Lake Tyers' All-Female Indigenous Fire Brigade in the Black Summer

Originally published 2020-01-26.

The Lake Tyers Aboriginal Trust brigade of Victoria's Country Fire Authority (CFA) is known as Australia's first all-female Indigenous fire crew. Led by Kurnai woman Charmaine Sellings, a small team of mothers and grandmothers protects the Lake Tyers Aboriginal community in East Gippsland, a remote settlement of about 200 people on a peninsula with only one road in and out. During the catastrophic 2019–20 bushfire season they spent weeks preparing, patrolling and defending their home.

This is the story of who they are, why the brigade was formed, and what it shows about local knowledge and community resilience in a warming climate.

Lake Tyers: a community with a long history

Lake Tyers sits on Gunaikurnai Country, about 320 km east of Melbourne and 40 km southeast of Bairnsdale. Gunaikurnai people knew the place as Bung Yarnda. In 1863 the Anglican missionary John Bulmer established a mission station there, and for more than a century the Victorian government controlled residents' lives, at times trying to close the settlement altogether.

Residents resisted. Under Victoria's Aboriginal Lands Act 1970, the community received freehold title to the land in 1971, held by the Lake Tyers Aboriginal Trust. Women's Weekly describes it as the first successful Aboriginal land rights claim in Australian history. Today the trust land covers several thousand hectares of bush and lakeshore, which makes the community both beautiful and vulnerable to fire.

How an all-women brigade began

The brigade grew out of necessity. After a series of deliberately lit fires threatened the land and destroyed a home, Sellings and her friends Rhonda Thorpe and Marjorie Proctor realised how exposed they were: the nearest fire crew was about 45 minutes away. Rather than wait, they asked the CFA to train them. They recruited volunteers from the small township, and the first crew was formed by eight women.

Accounts differ on exactly when this happened. Some reports from 2020 say almost two decades earlier, while Women's Weekly describes the brigade as formed a few years before that summer. What is clear is that it became the CFA's only Indigenous brigade. In November 2019 the CFA Chief Officer highlighted Sellings with the brigade's new ultralight tanker, wrapped in the commissioned artwork "Working Together" by Lorraine Sellings and artist Emma Bamblett.

I just got back from Lake Tyers community, where about 40 people are preparing for another bad day on Saturday. They’re running out of water and only have a slip-on tank for the ute. Charmaine Sellings, the fire captain, is worried but she says the community is holding together. pic.twitter.com/2uJKpTLtsn

— Calla Wahlquist (@callapilla) January 1, 2020

(This post is no longer available on X.)

By 2020 the crew had a core of four women, with others helping when they could and at least one male member. Their kit includes a fire truck, chainsaws and bush-clearing tools, and their work ranges from clearing fuel around homes to responding to fires in a place where outside help can take a long time to arrive.

The Black Summer of 2019–20

The 2019–20 season, often called Black Summer, was one of the worst in Australia's recorded history. Fires burned an estimated 24 million hectares, at least 33 people died directly, and more than 3,000 buildings were destroyed, including around 2,800 homes. Scientists estimated that close to three billion animals were killed or displaced.

East Gippsland was among the hardest-hit regions. On 31 December 2019 fire reached Mallacoota, forcing thousands of residents and holidaymakers onto the beach, and approached Lakes Entrance, just along the coast from Lake Tyers. Navy ships later evacuated around 1,160 people from Mallacoota.

.@NACCHOChair Meet the all-female Indigenous fire crew protecting the Lake Tyers community ( East Gippsland) family and sacred land . #AustralianBushfiresDisaster

A highly-skilled bunch of mothers and grandmothers @IndigenousX @marcialangton https://t.co/BVEYquuRRm pic.twitter.com/mi6Xpg5sIM

— Aboriginal Health in Aboriginal Hands ❤️💛🖤 (@NACCHOAustralia) January 7, 2020

For Lake Tyers the danger was compounded by geography. One access road meant evacuation could be cut off, and a dry season left water supplies low. Guardian Australia reporter Calla Wahlquist visited on New Year's Day 2020 and reported that about 40 people were preparing for another bad day, that water was running short, and that Sellings was worried but said the community was holding together.

Sellings told Women's Weekly that her crew sees itself as the lifeline if anything goes wrong. She also said: "The community is proud of us, and they value us."

Meet Australia's first all-female Indigenous fire crew protecting community, family and sacred land.https://t.co/VA85oRAaOK pic.twitter.com/abvRDV7OBT

— DiversityCouncilAust (@DivCouncilAus) January 8, 2020

Why local, Indigenous-led fire crews matter

Volunteers are the backbone of rural firefighting in Australia. The CFA relies on tens of thousands of them, and in isolated communities a local brigade can be the difference between an early response and a fire that gets away. A crew that lives on the land knows every track, water source and vulnerable home.

Lake Tyers adds another layer: cultural knowledge. Sellings travels across Victoria teaching other firefighters to recognise and protect culturally significant sites, such as scar trees and middens, which can be damaged by heavy machinery during firefighting. That kind of training helps make sure the response to one disaster does not cause another.

The Black Summer also renewed interest in cultural burning, the Aboriginal practice of lighting cool, patchy fires at the right time of year to reduce fuel and care for Country. Gunaikurnai groups and other Traditional Owners have been working with fire agencies to bring these practices back into land management. It is not a cure-all for a hotter, drier climate, but many fire experts see it as a valuable part of the toolkit.

Lake Tyers Fire Brigade Firefighter, Charmaine Sellings is pictured with the brigade’s new Ultralight vehicle that adorns CFA commissioned artwork ‘Working Together’. Lake Tyers brigade is CFA’s only Indigenous brigade, led by a team of Gunaikurnai women. pic.twitter.com/pQIhsHeaoG

— CFA Chief Officer (@CFAChiefOfficer) November 4, 2019

(This post is no longer available on X.)

Women in Australian firefighting

Women have served in Australian fire services for more than a century, from wartime auxiliaries to today's career and volunteer crews. Even so, all-women crews remain unusual, and an all-women Indigenous crew was a first. The Lake Tyers brigade has become a model for leadership by Aboriginal women in emergency management, and Sellings has said she cannot imagine not doing the work.

Lessons for any fire-prone community

• Know your exits. Communities with a single access road need early-departure plans, because roads can close quickly.
• Secure water before the season. Tanks, pumps and fittings compatible with fire equipment make a big difference when mains supplies fail.
• Train locally. A trained neighbour on the spot can act long before outside crews arrive.
• Respect local and cultural knowledge. People who have cared for a landscape for generations know where fire behaves badly and what must be protected.
• Follow official warnings. In Victoria, check VicEmergency and your local CFA brigade for alerts and preparation advice.

The women of Lake Tyers did not set out to make headlines. They saw a gap, asked for training and filled it. In a country that will face more extreme fire seasons, their brigade is a reminder that resilience is often built by the people who live closest to the danger.

Sources: The Australian Women's Weekly: Australia's first all-female Indigenous fire crew; Wikipedia: Lake Tyers; Wikipedia: 2019–20 Australian bushfire season; social posts by Calla Wahlquist, NACCHO, Diversity Council Australia and the CFA Chief Officer (embedded above).