WEDNESDAY was WOW Day across the nation, a special day to honour the State Emergency Services (SES) volunteers in our communities as part of National Volunteer Week.
Wear Orange Wednesday (WOW) pays homage to the well-known orange overalls that SES volunteers wear, with businesses and individuals encouraged to wear orange or host an orange-themed morning tea to pay tribute to the important work the SES does in keeping the community safe during times of disaster.
Little Swans Childcare’s 28 staff all wore orange and invited two volunteers to speak to the children about what they did.
Centre director Rob Johnson said it was a great experience, with the children having the opportunity to see how the community worked together in a volunteer capacity.
“SES have always supported our community over the years – they are significant contributors in our community,” Mr Johnson said.
Swan Hill controller Damian Howison said the group in Swan Hill had more than 20 members but was always looking for more volunteers.
Mr Howison said they welcomed enquiries and everyone who joined was given on-the-job training in all aspects of the work carried out by the organisation.
“I think it is important for people to realise they shouldn’t imagine they have to have the skills for what we do,” Mr Howison said.
“The service will give them the skills – they will be trained in everything they like to do with the service.
“Here in Swan Hill we have three vehicles and three boats and all members get an opportunity to use all of those.
“Road accident rescue is a big part of what we do and we have recently been put through our capability assessment for that, which we came through really well.
“We also do a lot of training in boats because floods are seasonal.
“We do a lot of training around how to deal with people’s situations when they are flooded.”
Some of the other things keeping the volunteers busy include storm damage, domestic rescues, search and rescue and missing persons.
Volunteers are all fully trained in all the skills they need as well as regular unit training.
Members can go to do courses paid for by the service to enhance what they already know or to acquire new skills.
