Hidden costs bring new challenge to bushfire survivors


Australian Broadcasting Corporation

Broadcast: 22/01/2013

Reporter: Adam Harvey

Some of those affected by recent bushfires across Australia are finding unforseen costs and insurance shortfalls bringing fresh challenges.


LEIGH SALES, PRESENTER: Many survivors of this summer's devastating bushfires lost almost everything and they're now trying to rebuild their lives.

For some the heart ache is compounded by learning that they were under insured and either can't afford to rebuild or will be substantially out of pocket if they do.

In Dunalley in Tasmania, residents are at a public meeting tonight to discuss their plight and to seek government help.

As Adam Harvey reports, farmers in Coonabarabran in NSW need a hand too.

SUE SCHWANKE: There's the barbecue over there as well.

RAY SCHWANKE: Crazy, isn't it. That's part of the grading machine. Look at the solid aluminium. What a waste.

It's crap, isn't it? Absolutely crap.

But we will rebuild.


One barge is completely melted to the ground and that's about 630 degrees of temperature. So that's a hell of a fire.

ADAM HARVEY: The fire that razed Dunalley took Sue and Ray's home, their business and their livelihood.

RAY SCHWANKE: Just look at the mess, what's left, there's nothing worth salvaging.

SUE SCHWANKE: There are only two things that we found available afterwards was Shar cook clips and a roll of wire ties. That's the only things we were able to find and their tension was compromised by the fire anyway, so nothing was salvageable at all.

RAY SCHWANKE: You and your shark clips.


There was a factory, a residence and joinery shop and livelihood for a few people, you know, in the oyster industry and it's all gone through the fire, unfortunately.

Yeah, it's pretty devastating. It's 14 years of work down the drain and very well underinsured, unfortunately, because nobody ever expected the magnitude of the fire to come through here like it has.

ADAM HARVEY: The Schwanke's say they're looking at a loss of about $700,000.

RAY SCHWANKE: The old gas cylinder's blown its top. That's alright.

Didn't even enter our heads that we were under insured. That's the scary part.

SUE SCHWANKE: Is that all still art?

RAY SCHWANKE: Yeah, that's alright. It's about $1.3 million worth of equipment, oyster tubes, factory, all gone. Barge totalled. We've got a new barge, thank goodness, to some kind people. We've got a tractor on loan. Yeah, it's been pretty hard.

ADAM HARVEY: It's not just them. Nobody expected this fire and many of the Schwanke's neighbours were underinsured.

RAY SCHWANKE: Yes, very common because nobody anticipates a magnitude of this type of fire to come through and do the devastation that's done and it's just uncomprehendible really. If you look around and see what's left, you know, there's very little left.

ADAM HARVEY: In Tasmania alone there's been 1,200 claims so far with insurers in line to pay out almost $80 million.

Claims are being settled quickly, often within days of the fire. At a public meeting in Dunalley, called by insurers this week, under insurance was a big issue.

CAMPBELL FULLER, INSURANCE COUNCIL OF AUSTRALIA: Under insurance is very hard to calculate. The Insurance Council has been quite vocal over the past few months urging policy holders to review their contents and their building cover to ensure that it does cover them for these kind of catastrophes.

ADAM HARVEY: It's an issue too after the fires in northern NSW where a big cost facing farmers in the Coonabarabran area is replacing destroyed fences. Even a small property can have $15,000 worth of fencing.

CAMPBELL FULLER: In many rural areas we do find that policy holders will insure of course their home and contents, much of their machinery but fencing is something that many rural land owners don't insure simply because of the amount of fencing that they have.

ADAM HARVEY: On the western fringe of Sydney in the Blue Mountains, tens of thousands of people live in one of the highest bushfire risk areas in the nation.

Katoomba resident Suzie McGregor lives at the top of a steep bushland gully. She's been here 25 years and gets edgy every summer.

SUZIE MCGREGOR: Very nervous and since I joined the Rural Fire Service very much more so. Instead of waking up and going oh, it's a lovely hot day, how wonderful. I wake up and go oooh, breath of Satan day.

ADAM HARVEY: She and her husband were mindful of fires when they built the house.

SUZIE MCGREGOR: And we've also got these steel windows so that if your ember gets lodged in the corners, which is where it happens, it can't burn, there's nothing to burn.

ADAM HARVEY: But they've also taken some calculated risks.

SUZIE MCGREGOR: If a fire came through and it ignited we'd have embers falling all over the deck and then possibly getting up into the eves and then possibly setting the ceiling on fire and once that happens it's goodbye to the house really.

We've decided to leave it because it's such a beautiful old tree.

ADAM HARVEY: Suzie McGregor is a deputy captain in the local fire brigade and she works for a company that assesses buildings for bushfire risk. She knows what she will do with her own place when a fire strikes.

SUZIE MCGREGOR: Well, our bushfire plan is we will be on the big red fire trucks and the other day what we did was we prepared the house as best we could and then we went down to the fire shed and we were on standby all day.

ADAM HARVEY: The access road to her home is narrow and surrounded by dense bush.

SUZIE MCGREGOR: I wouldn't bring my crew down here under any circumstances. It's too dangerous. It's a house, lives are far more important.

ADAM HARVEY: If a fire did strike the McGregors wouldn't be able to rebuild a house that looked like this. Bushfire codes are much stricter now and that means another expense for people who want to rebuild after a fire.

DAVID JONES, RURAL FIRE SERVICE: There's no question there's an additional expense. There are things you can do to make your house bushfire safe. Putting stainless steel fly mesh fly screens on the outside. Yes, there's an additional cost there but that will stop ember attack against glass. The type of materials you use on the outside, thinking a little laterally.

ADAM HARVEY: Back in Dunalley, locals are helping each other to rebuild.

That community spirit is fuelling the Schwanke's decision to begin again, despite their enormous losses.

RAY SCHWANKE: Got a new barge sitting to the back of us here, we've got a tractor on the way, a grading machine getting made, so yeah it's all good.

SUE SCHWANKE: Twelve years of work that's gone down the drain, so we've got families relying on us so we've got no choice but to go ahead.

RAY SCHWANKE: Oh, well, the excavator will be here tomorrow to take all this away so there will be a fresh start.

LEIGH SALES: Heart breaking. Adam Harvey reporting.