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Speaker 1: You're listening to a podcast from News Talks be follow

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Speaker 1: this and our Wide Ranger podcast now on iHeartRadio.

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Speaker 2: Firefighter's Face another day battling to bring the Tongadedo National

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Speaker 2: Park fire under control. The large fire on the Central

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Speaker 2: Plants I broke out on Saturday, triggering evacuations of trampers

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Speaker 2: and residents, including fuck Apupper Village. Authorities have just finished

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Speaker 2: a media briefing and New Zealand Heralds Mike Scott was there.

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Speaker 2: He's on the ground and he joins us on the phone. Now, Mike,

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Speaker 2: very good afternoon to you.

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Speaker 3: Good afternoon.

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Speaker 1: Who is at the stand up and what do we

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Speaker 1: learned about the situation? Mike?

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Speaker 3: There was a multi agency stand up, so we had

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Speaker 3: doc we had been police, Local Ewie and Mayor.

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Speaker 2: Whe's Curtis And what came out of that media briefing? Mike,

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Speaker 2: I understand we've we've found out roughly how many hec

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Speaker 2: tears have been destroyed by this fire.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, twenty eight hundred has been destroyed so far, which

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Speaker 3: sounds pretty bad, but actually there was a little bit

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Speaker 3: of good news out of this briefing. The fire is

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Speaker 3: way more contained. Weather has been helping I've been quite

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Speaker 3: wet here, and so the things are looking a bit better.

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Speaker 3: There's also not so much wind, not like in the

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Speaker 3: weekend when it was hot and dry in windy.

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Speaker 1: So have we seen the worst of the spire, do

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Speaker 1: you think, Mike?

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Speaker 3: Yeah, yeah, we have. The residents of the Fluckerpapa village

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Speaker 3: are actually going to be allowed to back this afternoon,

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Speaker 3: so it can we turn to their homes, which, yeah,

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Speaker 3: that's obviously a good sign. The fire itself, the main

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Speaker 3: part of the fire has actually been kind of contained,

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Speaker 3: and so it's split into two flanks, and in those

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Speaker 3: flanks aren't quite as devastating as what the fire was

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Speaker 3: like yesterday.

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Speaker 2: What does it smell like at the moment, Mikey, Can

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Speaker 2: you still smell the smoke there? Are you still seeing

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Speaker 2: some flames in the distance.

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Speaker 3: No, you're not. When I arrived at six o'clock this morning, yeah,

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Speaker 3: it was smoky and you could definitely smell it right now. No,

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Speaker 3: it seems like quite a nice, crisp alpine day. It's

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Speaker 3: very cloudy here, so we can't see any flames or

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Speaker 3: any smoke at the moment.

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Speaker 2: So you say twenty eight hundred heck, tears have been

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Speaker 2: affected by the fire.

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Speaker 1: What sort of specific damages occurred in that twenty eight

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Speaker 1: hundred hec tears.

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Speaker 3: It's mainly just the destruction of the bush. It's sort

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Speaker 3: of a subalpine sort of bush, very slow growing, quite

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Speaker 3: devastating actually, Gamien from Dock he was saying that that's

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Speaker 3: the worst impact. There's probably been some impact on the track,

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Speaker 3: you know, the tong we were crossing in the Northern

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Speaker 3: Surge as well, but not as much as what they thought.

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Speaker 3: They think that that can be sort of rectified really quickly.

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Speaker 3: It's the bush that's been damaged that's the real harm.

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Speaker 3: The good newsers is that the fire, when it split

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Speaker 3: into these two flanks, it was able to be diverted

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Speaker 3: away from a publer village but also towards crucially not

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Speaker 3: hit beach forest or the kiweeds that resided there.

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Speaker 2: Was there there any information Mike about how this may

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Speaker 2: have started the fire?

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Speaker 3: No, they hadn't let us. There is only speculation at

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Speaker 3: the moment, and there's an investigation going on and sends

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Speaker 3: North last we're going to give us any more information

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Speaker 3: on that at the moment.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, And the message from Western curtin the mirror of Rupai,

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Speaker 2: who obviously was we are back open for business. We

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Speaker 2: want people to go back, and I suppose that is

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Speaker 2: an important thing for some of those businesses down there, right, Mike.

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Speaker 3: Oh, definitely. This is an area that's been hit consistently

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Speaker 3: for the last five years. You know, you've had ski

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Speaker 3: field closures, you've had the shadow and closure. You know,

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Speaker 3: they're obviously subbed through COVID, and they even had the

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Speaker 3: sawmills cloth down rather he So it's like it's just

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Speaker 3: been kind of punched every year. So this is just

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Speaker 3: the latest one. So you really do feel for them.

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Speaker 3: But you know, Where's as a positive guy. He's going

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Speaker 3: to be looking to try and make things now come

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Speaker 3: back to life as quickly as possible.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, it sounds like it some good news all around, Mike,

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Speaker 2: that they've got it under control and people can start

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Speaker 2: going back. But it sounds like there will be a

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Speaker 2: bit of clean up to go before this is all over.

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Speaker 1: Yeah.

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Speaker 3: Oh, look, those firefighters will be there for days actually,

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Speaker 3: because you know, while the fire, the main flame might

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Speaker 3: be gone, there's going to be still clean up and

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Speaker 3: making sure that there's no flames underneath the ground. Really. Yeah,

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Speaker 3: so you's still a long way to go.

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Speaker 2: Mike, really appreciate your time this afternoon and coming on.

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Speaker 2: Thank you and all the beast down there.

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Speaker 3: No worries, thank you.

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Speaker 2: That is the New Zealand heralds Mike Scott on the

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Speaker 2: latest on that wildfire and Tongadedo. So thankfully it appears

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Speaker 2: that they have started to contain that fire and residents

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Speaker 2: have started coming back. So that is good news because

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Speaker 2: it was pretty full.

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