The Ballarat Fire Brigade’s road rescue unit attends between 70 to 100 incidents a year. Yet in just the last few weeks, it has attended four major collisions in just five days.
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When it comes to road rescue, the brigade is asking the community to look at the whole picture – the reality is sometimes far from the glory of riding in a big shiny truck with lights and sirens that comes across in school talks.
First Lieutenant Damien Scott said every time his crew go out on the truck, it’s to make a difference.
But they can’t always win.
“Mentally and physically it can be very challenging,” he said.
“Some people may (deal) okay with people trapped or deceased, but a specific type of incident ends up hitting them quite hard. Jobs where there might be children involved, trucks carrying cattle and that can really affect people.
“Road rescue isn’t for everyone. We have members join who work out it’s not for them and it’s not the best task to be doing all the time.”
Third Lieutenant David Elms said it helped to stay focused on the job rather than the people.
“I don’t like to know names because if you get too emotionally attached, quite often you tend to take it home with you too much.”
The road rescue team is a close-knit group, who need to understand each other very well, and their strengths and weaknesses, to do their job.
They require extensive and ongoing training that includes cutting up cars and having a sound knowledge of the latest models of vehicles.
While they are well-trained and equipped to do the job, it’s a job they would prefer not to be doing.
In Victoria, 239 lives have been lost on the road so far compared to 213 last year.
“People don’t understand the statistics – they think it’s not going to happen to them, but it does,” Lieutenant Scott said.
“It happens to people every single day and it’s not going to change unless the community changes with it.”
Lieutenant Elms urged drivers to slow down and not take driving for granted.
“At 18 I probably thought I was bulletproof and did some things I probably shouldn’t have done,” he said.
“But the consequences are not only for the person injured, but the families, the other people involved, the rescue crews and other emergency services.
“It takes a toll on a lot of people so just consider before you do something how it’s going to affect not only you, but everyone else.”