Profile - Gavin Wright

by Jodie Guest, CFA Public Affairs

Gavin Wright, 37, has been an Operations Officer based in Swan Hill since September last year. He looks after 26 brigades in Region 18 – the Mid-Murray Group, Southern Mallee Group and parts of the Ouyen Group.

But he’s been involved with CFA for much longer than seven months – Gavin joined when he was 12 and was the Captain of Plenty brigade in Region 14 for eight years immediately before he became a staff member.

Gavin was introduced to CFA by his father, who was a lieutenant with Plenty in the 1970s, and started off in the running team. He became a lieutenant at the age of 26 and also served as a DGO (Deputy Group Officer) within Whittlesea/Diamond Valley Group.

Gavin joined the NWA staff after a career in Victoria Police beginning at age 24, following a stint working in a bank.

While in the police force, he was stationed in Melbourne’s northern suburbs, doing general policing. Gavin then worked on Project Clarendon from 2002 to 2004, which trialled putting crime scene officers out in the field attending burglaries and other types of commonly-occurring crime.

With this forensic training Gavin then transferred to the newly-formed police Disaster Victim Identification/Chemical Biological Radiological (DVI/CBR) Response Unit.

DVI/CBR was responsible for identifying deceased victims from crimes and accidents where visual identification of the body was not possible. Members of the team were also trained in breathing apparatus and the wearing of gas suits, and had sophisticated chemical and radiological monitoring and detection equipment that allowed them to attend suspicious powder and other CBR-related events. During this time, the unit worked very closely with both MFB and CFA in training and actual incidents.

During his time with DVI/CBR, Gavin was one of the police members assigned to the Kerang train crash in which 11 people died.

Gavin said working with the other agencies at the very tragic crash had created lasting bonds, particularly with Kerang Fire Brigade members and the Kerang SES unit.

“The bond is from what we saw over those two days. In fact, I used a SMEACS (Situation, Mission, Execution, Administration, Command and Communications, Safety) briefing to establish how we’d go about the job and limit the trauma to the CFA and SES members, given some of the deceased were from the local area.”

Gavin said even while Captain or DGO, he never had trouble balancing his CFA and police roles.

“I was fortunate to have a good team of lieutenants. I had a lot on my plate and at times was pedalling pretty hard, but as they say, give a busy person something else to do

“It was a busy urban/rural interface brigade with the additional responsibility of providing RAR (Road Accident Rescue) and also looking after the Plenty Gorge – one of the highest fire risks in the outer metropolitan area - in its response area but I had two completely separate lives.

“One was my occupation that I did for a living and the other was serving the community in my own time.”

“I started to think about the kind of career I wanted to have. I find CFA’s mission more clearly defined and the results tangible.

“In terms of creating safer communities, we can see we are beginning to achieve our aim. We have runs on the board with minimal losses of life and property in recent large fires, compared to the 1970s and 80s. CFA knows where it wants to go and it’s clear where it wants to move to. We are clearly moving in the right direction.”

Although Gavin has taken a different path to become an Operations Officer than undertaking a Fiskville recruit course and working through the ranks, he found other Ops Officers, fire station staff and volunteers to be very supportive of him in his new role. “I think lateral entry does allow for some different experiences and skills to come into CFA but of course the bulk of Operations Officers will continue to come from our existing career firefighters.”

“My volunteer background is something I took very seriously. I worked hard to train and advance my skills. And my emergency management background with Victoria Police means I’m used to thinking on my feet at the management of large and complicated incidents. My time with CFA prior to becoming an Operations Officer also means I have an understanding of the motivations and needs of CFA volunteers.”

In terms of Region 18, the terrain isn’t what he was used to: “but the core learning still applies although the fuels are different and the fire behaviour in the Mallee can be different”.

And one of the most complex jobs in his time with CFA occurred little more than a month after he took up his full-time position last year.

In October, a silo in Beulah filled with canola caught fire, probably because of a build-up of moisture in the seed. Canola is an oil seed and there were about 200 tons in the silo. The job ran over four days and extinguishing the fire involved calling in an aerial appliance (platform) from Bendigo.

“The silo was a thick concrete bunker so it was like a massive incinerator. Because the oil’s on the outside of the seed, it congealed into charcoal, and Graincorp couldn’t get it out of the silo.

“There were many levels of complexity and we had to remove the iron from the roof. The platform positioned itself so it could put the fire out.”

When he takes time from his Operations Officer role, Gavin spends time with his 13 year old daughter and at a house he’s built on a couple of acres at Plenty.