`No evacuation plan` for Marysville

Fire authorities made no plans to evacuate Marysville or to protect locals
sheltering at the town's oval as the Black Saturday inferno bore down, the Victorian
Bushfires Royal Commission has heard.
Marysville was also believed to be the best prepared town when it came to firebreaks
and fuel reduction burns, the commission heard.
But 34 people died in Marysville on Black Saturday and nearly every public building
in the town was destroyed.
Department of Sustainability and Environment officers running the incident control
centre in Alexandra knew by 5.55pm on February 7 that people had gathered at the
Gallipoli Park oval in Marysville.
Andy Miller, a department incident controller who was on duty at the centre until
5.30pm, and Tony Lovick, who took over from him, both told the commission that
evacuation and protection of the oval were not considered.
Both men were put in charge on February 7 despite their lack of qualifications to
deal with a major fire.
Mr Miller was only qualified as a level one incident controller and Mr Lovick was
level two, but they were put in charge of the Alexandra centre, which is supposed to
be operated at level three - the highest category.
A level three incident controller was not on duty until the following day, despite a
qualified individual living just 1 km from the centre. This person spoke to Mr
Miller but was not asked to attend, the commission was told.
Mr Miller told the commission he had never dealt with evacuations and was not aware
that under Victoria's emergency response plan it was the responsibility of incident
controllers to order them. Evacuations are then to be carried out by police.
The commission has also heard that for the first hour after the fire broke out, from
3pm to 4pm, the department and the Country Fire Authority were acting completely
independently of each other, although the Yea CFA was meant to be in charge of
fighting the fire.
The commission has previously heard that the inferno, known as the Murrindindi fire,
was out of control within minutes of igniting.
Mr Lovick took over control of the fire at 5.30pm and had just over an hour to get
an appreciation of the situation before the devastating wind change hit, causing the
fire to overwhelm Marysville.
"I understood the refuge area to be Gallipoli Oval and that any evacuation attempted
at this later stage was extremely risky ... and should not be done," Mr Lovick said.
Asked by counsel assisting the commission, Peter Rozen, if he did anything to
protect those sheltering on the oval, Mr Lovick replied: "No, because I'm quite
familiar with the oval and that area.
"It's quite a large area and I viewed it as quite a safe area, so I did not do
anything."
He said he was not aware spot fires fell on the oval and were put out by
firefighters, but that he would have expected that.
Police officers at Marysville eventually took over and evacuated hundreds of people
in a convoy from the oval, as fire descended on the town.
Mr Lovick also said Marysville was well prepared, with a fire break around the town
and regular fuel reduction burns.
"I believed that Marysville was probably the best prepared town that I knew," he said.
Both departmental and CFA firefighters carried out a back-burn near Marysville at
6.30pm but were forced to retreat nine minutes later as the fire overran them.
Mr Lovick said he felt at the time that the back-burn would significantly lessen the
impact of the main fire on Marysville.