A LETTER FROM THE EDITOR

When Kate Brew sent me a story about her experience with a bushfire some years ago, neither of us expected that she would again be faced with a wall of flames only a few months after it appeared in our pages. But on December 20

last year, that is exactly what happened when a fire roared into the Adelaide Hills and Nether Hill Farm, Kate’s beautiful new home that she shares with husband Adrian and their four children, was under threat. Luckily, the house was saved but it was a terrifying experience and their local community was hit hard, like so many towns all over Australia. Eerily, it is difficult to tell the difference between Kate’s photographs of the last fire in 2015 that you can see in our Christmas 2019 issue and this one. The charred paddocks show how close the flames came to the house on both occasions.

Many of you have contacted us to ask how the people we have featured in our pages over the years have fared. I do know about some — Jenny from The Old Schoolhouse in Milton, NSW, which appeared on our cover in April last year is safe — but news is still trickling in as we go to print and it will take a while before we know the full extent of the damage. (A fact bought home to me today when I spoke to a reader near Wagga Wagga. She explained that although her livestock hadn’t suffered any obvious burn injuries, she was still concerned about losing them because of smoke inhalation and stress.)

Another South Coast family, David Gleeson and Leah Atkins, whose house was on our January 2019 cover, were in Lake Conjola, one of the worst hit areas — thankfully, it was spared. When we featured David and Leah’s house, I wrote about my childhood summer holidays spent in this NSW South Coast village and I received a lovely email from a reader who also used to holiday there. Sadly, she got in touch again on January 1. “Almost a year ago, I wrote to you about the love we had in common for Lake Conjola. I spoke of my parents’ house and how much I loved it there. You were kind enough to print my email. I don’t know why I’m writing again except that as a fellow Lake Conjola ‘lifer’, you’ll understand how devastating the NYE fire was for the community. Heartbreakingly, my parents lost the home I wrote to you so lovingly of. The community of Lake Conjola West was decimated yesterday and my heart hurts in ways I can’t deal with. Thank you for printing my letter last year, and giving me a precious memory in print.”

We are thinking of everyone impacted by these terrible fires,