2 Telebooms/telesquirts + 2 snorkels + 2 turntable ladders/aerials (1992)
Emergency Lights on Emergency Vehicles in Queensland - April 2000
Sept 00 Info on Fire Services in SE Queensland
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South Australia - 15 million hectares
SA PD - ?
SA SES - ?
St John Amb - ?
SA Amb Service - Click Here
Red Cross - ?
Dept of Environment, Heritage, Arts, and Aboriginal Affairs - fire units are registered CFS brigades
South Australia Forest Service - 82.675Mhz - 450.775Mhz - 163.63Mhz - Smokey 1 is HQ (1991) - fire units are registered CFS brigades
SA Fire Service - 35 urban stations + 450 rural stations
SA County Fire Service - 6 regions - 400+ brigades - 18,000 vols - Click Here
SA Metro Fire Service - ?
Command Phrases and Radio Operating Procedures from www.cfs.org.au/pdf/fire_ground_practices.pdf
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see below for Tasmania
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Victoria
87,000 square miles - 6 million population of which 4 million live within the City of Melbourne
Please click Here for http://members.xoom.com/RadioComms for a great site with links to all of Victoria's Emergency Services.
Victoria State Emergency Service - volunteers
Ambulance Service Victoria - serves rural areas
Victoria ?Forestry Service - ?
Victoria Department of Conservation and Natural Resources Fire Management Branch - all rangers have basic firefighting training - first aid training is not mandatory (1992) - protect just about all of the public land in the state (37% of the land area) - 84% of the protection area is forested - 4,500 fulltime employees plus 400 seasonal fire season employees (75% of all employees are available for fire duty when required) - 90 lookout towers are used plus Cessna 182 recon planes - (1992)....use Single Engine Air Tankers + 4 Bell Jet Ranger helos + 1 Bell Long Ranger helo + 1 Aerospatiale Squirrel helo (for detection) + 2 Bell 212 + 2 Bell 205 + used a Sky Crane helo for 4 months (97/98)
Victoria Police Agency - 10,000 sworn officers plus 1,600 civilian support staff - Melbourne has 11 districts and 11 radio dispatch channels - operate at least 1 Dauphin helo
Metro Fire Brigade - covers Melbourne
First Alarm - 2 or 3 units
2nd Alarm - 2 or 3 more units
Highrise Fire - may receive an immediate 2nd
alarm based on info received by the dispatchers
Each rig has 1 portable radio - "Pumper 5
portable" etc.
see webpage
1500 uniformed plus 200 support -
minimum of 247 fire staff on duty - 4 zones - Central
Zone has 8 stations
Country Fire Authority - serves the rest of the state - mostly volunteers - ?1000 stations - protect private lands from
wildfires - 1992 - per 3/99 website - 1265 FT, 245E, 8L, 247
trailers, 249 brigade owned WT - 3 ATVs - 24R - using
Skycrane helo in ?1998 - 6 more aircraft now (23
total) - 1200 brigades - use pagers, alert receivers,
phones, and sirens.
For a list of Region 2 fire
brigades and groups please click
Here
Metro Ambulance Service - serves Melbourne - (8/99 - have 520 ambulance paramedics - 4 ops areas - 1 op area has 6 Ambulance Stations)
Dispatch System - 000 to Operator to Dispatch Center - have ALI (Automatic Location Information) - 11444 is the direct telephone number to Dispatch Center - Burwood Dispatch Center dispatches Melbourne Amb Service + Metro Fire Brigade + Country Fire Authority - Melbourne Dispatch Center dispatches Victoria Police + SES
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Tasmania - population 500,000 - 42,000 square miles
Tasmania - 1991 - 296 of 300 local fire stations are manned by volunteers - Forestry = 76.79Mhz - 76.87Mhz - 76.94 NW + SE - 77.00 NE + SE - structural FDs use similar freqs (1991)
Tasmania Fire Service - 230 brigades (4 fulltime + 30 mixed + rest are vols) - fulltime FDs are in Hobart, Launcester, Burnis, and Devonport - in 1996 a statewide fire comm center went into operation with 21 radio channels and alphanumeric pagers
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West Australia
West Australia Fire Brigade - 105 stations
I think I saw a link to the West Australia Bush Fire Brigade also
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Australian police officers carry pistols. - 1999
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by Peter Szerlag - 1999
Updated - 1 June 2000 - fixed www.techrescue.org link and added EMS training levels link - 4Oct00 - South Aust file + SE Queens files added - 15Feb01 - new website Canoelands FD near Sydney
