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Fire bunker caution urged

Posted on November 8, 2009, 8:08am and updated on November 9, 2009 at 2:54 pm

Grant District Council has issued a warning to people living in high-risk bushfire areas that they should not rush out and install fire bunkers because the consequences could be deadly.

With the community feeling vulnerable following the harrowing Victorian Black Saturday bushfires, Grant district mayor Don Pegler called on people who were thinking about installing bunkers to reconsider.

“Some people are flogging these things, but there are no standards,” Mr Pegler said.

“People think they are doing the right thing, but they could be doing the wrong thing.

“If you hop into a cement tank, the oxygen would be sucked out and you would get caught.”

Cr Shirley Little, who lives at Tarpeena and survived the Ash Wednesday inferno, said people were feeling vulnerable about the upcoming fire season.

The South Australian Government has issued a warning that bunkers were not endorsed in SA for use as a safe refuge in a bushfire as no recognised standards exist for such a purpose.

Since the Black Saturday bushfires, the government claims there has been considerable interest in bunkers because of survival stories in the media.

But the government claimed there were also seven people who died in bunkers in the Victorian fires.

The government claims people should only install a bunker if they are:

  • Confident the level of fire protection would exceed their house.
  • Can afford to build a good quality, appropriately positioned bunker.
  • Have considered how the bunker would fit into the family’s bushfire survival plan.

Other factors to consider include quick access with alternative escape directly to outside, whether it can withstand the weight of the house collapsing on it and allow occupants to emerge even if the house collapses.

A house that complies with the latest building standards should be regarded as the safest building on the property.

If a bunker is buried more than one metre in the ground, development approval is required.

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Comments

One Response to “Fire bunker caution urged”

  1. Robert Stewart on November 8th, 2009 4:03 pm 1

    There is more to it than political warnings. As a Heavy Engineering and Environmental Risk Engineer for 22 years I suggest that anyone considering such a safety pod “that would not be affected if the house fell on it” talk to their fire insurance underwriter who has more information and experience than anyone of the risks associated with any protective measures where you live and whether they would accept the liability for any loss.. I have already described the death of a mother and her two children who jumped into the swimming pool –not from drowning but asphyxiated from lack of oxygen. A “concrete tank and the oxygen sucked out of it ” Come now, Mr. Pegler so where is the rest of the oxygen, outside of the tank?

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