VIDEO: Farmers fear fires after bumper harvest

TOM HARTLEY, REPORTER: It came early: a bumper crop, enormous yields, thousands of hectares of fields of gold. 

But for some farmers, here in northwest New South Wales those early harvest celebrations were short-lived. 

More than 70 fires have claimed over 1000 hectares of crop since the start of November, many sparked by the million-dollar machines used for harvest. 

The economic loss is substantial. 

HEATH STIMSON, NSW RFS AREA COMMANDER:  And as we see those temperatures increase, the humidity dropping and the increased winds, we do see those fires become harder to control. 

It's really important that we work with communities because ultimately that's the lifeblood, that's the industry out here, and we do what we can to ensure we're working together.

TOM HARTLEY:  Fifty kilometres north of Moree, the Garah Brigade runs its operations out of a big shed in the centre of town.

Here, in ‘big sky country’ where properties are kilometres apart, the same conditions considered ideal for harvest, are also ideal for grassfires. 

BILL NEWCOMEN, REF VOLUNTEER:  Our biggest issues is we have a fair fuel load with all the stubble and the crop itself. We're saying elevated temperatures, low humidity. So, the potential for fire is much higher.

Behind the wheel is Bill Newcomen, a fourth-generation farmer. His wife Kylie is also a volunteer. 

KYLIE NEWCOMEN: Having to come in and then go out and around the paddock.

TOM HARTLEY:  Over the past month, their small crew has raced across the region fighting to save their neighbours’ properties. 

With such great distance between farms and fire-engines, oftentimes when they get there, the damage has been done.

BILL NEWCOMEN:  Like the crop alone, if you say each hectare could be a couple of thousand worth of crop and if f you lose 100 hectares, there is $60,000 gone.

It’s shattering, particularly when you’ve put the effort and the money in, and the crop is virtually ready to come off. 

I think you've always got to be aware too, that while you're going out to a fire, there could be a potential of a fire at your place too.

TOM HARTLEY:  At his family’s farm, even though they’ve completed harvest, Bill still stands to lose a lot. 

BILL NEWCOMEN:  So in the bag is barley. Each bag has in between 220 and roughly 240 tonne of grain. 

It’s a huge fire risk because if this paddock behind us here caught, and the wind was going that way, this is a large plastic bag. The bag would burn, you’d lose the barley.

TOM HARTLEY:  A quick look around gives you an idea of just how tinder-dry, and volatile the conditions are. 

This is what’s left of the chickpeas, and this is what’s left of the barley.

BILL NEWCOMEN:  If we got a dry electrical storm at present with a dry strike, you could ignite a fire and if you got sufficient wind off the storm, it could run very fast.

TOM HARTLEY:  And when it’s this dry, how fast is this going to run the fire? 

BILL NEWCOMEN: Dependent on wind, like worst case scenario probably do a k in half an hour.

TOM HARTLEY:  Fires sparked by dry lightning in previous years have been catastrophic and exceptionally hard to contain.   

TOM HARTLEY:  As head of the local farmers association, Bill knows what’s at stake across the region.

BILL NEWCOMEN, FARMER: I think for a lot of us, we're still recovering from the 2017 to 2019 drought. 

Most of us went through a period of two years of minimal income, followed by a year of no income and massive costs. 

Last year was a year where most of us lost money, so this year you would be counting on a good crop to remain financially viable.

In the past I’m aware of people who after a major fire event basically walked off.

ROB ROGERS, RFS COMMISSIONER:  So this map shows the level of curing in the grassland areas. 

TOM HARTLEY:  Six hundred and fifty kilometres away, at the Rural Fire Service’s Sydney headquarters, real-time maps reveal the state-of-play, and areas at risk. 

ROB ROGERS:  This, this centre part of the state from the Victorian to the Queensland border is the area we’re obviously going to be watching quite closely. 

You’ve got the Great Dividing Range, and the browning of the grass out to the west. 

And then this map shows you level of fuel, the amount of fuel loads you can see. So a higher concentration of grass which again is covering that centre bit of the state

TOM HARTLEY:  So this is up where we were, around Moree. 

ROB ROGERS:  And up there, and down in the Riverina area are two areas that we’re particularly focused on into January-February, that’s what we’re concerned about.   

TOM HARTLEY:   While proactively planning for fires, the service is also trying to better understand, and protect, the priorities of farmers. 

ROB ROGERS:  Sometimes it's the crop, because it’s about to be harvested, and that becomes very expensive. Sometimes it's the machinery shed because of the value of the machinery and then other times it's the house. 

But we’re making a concerted effort to rebuild those linkages with farmers because often they’re on the front lines and they are dealing with these things before we can even get there.

BILL NEWCOMEN:  We’ll fill it up, about 1000 litres of water, have a Honda firefighter on the back. 

TOM HARTLEY:  Bill says the most vital equipment any far, can have is a working farm fire truck.

BILL NEWCOMEN:  It's a bit late when the fire starts, to realise that you have no water actually on site to fight the fire.

You need to plan. More importantly, you need to communicate that plan to anyone who's on the farm during harvest. 

Better still - be a volunteer. It's a case of fires will happen, it's not if they'll happen. So if you're prepared, you can minimise the damage. If you're unprepared, that's where the cost is.