Twenty two firefighters and seven fire appliances spent around three hours putting out a blaze that threatened an important wetland in the Bay of Plenty.

At 5.30pm on Monday, the Matata Fire Siren called the crew to the station for the 10th time this year.

This time for a report of a 'Grass Fire' near Arawa Street in Matata.

'Crews for MATA941 and MATA9433 quickly arrived at the station and seeing the smoke down in the dunes by the DOC Camp, we headed straight for the parking area,” says a post on the Matata Volunteer Fire Brigade Facebook page.

Seeing the fire from the highway, the local Bluelight Coordinator grabbed their Mule ATV and ran that down to the carpark too and met the crew at the scene.

'We then used this to ferry a crew with hand tools to assess the fire and provide us with a tactical report.

'With strong winds fanning the fire it was quickly moving and growing so we quickly escalated and called in support from the Edgecumbe tanker, the Rural Fire Officer, tanker and a crew while our teams began pulling out hoses from our appliance to get water to the fire ground.”

As Edgecumbe arrived, firefighters began pumping water onto the flame and quickly got control over the fire by around 6pm.

'Rural teams with their specialised equipment and skills joined our crew on the scene and teams worked until about 7.30pm, when all hot spots had been dampened down and mopped up.

'We were all back at the station by 8pm to wash and restock equipment and get all of our filthy clothing bagged up for decontamination and were into a debrief by 9pm.”

FIRE SAFTEY MESSAGE
Right now there is a Restricted Fire Season in place over the wider Bay of Plenty meaning that you need an approved Permit for any fire in Rural Areas, and you then need to comply with the permits fire safety conditions.

Lighting even the smallest fire or using fire lighting utensils in dry, hot and windy conditions is dangerous and should not be contemplated right now.

For more details about these permit conditions and to get a permit go to http://checkitsalright.nz and follow the prompts.