Mark Kettle · 67 min
Behind the smoke and headlines of Black Summer, a government advisor reveals the intensely human toll of managing a catastrophic bushfire season, and why that story has never properly been told.
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On November 20, 2019, the day before Victoria's Code Red bushfire declaration, Mark Kettle stepped into a role he did not expect to hold. As fire advisor to the Minister for Energy, Environment and Climate Change, he became a filter between the raw, streaming data of an unfolding emergency and the decisions that shaped how the government, and the public, understood what was happening. For weeks between Christmas and early January, Mark received situation reports twice daily, sometimes three times. He sat metres from his desk, conscious of how long he was away from his phone, reducing five-page briefings to the few lines a Premier needed before standing at a podium to address a frightened state. When the first death came through, a firefighter with a young family, the crisis shifted from numbers to raw human loss. Mark felt the weight of it personally.
What struck Mark most was witnessing the professionals on the ground. He attended emergency officer meetings where incident management teams presented maps showing not just where fire would go, but where it had been redirected by fuel management work already done. The fire behaved as predicted. That confidence moved through him to the Minister, to the Premier's Office, and out to the public. Yet Mark also wondered what might have been different had Victoria listened to Traditional Owners' land management knowledge 150 years ago instead of only recently. When fires swept through Budjebim, a UNESCO site, the government's partnership with Traditional Owners revealed new knowledge about the land itself. After the fires ended, Mark and thousands of public servants moved straight into the pandemic response without processing what had happened. Three simultaneous inquiries ran while government shifted to work from home en masse for the first time. In 2021, Mark's body and mind reached their limit. He left government work and built his own business. The adversity had reshaped him, clarified what he valued, and shown him what he was capable of.
“I actually froze up... people were talking about their own experiences and I was like I haven't actually spoken about this since it happened.”
“It doesn't matter what side of the fence you're on, this is a human issue — everyone felt it.”
“Through adversity there is a lesson, an opportunity for growth.”
The hero, today
Mark's role required him to make dozens of decisions a day about what information the Minister and Premier needed to see, and when, knowing that those decisions could shape how the public understood the emergency and what they did to protect themselves. The briefings he attended showed him that people on the ground understood the fire's behaviour through data, mapping, risk modelling, and experience; they could predict where the fire would go and had already done the work to redirect it, which gave him real confidence to pass on to political leadership. Mark wonders whether Victoria would have experienced the same rate of bushfire and deaths over 150 years if the knowledge of Traditional Owners about land management had been centred from the beginning rather than only adopted recently into government policy. The same public servants who worked extreme hours responding to the bushfires had to immediately shift into the pandemic response without time to process what had happened, and then respond to three simultaneous inquiries while working from home en masse for the first time. Mark came to understand himself better through the crisis, what he valued, what he could do, what his limits were, and it shifted him away from government work entirely toward building his own business.
Yes. Mark Kettle is a real person who shared their own story in their own words. Kintsugi Heroes is a not-for-profit that shares first-person stories of overcoming adversity, told with the person's consent.
Kintsugi Heroes, a registered Australian not-for-profit. Every story is shared with the hero's own consent and reviewed under Kintsugi Heroes' trauma-informed content standard before it goes public.
Mark's role required him to make dozens of decisions a day about what information the Minister and Premier needed to see, and when, knowing that those decisions could shape how the public understood the emergency and what they did to protect themselves.
The briefings he attended showed him that people on the ground understood the fire's behaviour through data, mapping, risk modelling, and experience; they could predict where the fire would go and had already done the work to redirect it, which gave him real confidence to pass on to political leadership.
Mark wonders whether Victoria would have experienced the same rate of bushfire and deaths over 150 years if the knowledge of Traditional Owners about land management had been centred from the beginning rather than only adopted recently into government policy.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 00:04
Welcome to the Kansuki Heroes Podcast special Alpine Bushfires series, where we share inspirational stories of everyday people from the Victorian Alpine region who went through the bushfires which occurred from late 2019 through to early 2020. These stories highlight the different challenges and events people went through and how they overcame them. Please be aware that the story you're about to hear may have moments of deeply felt emotions and personal experiences. If anything you hear has a triggering effect, please reach out to someone who can help you. If you love this conversation, please like and share it with your friends so we can continue to share more inspiration and hope to as many people as possible. Now listen up for our next hero's story. This conversation is with Mark Keddle, and what makes Mark quite unique is that he was actually on the other side of the fence, so to speak. Mark was working as an advisor to the Labor government at the time that the fires commenced, and he was put in charge of the task force that had to manage the response and give advice to the government, get updates, and actually manage how it was communicated, ensuring that the people were safe. It actually opened my eyes to what goes on in that respect when we have a national disaster and the fact that it doesn't matter what side of the fence you're on, this is a human issue. Everyone felt it. And Mark talks so passionately about how it made him feel, his drive and motivation to save lives and do absolutely everything he could during the time that he was in charge. He's a remarkable man. He shares his story with a lot of heart and a lot of purposefulness. And, you know, he's very grateful for the experience and having helped serve in the best way he could. It's a really lovely conversation. This is Mark Kettle. Hello and welcome to another episode of Kintsugi Heroes. Special Alpine Bushfires series, and today I have Mark Kettle with me. How are you going, Mark?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 02:27
Very good, Evelyn. How are you?
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The same public servants who worked extreme hours responding to the bushfires had to immediately shift into the pandemic response without time to process what had happened, and then respond to three simultaneous inquiries while working from home en masse for the first time.
This conversation includes taking on the fire role, the day before code red, instinct and skill set, the machinery of government response, days that blurred together and when the first death came through.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 02:29
I'm well. Thank you so much for joining me and for willing— being willing to share your story and some time, uh, about your experience of the bushfires in 2019-2020. You've got a unique story and I think a unique position And I would love for you to share, first of all, what was your role? Like, what were you doing at the time? What was your role in life at the time?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 02:55
Yeah, thanks, Evelyn. Yeah, so the role I had at the time was being the fire advisor to the Minister for Energy, Environment and Climate Change during the bushfires. And the Minister for the Environment is responsible for land management in Victoria, which includes all of those national parks and state forests, but most of the bushfire when all the bushfire commences before it moves into private land. It means that the Minister is then responsible for Forest Fire Management Victoria, the agency that is responsible for protecting and responding to bushfires on public land, and they wear the green and yellow overalls that might be quite familiar to some of your listeners. During a bushfire, the chain of command does change, and Forest Fire Management reports into the Emergency Management Commissioner and then that then is responsible to the Minister for Emergency Services, who's responsible to the Premier. And it creates this very interesting dynamic, which then became the subject of future inquiries in relation to other portfolios as well, which we may touch on in our conversation. But my role was as the fire advisor. So I was one of the 6 advisors to a minister, plus a chief of staff, executive assistant, an assistant to the chief of staff, and then 3 media advisors. It's not actually a very big team that a minister in the state government has. And then the role that I had was anything that comes through in relation to bushfire or fire, so that relates to anything to do with planned burning, preparation, response, I was the person that would receive the briefing first before the Minister and then you're responsible for filtering before what the Minister then, and providing advice on to them what the Minister then sees and when they interact with their officials and their department advisors. And then in the same way, when anything comes out from the Minister, goes out in the Minister's name, you see it first. So every time there's a media statement, every time there's response to Parliament in Question Time. Every time that they do a media interview, you'll be the person that preps them along with the media advisor. When you're meeting with department officials developing a policy, you'll be the person that liaises with the department and navigates the processes. When it comes to dealing with Premier's Office or Treasurer's Office or the Emergency Services Minister's Office or other ministers that have an issue in relation to your department, they'll call you in the first instance rather than calling to through to the Minister because at the end of the day, they're the person that, you know, their pen holds legal weight and legal power. They have a lot of responsibilities. They have a number of staff to assist them in those duties. And I was one of those people during this very critical time that had this role.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 05:18
Thank you so much. And for most of us, we don't understand how these structures are set up and the roles. Was that something that you had already been assigned well before the bushfires came about? Like, was it part of your role?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 05:33
So since the government was re-elected in November 2018, I was the climate change advisor along with the parliament advisor and the caucus liaison advisor. Um, the day before the Code Red— so on the 20th of November, the day before the Code Red was declared on the 21st of November, which kicked off this 2020— so 2019-2020 Black Summer bushfire season was when I took on the role. But I was aware of a lot of the briefings and was involved in a lot of conversations. We ran the office in a very collegiate way. So a lot of the staff were involved in a lot of the briefings that could self-select into meetings using their own judgment. And I, being part of the climate change portfolio, I would often sit in as it was a very real and immediate, uh, effect on what we were doing because the government was undergoing quite a large and ambitious climate change policy process at the time, which got released a couple of years later. So there's definitely some important links between the two. And then as the briefings are coming through and how important it became, we had a rearrange of roles in the office as some people became aware due to family responsibilities they couldn't hold certain roles, so I took on the fire role in the office. And we knew from the briefings it was gonna be the driest season on record, and that it was potentially gonna be a very long and drawn-out season because of how dry the underlying moisture levels were across the state, particularly out in eastern Gippsland. And that was coming through in the department's risk modeling. It was coming through anecdotally from, you know, officers and, officials on the ground, um, and first responders. And so it was something that we knew was going to be a big role, and I was fortunate to be young and single and had a lot of time, so it became a natural fit for me to take on that role, as often is the case in, in a minister's office when it comes to such a large responsibility.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 07:17
Yeah, wow. And, uh, did you have any idea at that point what you were getting into? What was going to come?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 07:24
Not fully, but I guess that's the— I mean, that's part of the nature of these, you know, anything in life like this you can't fully plan for. Um, and part of that, but instinctually I knew it was going to be important. Instinctually I knew it related a lot to what the work we were doing on climate change, and it was something that I knew that was a very complex area of like the way which the government operated. And that's to do with the legacy of like Saturday and the way in which the arrangements were set up in post-2009 and the Bushfire Royal Commission. So that part of— I knew that it suited my skill set, which was both how do you navigate a complex bureaucracy to get an outcome effectively and efficiently, but then how do you also draw that back and communicate that to the public and go, well, how does this affect me on my land? And that's a skill I also knew that I had, and so I wanted to combine those two in this role. And then also being able to communicate differently to different audiences because, you know, one minute you might be talking to, you know, the Chief Fire Officer, but then you're talking to the policy expert that sits alongside the Chief Fire Officer that's analysing and detailing the detail of the risk modelling and all the different inputs due to moisture levels, prox— number of houses in the area, access to roads, the type of vegetation that's in the area, and how that affects what the risk is going to be. But then you're also talking to the Emergency Services Minister's Office and showing that the relationship between Emergency Management Victoria and Firefighting Management Victoria smoothly and we're getting the same briefings. Then you're coordinating ahead of, you know, when the ministers are going into cabinet or Security Emergency Management Subcommittee of Cabinet, you're communicating and ensuring that each person is getting the information appropriately. And then it comes to briefing within the Premier's Office, you're talking to the Emergency Services Advisor, then I was also talking to the Environment Advisor, then you're talking to the media advisors, which both sat within different teams., and then at a later stage in the bushfires, you're then liaising and briefing the Parliament team, and then on in heads of questions that make up the Parliament, and then you're also talking to any members of Parliament in the local area that have any issues of both sides of politics, because in an emergency, the partisan nature does get removed due to the urgency of the situation. That's a situation of an approach that was adopted again during COVID where the partisan nature was removed in terms of any requests for people to get exemptions for hotel quarantine because of life or death situations, which is something I dealt with not too much later on in my career. So, in terms of responding to emergencies, it became something that suited, I guess, my skill set and personality, but also being able to— there's something about in an emergency, and this may have come through on some of the other interviews that you've done, I've listened to a couple of them, that there's something about an emergency that can, for some people, can really click their brain into gear and kind of have quite a calming effect. I know this is very much true of some first responders whereby in that moment you're actually quite calm. It doesn't sound very logical, or for a lot of people it sounds a bit odd, but that's the nature of an emergency. For some people it's just like, well, your brain just automatically puts into a prioritization. I just talk to this person at this point and then this person, and then I need to, you know, get that piece of information because I need that a couple of hours, and everything just kind of seems to flow. And then it's sort of the post-effect of the bushfire when it's a year past, 2 years past. And, you know, part of my interest in doing this interview was when I was sitting with a group of people involved with Kunsugi Heroes was I actually froze up, like, and we were talking about it, and I just like— and people were talking about their own experiences, and I was like, I haven't actually spoken about this since it happened. Like, we just moved straight from, you know, response for the bushfires into the public debate around plant burning then into the parliamentary season. There were 3 inquiries going on simultaneously which we needed to respond to in order to say the government had done what it was legally required to do. We had to keep the public safe, you know, and there were 5 tragic deaths here in Victoria, but, and that's, you know, an awful thing to have occurred, but the state had done and fulfilled its responsibilities. And actually there's some important lessons that we could learn, both saying that what happened in Black Saturday we learned from And in many ways, what happened in Black Summer in Victoria, that those lessons were implemented, and there's obviously more learnings that can be taken on, but that it was actually quite— it was a positive story of responding to an emergency in the most bushfire-prone area in the world. And the technology that we use in Victoria and the approach that we use is the most advanced in the world. And we send people to, you know, to Canada, to America, to Greece, to Portugal You know, all over the world firefighters, we get sent from Victoria because we're one of the largest permanent contingents of full-time forest firefighters. It's around 500 here in Victoria, then there is up to 3,000 surge staff that are trained to respond to bushfires in the department and across departments in the public service. It's a very large cohort of people that are trained to do this and to respond to a bushfire. And so, um, it becomes a large part of the responsibilities of, of us as a government. Also, I say us, I don't work in the government anymore, but just that mentality kind of seeps through. But it's just drawing back to why I wanted to do this interview was, and you can kind of see now, even like it's a stream of consciousness because it's just, it's such a complex thing to talk about and to explain to people because, but as you start talking about it, you're like, oh, okay, that's a lot. Like, it's a lot happened in a period of time. You're responsible, as in I was responsible for a lot of crucial pieces of information at crucial pieces of time. And it's like, in many ways, in some ways you can't necessarily pinpoint and go, "I did that." But then if you put the opposite and you say, "Well, if I took myself out of that situation, what would've happened or wouldn't have happened?" And that's when you get quite a large sense of, "Oh, okay, I actually did play quite a large role." Because in terms of making sure that the Premier's got a piece of information on a bushfire, what's happening with the latest reporting on bushfires or the bushfire reporting 's coming through before he goes to a press conference at some local school down in Frankston becomes a very important part of defining the media narrative. Because if that information hasn't been provided to the media advisor or to the emergency services advisor in that office before he does that briefing, he may not provide that information to the public. And then, lo and behold, a royal commission might come around and then he's held responsible for not adequately informing the public before, you know, or preparing the public in terms of what's about to come. So you have this huge amount of weight upon your shoulders around, am I providing the right information? You know, you try to understand the mentality of bushfires. Like, I've actually got one of the books that I tried to get was Chloe Hooper's The Arsonist, which is a book about the 2009 Black Saturday fires, because I was trying to get into the mindset of what it was like because I was a kid at the time. Like, I was starting uni, I remember the bushfires, but it was not— and I remember being very hot, I remember there being some confusion around the awareness, but I grew up in suburban Melbourne. I wasn't necessarily in the mindset of people who live in these communities who have been facing this for 150 years. So I was trying to understand that as well at the time, and I think that all of those factors combining in together and then linking in with, you know, the increasing prevalence of bushfire in Victoria and its relationship to the changing climate, that was why, yeah, I wanted to take on this role. So instinctively, to come back around, it did fit within what I was doing, but I didn't know quite where it was going to take me, or I'm not sure anyone did in terms of the emergency response that went on at the time.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 14:46
So interesting, and thank you for giving me that background and the context and, you know, why, you know, how you felt, why, you know, all of, all of that, your experience, and also the mechanics, I guess, of that interplay between the government advisors, the policymakers, you know, and the different people that take information and, you know, have to disseminate to the, to the right places. And, uh, you know, as the public, we, we get to see what's on the media. And obviously the people that were impacted by the fires, many of whom will be listening to this conversation, will know how— what they heard at the other end. So it's going to be fascinating for them to hear, you know, what your, your experience was. And that's now where I'd like you to take us. Um, I'm going to hand over to you and ask you to tell your story, if you can, around that period. So take us back, where did it begin?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 15:45
Um, uh, thanks. Yeah, I'll try and do my best with this one, but, um, as you can see, I'm— it's, it's coming out as it comes out, so it may not be very structured or logical, but it makes sense in kind of how I'm recalling the information. But that may be true of a lot of people that have been through, um, these situations. So hopefully that's the point of similarity of people that can relate to. So it started on the 20th of November, uh, 2019. Um, so sat in there, very vivid, sitting at the top of level 16, 8 Nicholson Street, sitting in the briefing. And then very quickly, the advisor at the time had family responsibilities, couldn't take on the role. I then took on the role, and that then meant I very quickly was taken down to level 14 of the department and giving a number of briefings in relation to the nature of bushfire, plant burning, the way in which you do land management here in Victoria, and our risk-based approach in order to manage the risk, which is one of the big things that was changed out of Black Saturday. And I will keep referring to Black Saturday because as I was talking to senior officers and first responders, it was very much in the minds of people, you know, 'cause someone that goes into this role will have been someone more often than not will have worked, grown up in regional Victoria, They will have, you know, studied land management or environment or forestry, worked in the department, and it's their life. It's more than a job or employment. So there's something they are very attached to and feel a great sense of responsibility and pride in being responsible for. But the thing that became very aware in all the work that I was doing was the consciousness of Black Saturday that sit through everybody that was doing the work. And so the way in which the government was responding was very important, but also showing that it had learned the lessons from the last major bushfire, which saw 173 people die, which was very tragic. And I think that was very much in the conscious of what people were doing in terms of the work they were doing. So yeah, that was on— so I was receiving quite extensive briefings on the 20th of November, and then the 21st of November, the Code Red was declared for— it was actually not where a lot of the risk was at the time, It was out in the northwest of the state, from memory. So, but that just shows how broad the risk was for Victoria at that state of time, just due to the lack of rainfall that had occurred and the underlying dryness that was there in, in across the state. And so I then, I'm just going to take a step and think about what happened next. So November, we had the Code Red day. That was, that day went smoothly in a way, in terms of the responses, the resources were allocated in terms of the aircraft, water bombing, um, there are responses. And then it, it felt almost like a calm before the storm in a way. So when it happened, um, and then they were receiving briefings very regularly, weekly or sometimes twice weekly, um, on terms of where the progress was in terms of where, um, the department was allocating its major resources. And we have about 50 aircraft, water bombing aircraft of various sizes And then there are, I think it's 200 to 300 aircraft on call across the state in terms of what we do. And in many ways it is akin to a military operation in terms of the way in which it is responded to as a bushfire. And so that, a lot of it then becomes about resource allocation logistics. And so this became what a lot of the briefings would be about that we were giving to the Minister, or we would organize for them to give directly to the Minister due to the seriousness of the nature of what was being of what was occurring. And as I'm trying to think, next, then we had— there were some fires out west around Budj Bim National UNESCO site, so the Indigenous site that's out there in the west of the state, which I'll probably come back to later in the story. And then there was, uh, some fires started out in the east before Christmas, and I remember there being a major briefing on the 24th of December, and then It was when we went about to go after Christmas, so 23rd, 24th, it was like, it's coming. And so we waited for an alert on, um, on the 25th and nothing came. Um, some briefings, and then 26 was when all the briefings kicked off in terms of the fires and, uh, what was happening in terms of— and it moved very quickly at that point in time. And it becomes familiar for anyone that's I guess, knock on through a bushfire. It's, it's almost like watching a World War II movie in terms of it clicks into a military-style operation in terms of where resources are allocated, who's responsible, how the chain of command works. Um, and then, uh, then from there you have daily reporting in forms of a situation report or a sitrep. And so you're getting this briefing either daily or twice daily that comes through in the morning, the afternoon. I think at one stage it was 3 times a day. It just gives you a status report on what's happening across the state in different areas. Because not only in the Minister's portfolio was she the Minister responsible for land management across the state, and so, which is a third of Victoria is under public land, but is also responsible for the first thing that goes in bushfires and is, you know, etched into the memory of a lot of people is, for anyone who was familiar with Black Saturday, will be power lines and the effect, because that was the real cause of a lot of, um, the tragedy that occurred at that time. And so there is a responsibility there in terms of ensuring that power is retained, that, you know, the distributing— the DSPs are exactly managing their communications, but also their risk. You're also ensuring that the transmission network operator, AusNet, is everything in terms of the transmission is being maintained. The nature of the way the energy market works in Victoria— Victoria is in the middle, so it gets power from South Australia, power from Tasmania, and then sends it to New South Wales and to Queensland. So it means Victoria is at the heart of the NEM. So if Victoria gets islanded, not only does that have a consequence for Victoria, but potentially for other states as well. And so fortunately, communications is separated from the energy network, but the ability of them people to receive information and to charge their phones and the various devices. And this is like, fortunately, we've had a large uptake of batteries the last few years during COVID But this— there is a real risk around how critical— it becomes very apparent about how critical energy supply is to, you know, the functioning of a society. And then that flows through in terms of the minister is also responsible for waste collection, is also then responsible for, uh, making sure that the wildlife is protected across the state as well. And so you've got all of these multiple parts of the portfolio that you need quite regular briefings that are deemed critical functions. And so this— and this applies in terms of public transport, roads, in terms of relief in terms of community services or agencies, in terms of hospitals. And so all of this, the whole of the public service is working away at the same time, getting, providing situation reports daily or twice daily. And then ministers are then reporting into cabinet or a subcommittee of cabinet. I think SEMC met, or Security Emergency Management Committee of Cabinet, met multiple times in a very short space of time., and that's part of providing the formal accountability into the Premier as the person responsible to, you know, the people of Victoria for a lot of these decisions. And in terms of if anything was to happen, good or bad, he's the person ultimately responsible. So, and that's reflected in the briefings that go on. Every time the Premier would stand up and give one of those briefings, standing next to Andrew Crisp or one of the other fire chiefs, there would be days of work going in to ensure he was adequately prepared to stand up and give those briefings. Across the whole range of portfolios. Because at the end of the day, a minister can— if a question comes outside of the minister's portfolio, they can refer it to another minister. The Premier doesn't get that luxury. He is responsible to, you know, the whole of Victoria in terms of what is happening here and be across the detail of, you know, and communicating. And as we learned during Black Saturday, the communication is the thing that determines the safety and the response, and it sets the tone. And, you know, people will make large decisions, you know, very significant decisions about their lives, about their businesses based off what gets said at those podiums. Ensuring that people are as prepared as they can possibly be and information is as accurate as possible. There's a lot of work behind the scenes with advisors working with senior department officials and with the Chief Fire Officer and their deputies to ensure that that information is accurate and also then responds to what are the sensitivities that the government is facing as well. Because there is a public service and it's got its responsibilities and its accountabilities. And then you've got the government, the elected government as well, will also have, you know, what its concern is as responding to the media, receiving messages and inboxes from social media, from email. You know, as politicians are receiving all that information, you're then responsible for feeding that into the nature of the role in terms of what you're determining a priority may or may not be in terms of what the minister needs, what the department needs, what the Premier's Office needs. And so you're exercising judgment and making decisions after decision after decision and for, you know, however long you're working, 12, 18 hours or some days. And so that defines, I guess, that period between Christmas and early January whereby the days start to run into each other for me. I can't necessarily pinpoint which was where. If anything, my reference points will be the same as everybody else. It'll be, you know, seeing the red at Mallacoota and then seeing the Navy ships when they got people evacuated, or it will be when the Army came in, when the state of disaster was declared, I think on the 2nd of January. And so, but in that period of time, the days and the times start to run into each other because you're preparing this vast amount of critical information that you need to then filter to ensure that the right amount of, you know, you might get a report that's 5 pages long, 10 pages long, size 12 font, and you've got to go, I've got to get that down to this amount of information to provide into a briefing because there are 22 ministers in the government, one including the Premier. So 21 other ministers are providing their information, what's the thing that is important? And that's, that's your responsibility as an advisor. And yes, your chief will tick it off, and then it'll go through the Premier's office, and then their office will filter through it. But the first person that starts that process is, is the advisor from the Minister's office. And there's quite a huge amount of responsibility and, um, pressure. And that was something that I think naturally suited to my skill set and personality type. But I think in terms of what came next in terms of the men. Like, I'm just trying to think now in terms of the days, because a lot of the— because it was the holiday season, for lack of a better word, a lot of people were remote. This is before we started— this became the norm. So trying to get hold of people, we're using conferencing services in order to get the daily briefings or the twice daily briefings happening. We then had news coming through of the 5 tragic deaths here in Victoria, 3 of them were firefighters. And so David Morosi, Bill Slade, and Matt Kavanagh, if my names are correct for those ones. And then there were 2 others out in Gippsland that tragically passed away, paid members of the public, and those were coming through as well at the time. And I could remember when they come through because I remember one or two of them were sitting in the main briefing office on level 16 at Nicholson Street in East Melbourne. Near Parliament House, but I can't remember which day each of those things occurred, which is just, um, and so you're, as you're receiving this information, yeah, you're then filtering it, passing it on, ensuring that everyone's got it, and suddenly it becomes the anxiety or the, the pressure is if something's left sitting in your inbox or a text message is left unresponded. You know, there were times where I don't, like, you're conscious around how long you're going to the bathroom for because You don't want to miss something that's very important. And so you're constantly on. And it's probably something that, you know, a nurse or a firefighter is very familiar with in terms of you don't just get a break every hour to sit down. You know, like if an emergency's on, an emergency's on. It's a very different environment with this because you're sitting, or as I imagine, but you're sitting, no one else is like this. Like I was in an office and suddenly there are other advisors working in other areas, but if something was much less critical, um, it wouldn't have affected their day in the same way. Or if I was— I might have been at home, and you know, I'm not in, in a, in an emergency response situation. So you've got this huge amount of energy rushing through you, and at the end of the day, it's just, it's just texts on the phone or typing away or talking on the phone. So like, the way to expel the energy is quite— and that's something I'm, you know, some work I've been going through recently, it's like the energy is not really expelled in the same way. Like, you don't get that closure in a way that I imagine, or I hope, that some people that are, you know, when the fire's there, it's there. When it's not, it's not. Whereas with this, it's like my day-to-day work is the same as that emergency response, and that creates a very interesting relationship with email, mobile phone, um, in terms of interaction, because— and I'm literally sitting in the same spot a few meters forward from where I was responding to a lot of these And I deliberately wanted to do that in this room because for me that was part of the closure, was because sometimes sitting in this room I get very anxious because that's where this happened. And so it's just a fascinating— try not to intellectualize it too much, but you'll, um, it's a very odd role. And this would be true, I would imagine, of a lot of public servants that were then providing information through, a lot of people working in the State Control Center. And so you've got, you know, How do you manage or process through the trauma— I'm not applying value to it— of what that emergency is, and does it get resolved or processed? And so that's partially, you know, why I was very interested when Ian approached me about Conspiracy Heroes, because it was around exactly that. It was about getting people talking about what has happened to people and how their stories can relate, and then part of the resolving of such a significant event, both people individually but then also for the community that we're a part of.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 29:59
Thank you for that. I'm right there with you. You're sitting there in your room, you know, feeling guilty to run to the toilet, um, grabbing it, you know, eating at the desk, no doubt, and always on. You know, you painted this picture, and I think we can all relate to times in our lives when the adrenaline is fueling us and we're in a fight or flight response mode. And you were not just in it for a few minutes, you were in it for days or literally weeks. How did you feel when the first death came through? How did, how did you respond to that?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 30:36
Um, I took it quite personally, and I felt a huge amount of personal responsibility. And part of that was that my mother had died not too long ago. And so the raw emotion took over in a very powerful way in terms of, um, uh, I can't remember who passed away first, but I know one of them had a young family. Um, I think it was Matt Cavanagh had a family when he died in a car crash. And so that became very raw, it's probably the best way I can describe it. And ensuring— and then, but then you've got this, you've got to balance that very human emotion and then how it relates to your personal life, but then Okay, well, how do we talk about this? So, you've got to then switch very quickly into a work brain in terms of, well, what does the Minister then say? What do we tell the Premier's Office? Who makes the announcement? But then you've also got to remember this is a colleague of the people who are responding to this bushfire. So, it has a huge effect on the morale in terms of the way this person is talked about. So, then you've got to be talking to the department around, well, who was this person? What's their story? What have they contributed to? And do you effectively communicate you know, tell this person's story because you want to honor them and their sacrifice in this— in the middle of this emergency, which seemingly had no end at that point. And so you're also then, was this the first of many? How do we— how do we manage that? And suddenly your brain starts to, you know, go down these various paths, which is— which is what you're paid to do. It's to analyze potential problems and then come up with a solution to mitigate it. And so I think it had, yeah, quite a large— I think it made things very real because so far everything had been very information-based, numbers-heavy. And so you— and a lot of it was preparatory because from memory, the early death, first death happened quite early. So you're starting to see that these actions have very real consequences. So Yeah.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 32:31
Did you have any colleagues? You mentioned earlier the different roles that, that were in, in the Bushfire Task Force or the group. Um, did you talk with those other people about the situation at all, or were you very much sort of isolated and just working in your bubble, so to speak?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 32:52
And I said no, definitely talking to— and I— this is one of the areas, because you're part of the judgment, is you have to exercise in this. It's like, it's similar to an emergency. How much do you call the Chief Fire Officer or one of their deputies who's responding to the bushfire? Because a call from you isn't just a call, it's a call on behalf of the minister. So of course they're going to drop what they'll come out, whatever briefing they're in, to answer the call. I mean, it's very rare that I ever got told, I'll call you back in half an hour, because that's just the nature of the responsibility and the accountability that exists in our system. And so you have to exercise a lot of judgment around when you make that call.. And this was one of those ones where I was very comfortable making— asking for more information or asking for an explanation or who I could talk to, because I understood the significance of what had occurred and then how the government responded to what had occurred. And so definitely not siloed. He was one of those ones that you take a lot of soundings on because of the nature of, of what it was, and because it was, yeah, the first of what could have been many. And that, that those numbers from Black Saturday of 173 deaths definitely sit in mind. And I think that was, I mean, unfortunately what my relaxate, what my non-work time was at the time was trying to understand the history. And so you were living in it all the time because to these communities this has been going on for generations.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 34:12
And it, I, I'm sure, I wonder if that you're, you sharing what you just did is revelatory for some of the people listening to this conversation who went through the fire and don't understand, you know, the humanness of the role that government plays and played, because it's easy for them to think, well, they're in the city tower, we're here in the country getting burned. And what you've just described is a very human response just like them. So it's, it's, I guess in a way it's heartwarming and it's endearing and comforting to know that the people that were making decisions and working on behalf of the people from it in the government's office also had this, you know, the same human response to what was going on, just like everybody else. And thank you for sharing that. It's, it's, um, Yeah, it's fascinating, and yet it— and it's also really important for us to hear this, you know. This government's not a set of robots, you know, making decisions. Uh, we're humans. And, um, yeah, I could only imagine that that number of 175 deaths from Black Saturday and the book reading that you're doing it, you know, on every night is just ringing through your ears or through your mind as you go to the desk each morning and wondering, you know, what's going to happen today, what's going to happen today.
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 35:51
First, I don't mind— Evelyn, you just said something there that I wanted to add on, which is in terms of— so I was fortunate to attend a couple of the— and this is the Chief Fire Officer at the time, or still is, Chris Hardman, in terms of ensuring I effectively understood what was going on. And so they would have— I went along to their emergency officers only meetings. So I can't remember if it was SCRC or another committee, but they would meet daily at 9 AM, or sometimes twice daily. And so the purpose of those briefings was that everyone in the local, you know, incident control center or an IMT, incident management team, would— and everyone in the central part of, you know, in the city was hearing what was going on in the regions from not only from Forest Fire Management Victoria, but also CFA, with FAI and other agencies in terms of how preparedness was going, how response was going, and what resources they needed from the centre of the state. And that was something that gave me a huge amount of confidence, but also I think, I hope it's something that is a piece of information that gives some confidence or some faith in the seriousness with which the emergency service professionals in this state take their role and the way in which the flow of information is everything in an emergency and the structures that are in place in Victoria post-Black Saturday were able to ensure and were able to respond effectively in a very time-pressured emergency such as a bushfire were very effective and partially, largely because the primacy that's given to local information. And so, I'm sure there are many people that know somebody who worked as a member of an IMT or an ICC. And that information does get taken very seriously because of the nature of the accountability. If something was to go wrong, you know, everyone knew there'd be a Royal Commission or, you know, at the very least an inquiry from the Inspector General for Emergency Management. So the decisions are being made with that in mind as well, which is, are we listening to the people that are most effective and then are we making the best decisions based off that information? And in terms of Yeah, like, I, I'm a strong— obviously everyone's got their own experiences, but as someone who has studied the history of, um, become very intimately aware of what's the history has been in the state of, of bushfire, in many ways Victoria is defined by bushfire. You know, the year the colony— the Victoria became a colony was the year of the largest bushfire this state's ever had. It was over 5 million hectares. You know, the 1920 bushfires, I think, was 1.5. Black Saturday was 400,000.. And so when Victoria was founded, the prospect of, you know, how dangerous this place could be in terms of managing the land. And, you know, the Royal Commissions that have occurred over the years that established the CFA. So Pyehouse 1939, you know, and then Ash Wednesday 1983 put in place the current emergency management framework. And then we had Black Saturday and the floods. And so we had this Emergency Management Commissioner that responds to all emergencies because of the nature of increasing nature of the climate and the way in which that impacts emergencies and the likelihood of occurring simultaneously. And so, and then that in many ways what happened here in Victoria in 1920 during the bushfires showed that it was able to work very effectively in responding to local circumstances, but also working with the federal government, particularly the Army, working with Telstra, working with the energy companies to ensure that I had a colleague that worked at AusNet that was responsible for ensuring that generators were being distributed, some of them by helicopter, into remote towns in the Alpine and Gippsland regions across the state to ensure that they had power. And so the, the way in which it's responded to, I think, is a lesson of our own history, but is a sign of strength. You know, through adversity you see the successes or you see the product of the effort. And I think that as tragic as it was, the impact on those 5 people and the people that lost their homes, and particularly to the nature and the wildlife, and in terms of the way in which we manage the land, I think it is, it is a positive story. I think when history writes about it dispassionately— I'm trying not to do it myself too much now because of the very raw emotion that I'm sure people are still feeling, and I myself am still feeling But it is, it is not, and because we haven't probably really talked about it or learned the lessons from it because we did go straight from that into COVID, but I think it is a really, um, it is, it's on the whole a story of we met a better challenge and we met it. Like, it's not a, it's not a disaster in the way that I'm just passionately seeing it as compared to like a Black Saturday. But I think that obviously people individually had huge effects, you know, and there are many people that have lost their homes, and that's very tragic. And I hope that the process of rebuilding has given them some strength through their community. Um, but yeah, I do— it's a very— it's, it's a— because of COVID I'm not sure we've properly processed what these bushfires meant for, for us as a state. And it did take up the whole resources of government, as did, as did Black Saturday for the Brumby government at the time and the response to it, and Yeah, just, you know, I've become to really come to appreciate how much Victoria is defined by bushfire. Sorry for the interruption. This is Ian Westmoreland, the founder of Katsuki Heroes, and thank you for listening to this story from one of our amazing heroes. Our mission is for these stories to provide hope and inspiration to people experiencing life challenges and to also educate the broader community on how best to to provide support. If you would like to help us to continue to produce more hero stories and cover more adversity themes, we would welcome all donations. These can be made via our website, kintsugiheroes.com.au. The donate function is at the bottom of the homepage. We'd also welcome any feedback. You can email me direct using ian@kintsugiheroes.com.au. Now let's get back to the story.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 42:12
Well, it's, it's really fascinating hearing your, you know, the history and the fires. And like you say, it, it actually is a positive— there's a positive in all of this by looking at it, you know, through the timeline. I guess it was funny you said that because one of the questions I had for you was, how do you, you know, in hindsight, how do you feel that you carried out your role? How do you feel that the government played their role in the bushfires? Was it as successful as it could have been, given the nature of the unknown of such a disaster?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 42:52
That's probably a hard one to answer. From the situation I was seeing it, from where I was sitting, everything worked extremely well.. And so, and everything met or exceeded my expectations. And so every time I would attend a briefing, I would talk to, um, uh, you know, a senior official, I would talk to one of the Chief Fire Officers, one of the deputies, I was filled with confidence. And that's what, uh, in that situation is what you want, because then I could then project that same confidence onto the Minister, onto my colleagues, onto the Premier's Office, onto other Ministers' offices. And that sense that it's— people know what they're doing and they're executing a plan in response to a scenario that they've been thinking through and analyzing, and they've got data and they've got models, and they understand the way in which the fire is going to behave in various types of vegetation. They understand the proximity, the access routes, and the way in which the fire will move based off the weather. And I'm not exaggerating in terms of, you know, when we'd go into these briefings, there would be these maps on big A1 pieces of paper, and they would be a largely white map, and it would have, you know, the state or the area laid out, and then it would have, you know, it would be the fire would be in red, and then there would be the lines of where the large air tankers would be dropping the fire retardant and drawing the lines. They would have lines out where the back burning had occurred. They would overlay it with the fuel management in terms of what occurred, and they could give confidently say, well, the fire's gonna do this when it gets to this point, but we've done enough work here so the fire will redirect based off the work that the Department of Forestry, Fire Management, Victoria and the CFA had done. And then they would give that information and they would say, this is what's going to happen. And then the fire would run through this particular area and more often than not, what they said would happen happened. And so that fills you with more confidence in terms of, and it, as someone that was coming in, I was, you know, incredibly impressed the way that, you know, we could map and predict and redirect the direction of fire, you know, to an extent. And that I was, I was in awe of because it just kept happening. You didn't have time to appreciate it, but it was something that filled with a lot of confidence in terms of, you know, these people knew what they were doing. Like, and part of the big— the way I saw my role was to make sure that everyone else knew that, because they were filling me with confidence, and that's what I saw my role then to do was to pass that on. And I think that then played out in terms of the public debate that occurred subsequently. But the one thing I— the one thing that I do wonder, having said that, could we have done it better? And a large part of the way in which we've interacted with the land here in Victoria is to be blunt, a lot of people came from Europe. Um, the nature of the climate in England, in Scotland, in Ireland, in Italy, in Greece— maybe less so in Greece— but in terms of who fills senior positions in government, the cultural understanding of someone like me, you know, I was English, Scottish, Irish background, um, the way in which that the institutional memory of people that came here, in which they interacted with the land, is very, very different to the nature of the land and bushfire the history of bushfire that we have in Victoria. And I wonder if we had had a voice 150 years ago— so like New Zealand signed a treaty in 1840, we've never had a treaty here in Australia. We've never had a voice that gives, you know, the people that have been managing the land here for 65,000 years— you know, is that 300 times longer than anyone from Europe's been here in Australia— if their understanding of the land had been inbuilt into this state, would we have seen the rate of bushfire we'd seen the past 150 years? Would we have seen the deaths that we've seen, particularly on Black Saturday, if we had a greater understanding of the land? And the thing that's coming through, part of the reason why what came out of Black Saturday, why it was so successfully managed in a total viewpoint, is that But the learnings of, you know, cultural burning from Traditional Owners was something that's been incorporated, I think, since about 2015, 2014, '15, 2016, in terms of the department, you know, that learning and that type of knowledge being adopted by the department and the approach to the way in which fuel management is done in terms of techniques such as cool burning. So you'll run a fire, a cool fire through to remove some of the debris, but it doesn't affect or have the same impact on larger vegetation. And because a lot of the part of the state is— it is, it is a— like, you can't have the eucalyptus forests we have here in Victoria, the Alpine ash, without bushfire. So fire is inherent in the nature of the landscape. So fire is not, from the point of view of nature here in Victoria, it's not a bad thing. It's part of the cycle. But if you manage the land in a way that you're constantly stripping it bare and you're taking an all-or-nothing approach. You're not respecting the land and the way in which it relies on fire to regenerate. It creates these scenarios whereby bushfire builds, so the vegetation can either build and build and build, and then the bushfire will come through in a way that it's not meant to and cause huge scars, and types of forest will burn that aren't supposed to burn, like the wet gullies out in East Gippsland. Or rainforest even near the Dandenongs. But if you, if we had listened to Traditional Owners and, you know, adopted the approaches earlier that we did adopt going into 2019-20, would our state be so, you know, affected by bushfire? And would we have a different relationship psychologically with it? And that's something that I do wonder. And hopefully the Voice, if it, I hope it does succeed, will be one of the main things that you know, understanding this continent that we inhabit together using both schools of learning, you know, traditional Indigenous understandings of the land but also Western science. In many ways, Western science is only now— you know, a lot of the research the department was doing, and I wonder if this is— in fact, I know this is part of the reason why they adopted many of these approaches, is they've been talking to traditional owners out in Gippsland or near Ballarat or out in the Alpine region, and they were saying, this is how we manage the land, this is why, in terms of our relationship with it, fire is a cultural— we respect fire as part of the landscape. And then the science was coming through from, I think a lot of the work was done out of Melbourne Uni, around the ways in which to approach the land and understand different types of vegetation. Because in Victoria, it was classified as either grass or it was forest, and that has very little respect for the nature of the type of vegetation that was in that forest and the way in which it interacts with fire.. And so when the science starts to catch up with traditional learning or traditional, you know, understandings of the way in which to use the land that have been around for tens of thousands of years, yeah, I do wonder if a Voice had been in place if the fires would have been as bad.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 49:59
It's a really interesting insight and a point. It's a positive, right? Like you said, that the government policies that they're starting to adopt and understand the Indigenous management histories, their wisdom, and what since you said 2016, 2015, starting to look at those things. So it can only have a positive impact and effect. I mean, I've heard, you know, anecdotally from different people locally where I live, you know, if only we listened to that, our elders on these matters, if only we had, you know, learned in the past how to do these things better from them, then we wouldn't be in this situation. And, uh, it hopefully, like from what you're saying, we are starting to learn and adopt that and take it on board, which is very positive for moving forward. I just want to— yeah, I'm conscious of the time, and, and I just love hearing all of this from you, Mark. It's been so helpful and interesting. Tell me, what was, what was sort of— was there a highlight or a key moment during the period of the, the bushfires that, that you kind of draw back to and think, wow, that was the pinnacle kind of moment or situation? Have you got that in mind?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 51:26
I don't know if there's a A pinnacle, I guess, having the conversation where we've gone for the last few minutes, is that it's, in some ways, it's poetic in terms of the fires out at Butchbeam, which is a UNESCO site of traditional owners managing the land. I think it's out past Portland and Port Fairy way, is that the fires went through Butchbeam and the way in which the Forest Fire Manager of Victoria managed that fire in partnership with the traditional owners of the land. I'm sorry, the name escapes me in terms of traditional owners, but the— and I remember the name of the chief fire officer though. Um, so Scott Falconer was the chief fire officer at the time, and he was giving briefings on the way in which they were managing the briefing with the traditional owners because they were— because of the nature of the equipment they have to use. Um, you know, like a farm or like a dozer driving through and removing land, they did it very much in consultation and partnership with those traditional owners out at that site at Butcherville. And then those bushfires actually ended up revealing artifacts that we didn't know existed. And so the UNESCO site has become even more valuable both for Australia, for Indigenous people, but globally because the fire revealed, you know, and even more knowledge around, you know, the history of this land. And it's just, it's poetic in terms of part of the state where the Indigenous owners of tradition were very involved in the managing of the fire in terms of the way in which the response was undertaken in partnership, was then able to reveal even more about our own country collectively. I just think that's quite, it was a story that was definitely of interest in the inquiries that occurred in terms of what happened to Budjebim. So if anyone's ever read the Royal Commission or the Inspector General for Emergency Management report. It's a feature of those reports because it does show that we are learning as a state and we are taking on board that knowledge. And yeah, it was a pinnacle in a sense of, you know, it symbolized what is done well, um, in terms of, you know, what was quite a devastating fire for the landscape. This is one part of the landscape that was— it's got a very positive story to tell.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 53:44
Yeah, definitely. It's that, you know, the integration of the Elders, the current people, you know, it's a modern fire, it's using equipment, all of those things, you know, it's very positive. And hopefully any future fires, you know, this will be brought into play when they're planning and managing any future disasters, which we know are going to happen. We live in a fire-prone place, whether that's Victoria, but even other states, of course, as well. Mark, how— you know, after the fires finished and life went back to normal— of course, it wasn't really back to normal because we went straight into COVID— but how have you processed or, you know, been able to move forward if you— in any way, or have you?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 54:47
I— so I think this is a— this is a very interesting— probably one of the— one of the biggest lessons, but is that as well as not processing what happened because the bushfires, because we went straight into COVID here in Victoria, is that the same people that were giving those briefings and working extremely long hours, such as myself, um, you know, and we went straight from the fire response, which went through to February. You then had, um, recovery. So in terms of anyone who's working in, you know, health or community services or energy or waste and recycling or planning, people were working extremely long hours to, you know, ensure that, um, people's communities were restored and they were able to go back to living a life, a life worth living in their own communities as part of their own neighborhoods, is that those insane people, when the COVID briefings— and I remember the COVID briefings, I think the first briefing was late January, and it was at one of those meetings about bushfires, COVID was on the agenda. And, uh, it was— and it's a piece of the story I think it's a bit missed— is there is a very human element all of this. Like, it's the same Emergency Management Commissioner during the bushfires as it is during COVID and it's the same, uh, officers in all of the departments and providing all of the briefings. And there is a— there is a very human element to, um, and I think quite impressive way in which the bushfires were handled. And going to COVID was the people working extremely long hours, making, you know, in a flight or flight state for an extremely long period of time. And then had to then make decisions and get their brains out of— sometimes people working on both, but then moving into a pandemic response, which apart from— was it avian flu, bird flu, in, in the, like, again, similar time, not long before or long after the Black Saturday fires, um, when the current Premier was the Health Minister— is that people were then responding to another emergency. And again, every— and this is a very, you know, as someone that's moved into business, it's a very different way in which you make a decision in terms of, you know, it's based off, you know, it's in a market, you're basing it based off price. But when you're making a decision in these scenarios, there are so many factors that an official has to consider, or a minister, or their staff, or a first responder, in terms of not only in terms of are solving the problem in front of them, but how are they going to be held accountable into the future? And so at the end, you know, there's just a very human element of the people that were working in this, in all of the departments and all of the, you know, hospitals and fire services and the SES and everyone, is people have been working for a long period of time responding to emergency when we went into COVID, which is different to other parts of the world. And so that is something that— and I think there is definitely an element of, um, stiff upper lip or steady as she goes or a very British mentality within our institutions of, you know, uh, what's the Queen saying, you know, um, never complain, never explain. It almost, you know, you know, these people just went from one emergency to another, and then some people were quite visceral in terms of the inhumanity, in terms of some of their attacks on our public officials who had, by any extension, done something quite extraordinary going from one bushfire, then into a pandemic, then was to go on for 2 years. In the case of the senior officials in the fire space, we were responding at the same time as responding to COVID, we were responding to 3 inquiries, a Royal Commission from the federal government, an inquiry from our own government, and then the Auditor-General conducted its own inquiry. So, at the same time as you're responding to a pandemic, you're then saying, "We actually did a very good job against— these are the metrics or these are the standards that the community has set for us, these are the standards we set for ourselves, this is how we did against those standards, and here are many of the lessons or the innovations that we have picked up and will apply to future scenarios." This was all going on as people were responding to a pandemic, as people were making a shift from working to home. Working in government is— getting a whole lot of government to move from in the office all the time, you needed special permission to work from home, to working at home en masse at the same time as wrapping up one crisis while responding to a new one is an extraordinary story of what the state was able to achieve. But it's a story that I think has got lost, unfortunately. And hopefully when the history is written, it'll be different. Because I think it's an extraordinary success or sign of, you know, meeting adversity and then responding to it and moving forward. And there are many lessons that we can learn from the last couple of years because, you know, advisors such as myself learn far more— or ministers learn far more about the nature of their— of, you know, the way in which people interact with the land, in the way in which, you know, the lessons of our history from our traditional owners you know, the types of, uh, conditions that cause bushfire to occur. So there's a huge amount of knowledge that's been gained that's sitting in our, you know, our ministers and our advisors and our public officials that wouldn't have been learnt if it wasn't for the crises that we've dealt with. In many ways, like the Roaring Twenties that occurred, or, you know, I think in France they're called post-World War II, the Trente Glorieuses, in terms of the lessons of the way people understand society, but also what matters to people. You know, everyone's had this opportunity to either, fortunately or unfortunately, be working an 18-hour day in a very critical period, or unfortunately had their lives come to a halt. And we had this real disjuncture between some people, it was one, some it was the other. In my case, it was both. So I can very much relate to people who felt their whole lives came to a stop during the COVID response. Because I worked for the Health Minister for a period of time. But having worked through the bushfires and then going when the new Health Minister came in, and then when it came around to April 2021, I was like, I'm done. Like, I can't— my body's at its limit, my mind's at its limit, I can't do anymore. And so, um, I understand what it's like to then— and then coming out of that situation, it's like I'm trapped in my house, I can't see anyone, I can't really talk to anyone about this. And so I can very much relate to, you know, the trauma of that isolation. But there is a positive story in terms of what government was able to do in its response that I think's been missed. And that those lessons won't go away in terms of, you know, if there was— this state is no more, will never be as prepared as it is now for another bushfire or another pandemic as it is right now because of what we have been through. And it's through— yes, something bad did happen, but through that bad thing we are able to progress and to learn and to grow. And I hope that's a story that can come through for superheroes as well, in terms of, um, what, what do we feel about this period of time in our history? Because we are all a part of history in terms of these bushfires. You know, this made global news. You know, people, people would, you know, you've raised huge amounts of money in terms of charity and donations, um, both for people and for, for wildlife. This was an internationally defining moment. When people write a history of 2020, it'd be, yes, there was COVID, and before there was COVID, there were the bushfires in Australia. Like, it's a hugely significant moment in when people will write about this period of time. And yeah, I hope we get a bit more balanced view than the media narrative would have said that we had at the time that we all had together.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 1:02:34
It's very eloquent the way you've put that. I completely agree. I think, you know, there's a lot that we can be proud of, and hopefully you also feel that sense of pride that you were able to contribute at such a pivotal and, you know, remarkable time. It was devastating, but it was remarkable because of like the nature of it, and also it was right before COVID and, and you were in the middle of it, and hopefully you can take that away, that you did provide something positive. You survived the three inquiries, like the commissions afterwards, and this— the state, the government, that the people have learned from this and are adopting those lessons, and we are absorbing them. And by virtue of life moving forward and reflection, that's how we get to learn, that's how we get to grow, because we need integrate everything that we've been through. And it certainly sounds like you've done a lot of that processing now. You've probably got a lot more to go, um, and certainly the other people I've spoken to have as well. It's, it's not an overnight thing, and that's certainly been very, very clear.
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 1:03:50
Thanks, Evelyn.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 1:03:52
No, you're welcome. Um, I've just loved every minute of this, and For so many reasons. And in closing, I'd love to hear from you if there's any, any kind of parting words that you'd like to leave us with. It might be a lesson, it might be a message of hope. Is there anything that you'd like to say before we, we wrap up?
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 1:04:14
I think it's that— and this would be also true of myself— is that through adversity, there isn't a lesson, an opportunity for growth. I mean, And in many— like, us as a student of science, this is part of my own, and this is my response to situations like this, is to get very intellectual about or try to really understand things. And it's through adversity growth and change occurs. And, you know, after World War I, there was the Glorious Twenties, you know, the greatest era of, you know, Australian, American, European, you know, economic growth was after World War II. Like after what's happened in the bushfires and after what's happened in COVID, there is, you know, people— there is extraordinary opportunity because people, we know, we all know ourselves a lot more than we did before these experiences. You know what we like, what we don't like, what our strengths are, what our pressure points are, and what we want to do with our lives. Like, I've definitely changed the direction of my life based off this experience. Like, if you'd have said to me 5 years ago, I'll be running my own company, this will be doing this, I'll be doing that, I never would have said um, that's, that's the career path I would have taken. And that's probably true of a lot of people. And I hope that, yes, what was a challenge caused a lot of pain for a lot of people, but it's also that through that pain there's an opportunity for growth. And I hope that's a message that comes out of this.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 1:05:34
It absolutely does. Thank you so much, and thank you for, yeah, sharing all of that with me today. And I know that it will be insightful, helpful, and heartwarming for those listening. And, uh, yeah, much, much gratitude to you, Mark. Thank you.
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 1:05:51
Thanks, Elaine. Very much appreciate your time and, yeah, the questions. Thank you.
Aveline Clark (Host) · 1:06:00
We hope you've enjoyed this episode of Kintsugi Heroes with the Alpine Bushfires Special Series. Please like and share share the show to your friends so we can get this out to even more people. If you have a story you'd like to share with us, please reach out using the contact details below. And join us for our next hero's story. Until then, keep being you, and remember that we are all heroes in our own unique way.
Mark Kettle (Guest) · 1:06:32
Only when it's broken Only when it's broken. When it hits you in the middle of the night and the truth burns so bright. Only when it's broken. Only when it's broken. Take pride in those cries. It's only for tonight, and then you rise. Only when you're broken. Only when you're broken. Only when you're broken.
You don't have to be in crisis to call.
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