Eighteen kilometres off Western Australia’s coast lies Rottnest Island, the former prison camp for Aboriginal men and boys, now a world-class tourism hotspot and nature reserve.
It’s an island synonymous with its most famous resident, the quokka.
A member of the macropod family and listed as "vulnerable", quokkas have been all but wiped out on the mainland.
But on Rottnest Island, a population of about 15,000 continues to survive, sought out by celebrities like Chris Hemsworth and Roger Federer for that elusive "quokka selfie".
But after a devastating bushfire season across Australia, in which a billion animals are estimated to have died, there is renewed focus at the Rottnest Island Fire Station to ensure a similar tragedy doesn't happen in their patch.
Hundreds of thousands of visitors travel to Rottnest Island each year Source: Twitter
“There’s always a risk of bushfire. We're an island of 1,900 hectares, 11 by five kilometres long and there's a lot of vegetation around the place," Rottnest Island Authority Fire and Emergency Services Coordinator Brendon McLaughlin tells SBS News.
The Rottnest Island Authority is the statutory body established by the WA government to administer the island and its operations, and is responsible for all aspects of emergency management on the island.
Mr McLaughlin has been the RIA’s full-time, residential fire and emergency services coordinator for the past five years.
He arrived shortly after the island’s last major bushfire in 2014.
"There is always a risk of bushfire, what we try and do is reduce the likelihood of a bushfire on Rottnest Island. Because we don’t have the same resources available for a bushfire as there are on the mainland."
Rottnest Island’s Bushfire Emergency Management plan was reviewed and updated in December last year, as required every five years.
Brendon has been on Rottnest Island for five years Source: Aaron Fernandes/SBS News
The plan describes the risk of a bushfire event on Rottnest Island as "ever-present", due to large areas of vegetation in the outer areas of the island, and the proximity of this vegetation to infrastructure.
Between 1941 and 2014, there have been eight significant bushfire incidents recorded.
These fires were generally caused by electrical sparks on overhead power lines falling on to vegetation, or parachute distress flairs launched by boat operators.
Quokkas have been all but wiped out on the mainland Source: Aaron Fernandes/SBS Newsr
Cooks, mechanics and carpenters
The RIA funds and manages a private volunteer fire and rescue service brigade, a crew of mechanics, carpenters and other professionals.
Part of Mr McLaughlin's job is not only to manage the prevention and responses to fires, but also to train these volunteers, many of them temporary workers in Australia employed in Rottnest Island’s hospitality and tourism industries, to be capable firefighters.
Originally from Sri Lanka, 30-year old chef Wishmalak Perera came to Rottnest Island directly from working in Dubai in April 2018.
Only a week after arriving on the island, Mr Perera joined the local volunteer firefighters.
“I thought ‘why not learn some new skills, help save lives and be good to the community’. That’s what it's all about,” he says.
Rottnest Island has a volunteer fire fighter brigade Source: Aaron Fernandes/SBS News
“I’m a chef, and kitchens are dangerous places. I’ve been in two kitchen fires, one in Sri Lanka and one in Dubai.”
Mr Perera is now an active member of the brigade.
“I didn’t know that much about Australian bushfires. My sister lives in California, which also has bushfires, forest fires. So, I was a little bit aware,” he says.
“With Brendon teaching us, we are getting an appreciation of what a bushfire can do. How easily they can start, how easily they can escalate.”
Volunteers are on alert throughout the bushfire season Source: Aaron Fernandes/SBS News
Responding to bushfire
In the event of a bushfire emergency on Rottnest Island, the RIA has a memorandum of understanding with WA’s Department of Fire and Emergency Services.
During the summer bushfire season, any report of a bushfire during daylight hours triggers the deployment by DFES Air Operations Unit.
Water bombers would leave the mainland and arrive on Rottnest Island within 45 minutes.
As the RIA’s fire and emergency services coordinator, Mr McLaughlin would be tasked with coordinating that activity.
“A single triple zero call initiates a response during bushfire season,” he says.
“My priority then is to make sure I’m in communication with the aerial support crews laden with water.”
At the same time his crew of volunteers would be rallying at the Rottnest Island Fire Station.
“There’s an MoU with DFES, my crew are going to receive that message and get ready to mobilise in the trucks that you see here.”
The population of Rottnest Island, including residents and visitors, peaks during the high tourist season of late October to April at around 300,000 people.
That number drops to about 100,000 between May and early October.
"My job is, because I know that unless that aircraft have been tasked to a particular job, they're already on the way," Mr McLaughlin says.
"So I need to be in communication with those aircraft. Meanwhile, the volunteers are here, they're turning the trucks on and are on their way to the fire."
Some quokka habitat can present a bushfire risk Source: Aaron Fernandes/SBS News
Prescribed burning?
Since Australia’s bushfire season escalated this summer, debate has raged about whether more prescribed burning should be done to reduce fuel loads ahead of the fire season.
Prescribed burning is rarely used on Rottnest Island, as much of the dead wood that creates a fire hazard must be maintained as habitat for vulnerable animals.
Jessica McNamara is a conservation officer with the RIA.
“Dead wood is actually a great habitat source for everything from insects and reptiles to quokkas. It is a great area for ecosystems to start and continue,” she says.
Being a nocturnal animal, quokkas rely on the shelter provided by fallen trees and branches to manage their sleep patterns and rest during the day.
To strike the balance between fire prevention and preserving the natural environment, fire crews work in partnership with the island’s conservationists.
“Brendon will come to me and say 'is it ok for me to take this much?' So we will analyse the areas, check how many species are using that and we will come up with a compromise,” she says.
“So we’re keeping visitors safe, but we’re also maintaining as much as possible for the eco-system”.
It’s a consultative approach that Mr McLaughlin says provides an example for others to follow.
Prescribed burning is rarely done on Rottnest Island Source: Aaron Fernandes/SBS News
“A lot of people are quick to say, ‘you’ve got to do a lot of prescribed burning’. Well, you’ve got to balance that up,” he says.
“Being an A-class nature reserve, we can’t use methods like prescribed burns to remove bushfire hazards that accumulate because we’ve got a number of fauna here that rely on that for habitat.
"When I do the reviews of the bushfire emergency management plan and the bushfire risk management plan, I talk with our wildlife services and with our environmental team whose job it is to minor wildlife populations, but are doing the revegetation efforts across the island.
"We work together to get a balanced outcome, leaving what is necessary for habitat, but managing it so it doesn't become a bushfire risk."
The last major bushfire on Rottnest Island occurred in 2014 Source: Aaron Fernandes/SBS News
Bushfire prevention
The RIA’s bushfire emergency management plan notes an increasingly longer bushfire season in southern WA, starting before December and continuing beyond February.
While the RIA is confident in the measures it would take to respond to a bushfire, the primary task remains to prevent one happening in the first place.
"We do prescribed tree works, contractors come over twice a year and we make sure trees and bushes are pruned back to within one metere of buildings," Mr McLaughlin says.
"We constantly monitor key areas to see if trees are verging onto the roads or overhang that could prevent access to fire trucks. We inspect overhead power lines, and if there's the potential for pole top fires, we make sure there's no vegetation nearby."
Brendon McLaughlin grabs a photo with a quokka Source: Aaron Fernandes/SBS News
With Rottnest Island's growing popularity and worsening bushfire seasons likely to come, the risks of effective management on the island are growing.
"Tourist numbers are starting to rise. You can put that down to celebrities coming to get quokka selfies," Mr McLaughlin says.
"So we have to constantly re-evaulate. If we had a large-scale bushfire there is the likelihood that species of fauna are going to be impacted."
But with the recent memory of devastation across Australia, it's a challenge he says the Rottnest Island Fire Station, with support from the mainland, is focused on.
“Not only can you have species living in their natural eco-systems, but you can minimise the threat of bushfire through effective consultation," he says.
"The last bushfire that we had on the island was 2014. We always feel well supported and we’ll continue to do what we do.”
