All the lights that lead us there are blinding

Again, we are horrified by what we see on TV, and social media. Children targeted in an existential struggle they have no active part in. It cuts to the core for many of us for many reasons. We struggle to come up with answers not only for us to make sense of it for our […]

Golden oldies

Recently I’ve been trawling around op shops for vinyl records, hoping for that gem. The trouble is everyone else is now doing, so the hope of finding a signed Beatles is non existent. Or even just a copy of The Triffids Born Sandy Devotional. But I have been discovering a lot of golden oldies, music […]

Let’s have a party!

The Pyrennes region of Western Victoria has unsung beauty. Some time ago, I drove up with some colleagues to Elmhurst, a small town on the highway to talk resilience. Road trips are one of my favourite things in this job, generally because it involves music and good company. This was no exception. Unfortunately, I don’t […]

Out of Uniform

I couldn’t wait to leave school, to stop wearing a uniform. To my horror, when I started nursing, I had to start wearing one again. (the irony of it all, I am glad that my children wear uniforms to school, saves on clothes!). So, naturally, I gravitate towards a project called Out of Uniform, Building […]

Global Resilience Forum

Late last year I attended the Red Cross’ Global Resilience Forum in Cali, Colombia. Cali is possibly one of the furthest cities from Melbourne. It also rates as one of the most dangerous cities in the world (which I found out as I was researching what I might do with spare time while I was […]

Its a great big world

In Australia, I feel our relationship with the international community on disaster management is very tenuous. Apart from a number of mutual aid agreements on urban search and rescue and forest fire fighting, we had tended not to look at the international community for what practice we can learn. We’re a little bit arrogant, presuming […]

Tables that are round

Yesterday we held the second Red Cross National Resilience Roundtable. The focus of this roundtable was on the role of the not for profit and non-traditional organisations in emergency management. The idea was to draw attention to the range of resources that the not for profit sector has offer. To consider this, we brought together […]

Confession

Warning: Graphic Bushfire Related Imagery Dear Miss Hotston, where ever you are, I have a confession to make. You set Ash Road as our Year 7 English text. I didn’t read it beyond the first couple of pages, because I thought it was boring, and the boys were “old fashioned”. I probably copied my essay. […]

Cool for Cats

It’s a beautiful spring morning here in Melbourne. It’s also the Red Cross Disaster Preparedness Week. This is our third national campaign to promote disaster preparedness amongst Australians. Each year we try to engage with people with different themes, rather than a blunt “You must be prepared message.” Anyone else hated being told to clean […]

Ice Baby

Probably the best presentation at this conference, and one of the best I’ve heard for some time was from the dynamic Dan Neely from the Wellington Regional Emergency Management Office. Given that he used music (Vanilla Ice) as a hook, I was hooked. He talked about how they are reconfiguring emergency management to be community […]