23 Dec 2019

Bushfire Press Conference | ABC Radio Adelaide

Steven Marshall, Premier | ABC RADIO ADELAIDE

The Premier: Good afternoon and welcome to Woodside. Today I’m accompanying His Excellency, The Honourable Hieu Van Le, Governor of South Australia on a visit which has been conducted and organised by the Chief of the CFS in South Australia, Mark Jones. I’m also accompanied today by the Commissioner of Police and the Minister for Emergency Services in South Australia as well as the President of the Legislative Council. A pretty harrowing scene so far here, this is the first time we’ve been on to the fire ground, it’s certainly the first time the Governor and myself have been on to the fire grounds, we’ve wanted to stay completely out of the way but what we really are seeing today is what many people would have seen yesterday when they returned to their homes, that is a scene of absolute complete and utter devastation. What is amazing, to me, is how close the fire came to the built-up area here in Woodside and other parts of the Adelaide Hills. This would have been an extraordinarily frightening scenario for anybody in this local area. Of course there are many people who have come back to their homes, to their properties and with great relief find everything intact. Unfortunately that is not the case for everybody in South Australia, many people came back to their properties to see their homes, their dreams completely and utterly destroyed so our hearts and our minds are with those people at the moment who are doing it extraordinarily tough. I met with some victims of these fires earlier today, they were still in shock, very stressful situation especially for families in the lead-up to Christmas. We still have of course the two major fires that the firefighters in South Australia are working on and I’ll ask the Chief now to make some comments to update the people of South Australia.