‘I just saw an animal in need’
Volunteer firefighter David Tree says his natural instinct to save a helpless animal kicked in when he saw a parched, burned and terrified koala desperate for a drink.
David, 54, didn’t expect to appear in newspapers and on TV screens around the globe, but this reluctant hero’s ashsmeared face and the koala affectionately named Sam became a symbol of hope and resilience amid the horror.
The iconic image wasn’t taken on Black Saturday but during a back-burning operation a few days before the disaster. That didn’t matter to Aussies, though, who were low on inspiration and heavy with loss.
“It was my natural instinct to give her water but as I was doing that, and just after that photo was taken, we got a call that a house was coming under an ember attack,” says David, who said sadly Sam didn’t survive his injuries.
“There were other firefighters there at the time so I asked them to take over the care of the koala so we could help with the ember attack. I couldn’t take the koala with me. It was just a moment when I did the best I could at the time.”
Within a day or two the picture arrived on the desk of the Herald Sun newspaper, and from there it went global. Even Ellen Degeneres featured the image on her show.
And it inspired the Paul Newman Foundation to donate $100,000 to Wildlife Victoria.
“I was just one person out of hundreds of men and women in yellow overalls that day who were trying to save people and their homes.
“My daughter said about the picture, ‘That’s just dad being dad – what’s the big deal?’” he laughs.