Bottle Lake Forest fires cost $550k
Scrub fires in and around Bottle LakeForest Park in early January cost taxpayers and ratepayers about $550,000.
Hundreds of Rural Fire-trained staff from the Christchurch City and Waimakariri District council, neighbouring volunteer brigades, City Care, Selwyn Plantation Board, Environment Canterbury and the Department of Conservation worked alongside Fire Service officers, personnel from the Ministry of Defence and Salvation Army volunteers to contain and put out three fires which threatened the large commercial pine plantation in the city's north-east. Helicopters and aeroplanes were called in and heavy earth-moving equipment and logging crews were needed to cut and widen fire breaks.
Christchurch Principal Rural Fire Officer Keith Marshall says fires like these are hugely expensive to deal with.
"We've recently sent through our final accounts to the National Rural Fire Authority and the Spencer Park Fire alone, the one which started just south of the picnic area on 8 January and really threatened the plantation, cost almost $370,000 to put out.
"These costs do not include the cost to the Council of tidying up the area and replanting," he says. "It also doesn't include the very considerable help we got from the armed forces at Burnham and the Salvation Army people who help keep up the firefighters' spirits."
- Remember, if you see a wildfire, report it by dialling 111
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