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SES saves the day again

WHEN a tornado ripped a path of destruction across several streets in Chester Hill last month, the volunteers of the Bankstown State Emergency Service were well prepared to meet the challenge.

Both seasoned and less experienced volunteers began responding to calls for help on Thursday after storms and heavy rain swept across Sydney and surrounding areas.
A volunteer at Bankstown SES for four years, Michelle Beatty was hoping her very first shift as the unit’s duty officer would be quiet when the phones “started to blow up” with messages from Chester Hill on Saturday, March 20.
“There was nothing happening [at the unit’s Bass Hill headquarters] and we were wondering where all these jobs were coming from,” she said.
“We went for a drive about half an hour after it happened to do some initial reconnaissance and we just couldn’t believe our eyes.”
Answering more than 300 calls for help from the public and with most jobs completed just two days later, unit commander David Niven said he was very proud of how everyone responded and worked with other emergency services including the RFS, police and FRNSW throughout the operation.
He said the response included a flood watch for the Georges River which saw volunteers door knock more than 200 low-lying properties to warn them about the potential risk which luckily didn’t eventuate.
Also proud of the SES response, State MP for Bankstown, Tanya Mihailuk, visited the volunteers last week to thank them for their efforts.
“I was devastated to see the damage done to Chester Hill and surrounding suburbs but events like these are also a reminder that in times of great crisis, the people of Bankstown will selflessly come together and make enormous sacrifices to keep each other safe,” she said.

Inspired by ‘angels wearing orange’

FOR newer volunteers Carmen Heredia and David Soussi who joined the Bankstown SES in March last year, last month’s storm and flood event was their first operation in the field. It was also a chance to put the skills they had learnt during Covid-restricted training sessions into practice. Mrs Heredia said whenever she felt tired she recalled the words of one woman whose house they helped to sandbag. “She told me ‘angels wear orange’ and that really inspired me to get up and go out again the next day and the next one after that,” she said. A retired IT manager, Mr Soussi said the professionalism, skills and training received by the volunteers, even with Covid restrictions, was “amazing”. “It’s an opportunity to give something back to the community,” he said.