North Frontenac firefighter puts skills to use in Amazon wildfires

Craig Bakay | Jan 08, 2020

With 12 million hectares of wildfires burning in Australia, it might be easy to forget that during the fall of 2019, there were almost 5.3 million hectares burning in the Amazon basin.

And North Frontenac firefighter Michael Leach had a ringside seat to the fires in Bolivia.

Leach, 34, does rope rescue training, but, he said, once you get to the technician level in Ontario, “there’s not much left to do.”

So, when he got a call from a friend offering some interagency training in Bolivia, it seemed like a good experience.

“Hey, you get to rappel down a 300-foot waterfall in the jungle,” he said.

So, last September, Leach and eight others from Ontario, including a number of military police officers, were off to Bolivia for said interagency training and to distribute medical supplies they’d collected from donations.

They didn’t expect what happened next.

“We got a call that there were millions of hectares burning near the border with Brazil and they asked if we could help,” Leach said.

So, they grabbed up all the supplies they could and the next thing he knew, Leach was on a helicopter, through the efforts of a Bolivian air force general, and heading to the inferno.

“We gave out medical supplies for four days and then hooked up with the Santa Cruz bomberos (firefighters),” he said. “We fought the fire day and night for two days until the church bells rang signalling evacuation.

“But the people stayed to fight the fires because it was their home.

“Men and women and children with towels and machetes fighting wildfires in a panic state.”

He said his group fought the fires on one flank while the Argentine army fought the other flank.

“Guys you just met have your life in their hands,” he said. “It’s humbling.

“The air is full of smoke and soot, you could smell and taste it.

“Dehydration is a big problem and the kids had problems breathing and with their eyes.”

He called the experience “very eye-opening” and “the police, fire, search & rescue, the army, were all very grateful.”

Another thing that stuck him was the lack of gear and equipment the locals had at their disposal.

“There are two working pumpers in Santa Cruz, a city of 3 million people,” he said. “One bay at our Snow Road Station is better equipped.

“It’s not funny but I had more gear in my cargo pants than they had in the station.

“On the plus side, I had better cell phone coverage there than in North Frontenac.”

Leach paid for his trip down himself but when he got back, North Frontenac Fire Chief Eric Korhonen asked him if he’d do a presentation for the mutual aid partners (Kingston, Central Frontenac, Napanee, etc), which he agreed to do.

“They managed to come up with a $1,500 grant for my airfare,” he said.

The mutual aid chiefs are also trying to put together surplus supplies and gear to send down to area.

They’re still in the process of setting something up but Leach hopes he’ll be able to return to Bolivia in the spring.

In the meantime, if you’d like to help, contact Korhonen at the North Frontenac Fire Services 613-479-2231, ext: 232 or your local fire department.

“The fires have subsided now as the rains have come,” Leach said. “But flooding is still a risk.

“They do the best they can with what they have.”