GRAMPIANS RANGER RECEIVES SENIOR FIRE ACCREDITATION

GRAMPIANS RANGER RECEIVES SENIOR FIRE ACCREDITATION 03/13/2010

Last month Parks Victoria’s Chief Ranger for the Grampians, Graham Parkes, received accreditation as a Level 3 Incident Controller.

Graham was one of nine DSE and Parks Victoria staff presented with their accreditation, further increasing Victoria’s level of preparedness.

Graham also holds accreditation as a Level 3 Planning Officer and Level 3 Operations Officer.

The addition of his Level 3 accreditation as an Incident Controller makes Graham one of only a few people in the State to hold Level 3 accreditation for all three key areas of fire management.

“Across DSE and Parks Victoria we have staff with a great deal of experience and it’s important we continue to enhance our skills. Level 3 development, assessment and accreditation provides me with the skills to manage some of our states biggest and most difficult fires,” Graham said.

Graham has been employed with Parks Victoria for 35 years and has been the Ranger in Charge at the Grampians National Park for over 15 years. He has just been promoted to the position of Chief Ranger for the Grampians District.

During this time Graham has performed roles at many fire incidents including recent significant fires in the Grampians in 2006, the Great Divide Fires in Gippsland in 2006/07 and last February's Remlaw and Kilmore East fires.

Incident Controllers work out of the Incident Control Centre and require extensive experience in dealing with complex fires and managing, coordinating and communicating with a variety of different people across different agencies. Staff from DSE, Parks Victoria or CFA can fulfill these roles during an incident. A Level 3 Incident Controller is responsible for managing a large or complex fire where resources from a range of locations are involved. These resources can be multi-agency and the incident will normally exceed 24 hours.

The other newly accredited DSE and Parks Victoria staff are based at a range of regional locations including Glen Waverley, Traralgon, Hattah Kulkyne, Benalla, Broadford, Mildura and Box Hill.