Donations and Support

One really amazing thing to come from the ashes of our personal tragedy has been the support, resources and sympathy that our friends, colleagues, neighbours, families and even the school community have given us.

We bear a debt of gratitude to so many that I dare not list them here for fear of missing out someone whose contribution was subtle or so early on that we missed noting their contribution while we were in shock.

I tried to keep a diary of contributors, so that we could thank them properly, but who knows who we have missed in those early hours on Friday night and Saturday morning.

Collectively and individually Meryl's and my friends, colleagues and neighbours helped me and mine by providing generous cash donations, accommodation, clothing, linen and goods, cared for our pets, helped with the retrieval and cleaning of stuff from the house, lent furniture or even brought around casseroles and soups so that we didn't have to use precious time preparing evening meals.

Some exceptionally generous people did all this and more. Some organised donations of meals, cash and recreation events from several of the local clubs and venues. An otherwise tragic Mother's Day was boosted to "best ever" status by the local Burns' Club donation of an evening meal for 7 at club expense. Still others provided my children with small gifts to replace those that they had bought or made for Mother's day.

We even received a card and some cash from people who didn't know us, but knew our dog, Digit, and who wanted to help out Digit's family. (Digit is a small-time escape artist who entertains families who visit our local park by bringing them sticks, rocks and other things to throw.

The Principal and community of St Thomas the Apostle primary school unhesitatingly waived school fees for the term and arranged a number of events to raise a substantial sum of money towards our recovery as did my workplace at Centrelink and Meryl's workplace at The Canberra Hospital.

We were overwhelmed by the strength of our friends collective generosity and I thank you all from the bottom of my heart for your contributions. As a direct result, we have been able to restart "normal" life in our rental accommodation. We don't own much, but we are warm, safe and comfortable.

I offer you all my heartfelt thanks.

Michael

We found a house!

A day or two after the fire, when news of our fire had spread through our local community, we were visited by one of our neighbours, who is also our accountant. During the course of the conversation we told him that we hadn't yet found alternative accommodation. Casually he mentioned that one of the rental propertys that he administers had recently become vacant and that we were welcome to inspect it to see if it would meet our needs.

As luck would have it, it is a short 10 minute walk from our old house with ample space for us and our meagre possessions. We moved what we had managed to recover from the house into it last Tuesday (17 May) and have made ourselves quite at home. We borrowed other furniture from work colleagues and friends and, despite the house being substantially smaller than our old home, figuatively rattle inside it. We even have an entire room spare for interstate visitors.

We are indeed fortunate that due to the provisions of our home insurance policy, we are able to stay in appropriate accommodation for up to one year at the insurer’s expense. Unfortunately we have to keep meeting the mortgage payments!

Moving away from our old house was more traumatic than I would normally care to mention, but now that we have some normality in our lives, I’m glad that we moved when we did. We are comfortable (with lots of borrowed furniture), warm (reverse-cycle airconditioning is lovely), safe (deadlocks on all external doors) and far enough away from the old house that it takes more than a casual effort to go and visit it. I can now report that I have not visited the site for 2 whole days, although I have to go back tomorrow to collect some gear.

We have retained our old telephone number, and remain in touch with friends and relatives across Australia.

Thank you for the many well-wishes and offers of support.

In Loving Memory...

This is a photo of our ratties taken in happier times. From L-R Midnight, Dawn and Silky. Trapped in the fire, these beloved little girls were not burned, but died from smoke inhalation. Their bodies were discovered snuggled together in their nest box. They were interred in the garden with a short but moving ceremony. The whole family mourns their departure from our lives. Goodbye Girls. We loved you!

Some of the Workers

On Saturday, 14 May 2005 we used our new-found notoriety to extract some assistance from well-wishers who rashly offered to help us out. Not everyone who turned up got photographed, but their assistance was received with much thanks and gratitude.

Paul, Mark and Julie stack pavers



Ian and Meryl wrestle some garden ornaments into the garage while Hilton looks on



Hilton shifts a planter under Meryl's direction



Michael, Neil and Russell rest after helping to remove 6000 pavers



Michael and Meryl pose for the camera

My Office Desk

Another view of my office desk, showing the imitation Dali keyboard.

Roof Line - facing Bathroom

This interesting shot of the roof line shows how the fire was mostly in the ceiling rather than in the body of the house. The roof trusses have completely burned away, leaving only the tops of the dry walls showing. The second photo is a zoom of the hot-water pipe that has burst due to the pressure of steam built up in the pipe.

Park-side of House

This is a shot of the house taken from the park-side of the house. As you can see there is no roof left to speak of. The visiting engineer expressed the opinion that the building shell is salvageable, and that all plumbing and the concrete slab are suitable for reclamation.

Dining Room

This is the opposite shot of the dining room/computer nook taken from inside the kitchen area.

Kitchen

As you can see, the kitchen is dire need of a makeover. What is interesting about this photo, is the way that the smoke "stuck" to the tiles that had been wiped over with a detergent solution from time to time. The whitegoods are badly smoke damaged, although we managed to save the glassware and crockery. We even salvaged Meryl's precious Royal Albert collection. At $50 a plate she has amassed quite a fortune in Lavender Rose pattern.

Rumpus Room

This is a shot of the rumpus room. I used this as an office and had all my computer equipment in here. Luckily for me, my Toshiba Satellite P20 was in the shop for minor repairs at the time of the fire. Unfortunately I lost everything that plugs into it! The Microsoft wireless keyboard is a molten blob very reminiscent of a Dali painting...

Computer Nook

This a shot of the kid's computer nook located in the dining room. The iMac DV and PowerMac G3 are partly melted and soaked from the fire hoses. I removed the hard disks and will attempt to recover the data from them "soon".

Lounge Room

This is the prize shot of the lounge room. The fire started here, in a power board that had a kink in it. The increased electrical resistance was enough for the plastic to melt and allow the Active and Neutral wires to short and cause a fire.

Master Bedroom

Even though our bedroom is the furthest from the seat of the fire, it does not miss out on heat, smoke and water damage.

Entrance and Hallway

This is the view from our front door toward the dining room. Only the chair can be restored. aThe rest of the rubble represents the new skylight....

Elizabeth's Room

As you can see, most of Lizzy's furniture is recoverable. She still lost a lost of stuff to heat, smoke and water damage, but she will count hereself lucky, I'm sure.

Rebecca's Room

This is what is left of Rebecca's room. The roof did not collapse here, so we were able to salvage more tinkets and toys than with Cassy.

Cassandra's Room

This is a photo of Cassandra's room. Cassy was the hardest hit by the fire with only a very few nick-nacks able to be recovered and restored. Her room is open to the sky with the roof forming most of the rubble in her room.

The Fire

On 6 May 2005, I and my family lost our home to a house fire that has left us shocked, dazed and... homeless.

On the fateful Friday night the whole family (including the cat and dog) had joined our neighbours, Mark Stevenson and Julie Taylor for an evening of companionship, pizza and a movie.

At 9:50 pm, we were disturbed by another neighbour banging on our host's door, crying out that the neighbours house was on fire! It was our house!

I ran to our home to see if I could do anything, but the fire had already burned right through our roof, sending flames leaping into the night sky. It was obvious that the house was well and truly alight.

I rattled the dining room doors, to see if I could enter the house to rescue the childrens' pet ratties and some "important" papers I had left on the dining room table. Meryl was yelling at me not to go in, but I was doggedly determined to do something so I ignored her. Luckily for me, the doors were securely locked. I say luckily, because later I realised that the toxic smoke fumes could easily have incapacitated me before I could escape with my life and that the ratties were probably already dead from smoke fumes. I tried to use a garden hose, but the damned thing blew off as I tried to use it.

I eventually managed to find my briefcase and mobile telephone. In the melted remnants of the briefcase I found my newly awarded testamur for a Diploma in Project Management from the University of New England, just completed in April. It is “just a piece of paper”, but it represents a lot of hard work and a sackful of knowledge.

After this attempt I ran around to the laundry door, which was unsecured. I opened the door, but was taken aback by the strength of the wind that audibly howled into the house. It was only then that I realised that this fire was well beyond anything that I could do to affect its outcome. I did not enter, but quietly closed the door and waited for professional help.

All this while the fire brigade units were finding their way to our house. It is a battle-axe block, located some 90m from the roadside, so it can be a little hard to find. The first brigade unit arrived only 10 mins after they were called, but of course the fire had been burning for around 10-15 mins before they were called. (Note for self: Hire a back-to-base monitored burglar/fire alarm service).

They only took 15 mins to get the fire under control, but the damage had been done. The roof totally gone and the entire house and contents heat, smoke and water damaged.

I don’t think I have ever experienced such a feeling of total and utter helplessness as I watched the firemen smash in the door and the windows to pour streams of water on the blaze. All I could do was advise the firemen of where they could locate the electricity fuses and gas main.

I retreated back to our neighbours house and comforted Cassandra (11) and Rebecca (9) while Julie went to fetch our eldest daughter, Elizabeth (13) from her regular Friday night Youth Group meeting at St Stephen’s Anglican Church.

By 11pm, the fire brigades were rolling up their hoses and had set up a stand-by crew to monitor the fire’s progress all night. We had been interviewed by the community police and visited by the District Fire Chief who gave the girls very special teddy bears, dressed in Firemen's outfits.

The dog and cat had disappeared from the scene and we worried for their safety. We knew that the fish must have died along with the ratties, so we were very surprised when a 210cm fireman came from our house carrying a cracked, sooty aquarium with a couple of agitated goldfish swimming in it. These were placed in Mark and Julie's fish pond to recover.

Our other neighbours, the Crawfords, were away on a holiday in Europe so their daughter Jane offered us the use of their house for a few nights until we could organise more permanent accommodation. Gratefully we accepted, and spent a fitful night sleeping in a strange house, with the sound of busy a busy fire crew hosing off spot fires an infrequent counterpoint to an otherwise ordinary night. Judging from the number of early morning visitors we got the next day, I suspect that we were not the only ones to lose sleep that night.

The next day began our 10 day odyssey to getting some control, stability and normality back into our lives.

The pictures tell the tale better then I.

More later.

Michael (Cyclodelic)