1983 Melbourne Dust Storm, Ash Wednesday Bush Fire, ending with the photos I took with a Canon SLR camera from the 1983 Bush Fire Appeal game The Sun All-Stars Vs Carlton and Collingwood Vs Footscray at VFL Park which was 39 years ago today. I was only 15 years old and didn’t have the foggiest how to use a SLR camera, so happy a few came out sharply.👍 Cheers Gezza1967 (RUclips channel) Click link to view each photo properly on the VFL AFL 20th century footy page. facebook.com/1552983461627202/posts/2531639697094902/
@@danrobinson572 It's interesting that you mention the clean up because I walked through it in the city and could barely see a few meters ahead, then the view from the 13th floor office was totally blocked out but strangely I didn't notice much in the way of deposited dust afterwards - maybe I'm wrong??? One of the eerie things about it was that it didn't seem overly windy to me, just a large mass of dust moving on through.
Thanks for compiling this and uploading it. The pics you took at the games were amazing also. As much as I loathe Carlton FC with a passion (being a proud Pies supporter 😜 ) I applaud the Carlton FC, the All-Stars team, the Collingwood FC and Footscray FC for putting those games on to try and raise money for the bushfire victims. Great choice of song for this video, too, btw.
I remember that day as though it was only yesterday. I was at school in Melbourne, in the library, and we had to run around and close all the windows to keep the dust out. That night I was standing in my front yard looking up the billowing smoke from the bushfires. I'll never forget feeling one drop of rain on my cheek. Just one. A day anyone over a certain age will never forget. Rest in peace all those who perished on that terrible day.
I remember very well that Dust storm in Melbourne, 40 years to exactly this day February the 8th, I was a manager for a rental company and the Doncaster shopping centres Air conditioning system stopped working and the centre management hired every single one of our portable air conditioners for all the retail shops and I re member filling up one of our Holden one tonners choc a block full of them and delivering them there and when I was there you could get a magnificent view of the city and then I had a panoramic view of the encroaching dust storm about to hit Melbourne, what a spectacle that was!
I am in this video! 50 seconds in... 20 yo policeman wiping dust from my eyes. I remember the day as if was yesterday. I was directing traffic at the corner of Flinders St and Swanston Streets when the sky went BLACK. No one knew what was going on. I had MANY people ask me if this was the end of the world - like I would know :) Anyway, it was a memorable, freaky experience....thanks for posting
I arrived from New Zealand to Melbourne only a few weeks before , I had not long turned 20 . I can remember thinking wtf is this place about ? It’s so hot the place is on fire . Think I’ll be heading back to Nz . Well I’m still here 40 plus years later , with Aussie kids and grandkids now .
My god I remember standing in Fisherman’s Bend and watching this come through. It was like nothing I have ever seen before or since , that cloud of dirt was just breathtaking.
I can remember being in the bosses office in Northcote and asking what was on the distant horizon. An old bloke in the next office heard what I had said and remarked about it looking similar to the big dust storm in, I think 1939. We stood there and watched the dust envelop the city and then where we were. Then to wake up the following week and hear on the radio about all the communities that had been wiped out by the fire. I had only been in Australia for 18 months so compared with the UK this was unbelievable. Been here 40 years now and loved almost every minute of it!
Another good video. I remember the dust storm while working in South Melbourne. Kind of surreal seeing Brian Naylor reporting on the fires of 1983 considering he died during the Black Saturday fires in 2009.
@@MMM-dq9jj14up Yes it was extremely sad. We had a guy here in Marysville that sat on his porch and refused point blank to leave, saying that he'd seen fires come and go and this was no different. His elderly wife didn't drive. The car was packed and ready to go but he wouldn't drive it. She was found running down the hill and bundled into a neighbours car and survived. He was found just next to the porch. Crazy day that day. :(
@@ayrsen123 never underestimate a fire. Unfortunately far too many, even in this country and with all the previous evidence, often men, let ego and pride get in the way of rational decisions. Refusing to leave something that can be rebuilt over something, their lives, that can’t be revived.
@@andyrob3259 Very true. Some of the stories I heard after were that day were just crazy. I knew that guy on the porch. I couldn't believe he would do that considering the predicament it left his wife in. Fire will do weird stuff too, you just never know.
At the time of the dust storm I lived in far NW Tasmania.. we got some dirty rain that covered any cars left outside with a brownish red coating of silt...
OMG! I was almost 10 yo when all of this happened. The difference between memory of certain events and archival footage that shows those same events happening is both stark and remarkable.
I remember when that red dust came down from the Vic mallee region. It was around 3.30pm I was standing on Glenferrie train station waiting for my Spencer street red rattler to take me to Burnley. The dust wafted over the platform. I was 15 yo and never seen anything like that before.
More gold from Gezza. How could you forget that day of the dust storm if you lived through it. I was in South Melbourne working as a labourer and we heard something on the radio about it and looked up. Holy smokes!! In it rolled. After the main wall of dust rolled through I was swimming at South Melbourne Beach - it was hot that day - and , in the water, was burned by falling gum leaves. I'll never forget that. That drought in 1983 ripped right across the country and was as bad as I can remember. Even in the mountains things were dry. Calicivirus had not taken hold in rabbit populations and I saw "moving paddocks" of rabbits near Eucumbene in the summer .
It was a hot summer, I am pretty sure we had water rationing around then as well. The factory I worked in we had 7, 50 foot long ovens that were used to dry the ink on the tin plate we had printed. I remember the bosses coming around with trays of gatorade and giving us cups while we were cooking in our combination overalls.Common sense prevailed and we all got sent home that day about 11am I reckon. Being kids we were off to the local pool.
Ash Wednesday, 180 fires across SA and Vic! Listening to that reporter watching and describing his home burn down in the Adelaide hills will never be forgotten.
This day I was 16 years old and was walking up a narrow street behind Swinburne Tech after class heading east toward home when I turned around and literally saw that cloud of dust coming toward me... In my life I’ve see Ash Wednesday and Black Saturday in 09. My Grandfather fought the 39 fires. This happens in Australia, it’s just the way it is especially in Victoria where it can be moist for a long time, but then drought hits and it happens.
Funnily I was at year 10 at Swinburne then. I was 15. My class was 10E1. I got to Glenferrie station at 3.33pm and while standing on the platform that red/orange dust cloud wafted over me. Luckily my red rattler to Spencer street came soon after. So you would have been in Year 11? I wonder if you remember Donna French or Stuart Denovan?
Boy, do I remember that day. I was working at the Wentworth Hotel and in an American guests room when he asked, whilst looking out of a 45th floor window, " young man is this normal?" I followed his gaze to see a tidal wave of red dust swallowing the city. Later, in the pub ( The Arcade Hotel on Lt Collins Street) after work, news started filtering in about insane bush fires in the Dandenongs and all across south east Australia start getting out of control. By morning it was mayhem. RIP the country fire guys killed at Cockatoo that day.
I was a young guy working at Leader Newspapers office in Doncaster Shoppingtown and stood in the car park (seemed about 3.00pm), where you could see half of Melbourne looking west, and watched as the black cloud that stretched completely across the horizon, rolled eastward towards where I was situated (I had plenty of time to get inside, so just stood and marvelled at something I'd never seen before for probably around 15 minutes) It really was a surreal experience.
Yes. I got to Glenferrie station at 3.33pm and as I stood on the platform it wafted over. Red/orange colour. Then got home to watch Skippy on Ch 9 is when we saw all the fires unfolding.
Like others remember it well. Was driving home from visiting mum with my one yr old in car. Could see it in the distance getting closer. Got home before it totally engulfed. It was terrifying seeing it get closer and driving.
I remember the dust storm and I was walking home from school on that day and it was just unbelievable at 3.30pm. Came home with red eyes like a tomato with the dust.
A great summary of a surreal time. I was working in a ground floor office in Collins Street when day turned to night. My girlfriend (now wife) was working as a nurse at the Repat Hospital in Heidelberg, and watched the dust-cloud swallow the city. You could taste it in the air-con for days.
I remember this day very well with the dust storm. I also remember the bush fires,the hospital in Ferntree Gully my uncle and other patients were part of this story. Smoke caught many with respiratory problems.
Amazing, remarkable footage. A timeless record of that tragic day and those weeks. I was at Primary school in grade 4 and still vividly remember it to this day, choking on the dust storm at recess and lunch, wondering why our teachers had insisted we go outside. Great stuff!
I remember riding my ducati through Ringwood and the bushfire smoke was unbelievable. those poor volunteers caught in the fires at Beaconsfield was heartbreaking RIP
Remember the Dust Storm. Was around 16 yo. Was doing a summer temp school holiday job with Telecom (got via my dad) and we were driving in a van along Beaconsfield Parade heading to the CBD and saw it coming across the bay and then hit us.
Was working in the city the day of the dust storm, crossing Collins St saw it rolling in from the west, back to work and up to the roof of the the Sportsgirl building with a workmate to watch it, new one of those firefighters that lost his life on that sad Ash Wednesday
Never forget these two savage acts of nature as a Victorian..and then Black Saturday tore the heart out of the community. Thanks Gezza for sharing some sad bit eventful history with us again.
Nobody mentions just how hot it was on Ash Wednesday and the previous week when the big storm came. 43 -44 from memory, just hell. RIP the good people who lost their lives that terrible Wednesday.
Yeah I guess your right because I remember in year 9 at Swinburne Tech in 82 we went to the camp up at Bonnie Doon and I do remember how dry and parched the countryside was around Yea, Mansfield, Lake Eildon so in early 83 I guess it was perfect for fires. 40 years on and its the opposite.
Peoples memories are not always correct, it gets confused with time. The dust storm was in early February and the Ash Wednesday fires were on the 16th February. It was impossible to be swimming at South Melbourne beach on the afternoon of the dust storm, and be burnt by falling gum leaves as someone has commented.
Yes mate you are right it came from SA or the west. The fires were just over a week later. It was a very hot summer and we always get the weather from SA, I think at the time they had some bushfires they were dealing with but nothing compared to the carnage set to befall the Dandenongs a week later.
Yes, I remember the dust storm more vaguely but Ash Wednesday much more readily. So do not know the time difference but knew it in the same summer. My main memories about Ash Wednesday was my classroom windows at school in Yarra Valley were all smashed in so I remember being off school for about a week and remember the radio updates as bushfires too close to our town to not be on standby to leave. But I remember that lasted for days. Never needed to leave but fires within a few kilometres of our house. I also remember some holiday time we had stayed in Lorne in something called the Cumberland. I think it was lost in fires in that town so many different parts of state had fires and so did South Australia. I was only a kid at time but for some reason it was worst disaster I remember but it was not just for one day. The worst of it was Ash Wednesday but there were fires around for many days. As an adult 25 years later it seemed like should have learned better lessons but sadly too many lives lost.
I remember being sent home from work and a few of us going to the Preston baths for a swim. I was only an 18 year old kid and had no real idea of the horrors going on in the bush and was just happy to get a half day off work. The dust storm was so eerie and the smell of burning, I can still sort of remember it even today.
@@perpetualgrin5804 Became a Tafe College I think, probably the carpark of the Tafe. I was more an Ivanhoe Baths boy living in Heidelberg, my mates from work were from Preston.
I was there in 1983 and 2009 and recall where I was in Melbourne. I asked myself "What the hell didn't the Government learn from 1983??" - clearly nothing - Fools!! RIP to those that matter.
My Dad said at his workplace , when the men saw the dust storm approaching they feared for their lives , and looked for places to hide . Some were making the sign of the cross on their chest , as they didn't know what was coming towards them
We barely escaped with our lives. Directed by a misinformed police officer to just drive through a short wall of smoke and it would be fine. Drove through 1.5km of fire front. It was hard to explain to others what it was like, until I saw recent footage of bushfires taken by people and fire fighters as they were caught in its fire front. A surreal sea of red surrounding you, with everything on fire, and I mean everything, and embers constantly raining down.
I remember it well. I was at the Essendon baths and everything went dark. Lol...did I see Renee King playing for Collingwood.? He played for Essendon in 1983.....hhmmm
You're right, but he transferred to Essendon mid-season. Played 8 games at Collingwood before the move. afltables.com/afl/stats/players/R/Rene_Kink.html#19830
@@nunziorose1749 I think it was pretty common back then. If I remember correctly, Collingwood sent Leigh Carlson to Fitzroy for Warwick Irwin in the middle of the '81 season. Different times.
@@hamishphistopholoes6540 definitely different times. Maybe they should allow it to happen now. Imagine that.....so in 1983 kink went to Essendon and played in a grandfinal. Lol
I remember the day - I had to unload a semi with a forklift in Dandenong. Ended up putting on a balaclava and oxy-welding goggles with the tinted lenses flipped up to stop the windswept dust getting in my eyes and mouth. Later that evening (or the one after), we small twigs and smouldering leaves falling from the sky that were carried by winds from fires in the Danendongs. It was pretty surreal.
I was driving through the city when the dust storm hit. By the time I got home it the car was covered in red dust. I didn't know it at the time but my car's air filter got completely blocked which buggered up the whole cooling system and within a couple of days the water pump was pushing the fan into the radiator too. It was completely stuffed.
I was in HSC when this happened..... the sky went black when the dust storm hit and burnt leaves dropped from the sky after the bushfires and Melbourne was covered in smoke.
I had just left yr 7 and waiting at the train station (which was elevated) and could see the dust storm coming in, we were kinda scared because some idiot said a nuclear bomb must of gone off... anyways I hopped on the train and half way home (to Richmond) the dust storm hit and we could see outside all the dirt etc.... quie scary
SO, we are talking about 2 distinct events are we?The Arvo of the dust cloud, where I nicked off early, to go to the baths. I couldn't go in & pay for a ticket, as baths were being closed. I drove back home with zero viz, with no sign of arvo hours , with all sreetlights on. All cars head lights on, and could not see each other trying to redrive back home, despite that ALL headlines were on Next Ash Wednesday: I was studying dressmaking at CAE,could ONLY smell smoke coming through thr air-con.Got outside, in the city, not knowing what what was going on; did not know if Melb.city was burning Could hardly detect the faint full moon through the smoke, AND being stuck in the city. For the time in my life, I felt distant from my family.
It's been forty years since that dreadful event being the ash Wednesday bushfires. For many its like it was yesterday and the pain and suffering of losing loved ones is still ever so raw. That dust storm that swept Melbourne was terrible. I've seen many photos of that. Around that same time a big dust storm swept through central West NSW. I saw a photo of that dust storm as it was raging near the town of Condobolin. I don't think it was as bad as the dust storm that swept Melbourne. Dunno which direction that storm blew in from but I'm sure someone knows more about it than I do as it was before my time.
Back when we didn't blame everything on climate change. I remember being sent home early from school because of the dust storm and being caught in it. I remember the fire's and smoke as I lived on the east side of Melbourne in Vermont South. The weather conditions for the 2021 fires in N.S.W I read in a scientific study were exactly the same as the Ash Wednesday Fires.
I remember i was 15 at the time and at school. We all saw the red dust cloud through the windows and being kids we were absolutely amazed. The teacher closed the curtains. I dont know why but i think that was a huge mistake on her part.
It was a hot February day and I was in Grade 6 having a swimming lesson in the local Baths. Everything went dark outside that I could see from the pool, and they had to turn the pool indoor lights on. The teachers told us to stay inside and they seemed panicked. With the fear of The Day After Nuclear War movie, I thought we had been nuked. Afterwards everything was covered in an orange dust, it was a really strange day.
1:49 ironic that Brian Naylor reporting on the 83 Ash Wednesday fires would himself die at his home in Kinglake in the much more deadly 2009 Black Saturday bushfires
@@georgebronte840 wow that’s unbelievable. We have them over here in America 🇺🇸. But mostly out west in California New Mexico or Arizona. Not my state of Pennsylvania.
1983 Melbourne Dust Storm, Ash Wednesday Bush Fire, ending with the photos I took with a Canon SLR camera from the 1983 Bush Fire Appeal game The Sun All-Stars Vs Carlton and Collingwood Vs Footscray at VFL Park which was 39 years ago today.
I was only 15 years old and didn’t have the foggiest how to use a SLR camera, so happy a few came out sharply.👍
Cheers Gezza1967 (RUclips channel)
Click link to view each photo properly on the VFL AFL 20th century footy page.
facebook.com/1552983461627202/posts/2531639697094902/
Wow that had to be terrible all that dust. I bet it to a lot of cleaning up.
@@danrobinson572 It's interesting that you mention the clean up because I walked through it in the city and could barely see a few meters ahead, then the view from the 13th floor office was totally blocked out but strangely I didn't notice much in the way of deposited dust afterwards - maybe I'm wrong??? One of the eerie things about it was that it didn't seem overly windy to me, just a large mass of dust moving on through.
@@Ash1959 okay 👍
Thanks for the trip down memory lane, I am a year older than you and lived in Vermont South.
Life was so different them 😊
Thanks for compiling this and uploading it.
The pics you took at the games were amazing also.
As much as I loathe Carlton FC with a passion (being a proud Pies supporter 😜 ) I applaud the Carlton FC, the All-Stars team, the Collingwood FC and Footscray FC for putting those games on to try and raise money for the bushfire victims.
Great choice of song for this video, too, btw.
I remember that day as though it was only yesterday. I was at school in Melbourne, in the library, and we had to run around and close all the windows to keep the dust out.
That night I was standing in my front yard looking up the billowing smoke from the bushfires. I'll never forget feeling one drop of rain on my cheek. Just one.
A day anyone over a certain age will never forget.
Rest in peace all those who perished on that terrible day.
I remember very well that Dust storm in Melbourne, 40 years to exactly this day February the 8th, I was a manager for a rental company and the Doncaster shopping centres Air conditioning system stopped working and the centre management hired every single one of our portable air conditioners for all the retail shops and I re member filling up one of our Holden one tonners choc a block full of them and delivering them there and when I was there you could get a magnificent view of the city and then I had a panoramic view of the encroaching dust storm about to hit Melbourne, what a spectacle that was!
Spooky to think Brian Naylor would himself perish in the Black Saturday fires.
I am in this video! 50 seconds in... 20 yo policeman wiping dust from my eyes. I remember the day as if was yesterday. I was directing traffic at the corner of Flinders St and Swanston Streets when the sky went BLACK. No one knew what was going on. I had MANY people ask me if this was the end of the world - like I would know :) Anyway, it was a memorable, freaky experience....thanks for posting
Cheers for your memories Peter👍
Thank you for your service Peter ❤
Wonderful
@@Gezza1967I Heard That 7 News Even Made A Story
Shout out to Peter!
I arrived from New Zealand to Melbourne only a few weeks before , I had not long turned 20 . I can remember thinking wtf is this place about ? It’s so hot the place is on fire . Think I’ll be heading back to Nz .
Well I’m still here 40 plus years later , with Aussie kids and grandkids now .
I remember this day so well, the dust storm, the sky turned orange, it was so hot too.
My god I remember standing in Fisherman’s Bend and watching this come through. It was like nothing I have ever seen before or since , that cloud of dirt was just breathtaking.
I can remember being in the bosses office in Northcote and asking what was on the distant horizon. An old bloke in the next office heard what I had said and remarked about it looking similar to the big dust storm in, I think 1939. We stood there and watched the dust envelop the city and then where we were. Then to wake up the following week and hear on the radio about all the communities that had been wiped out by the fire. I had only been in Australia for 18 months so compared with the UK this was unbelievable. Been here 40 years now and loved almost every minute of it!
Poignant watching Brian Naylor reporting on bushfire deaths.
2009 he and his wife died at their Kinglake property in a bushfire 😢
Was thinking that too
Eerie
@@TheCleaner76
And their son, Matthew, was also killed in a plane crash about 8 months earlier.
Terrible tragedies for their whole family. 😢
Another good video. I remember the dust storm while working in South Melbourne. Kind of surreal seeing Brian Naylor reporting on the fires of 1983 considering he died during the Black Saturday fires in 2009.
Yes, that was the first thing I thought of too. He and his wife Moiree lived in Kinglake West. RIP
@@ayrsen123 Remember Brian Naylor And his wife being found, both gone, sitting together, holding each others' hand.
@@MMM-dq9jj14up Yes it was extremely sad. We had a guy here in Marysville that sat on his porch and refused point blank to leave, saying that he'd seen fires come and go and this was no different. His elderly wife didn't drive. The car was packed and ready to go but he wouldn't drive it. She was found running down the hill and bundled into a neighbours car and survived. He was found just next to the porch. Crazy day that day. :(
@@ayrsen123 never underestimate a fire. Unfortunately far too many, even in this country and with all the previous evidence, often men, let ego and pride get in the way of rational decisions. Refusing to leave something that can be rebuilt over something, their lives, that can’t be revived.
@@andyrob3259 Very true. Some of the stories I heard after were that day were just crazy. I knew that guy on the porch. I couldn't believe he would do that considering the predicament it left his wife in. Fire will do weird stuff too, you just never know.
At the time of the dust storm I lived in far NW Tasmania.. we got some dirty rain that covered any cars left outside with a brownish red coating of silt...
OMG! I was almost 10 yo when all of this happened. The difference between memory of certain events and archival footage that shows those same events happening is both stark and remarkable.
It was recess at primary school when we saw the smoke and the sky went black ...
I was at Caulfield station waiting for the tram when it hit. I still remember the colour of the sun .
I remember when that red dust came down from the Vic mallee region. It was around 3.30pm I was standing on Glenferrie train station waiting for my Spencer street red rattler to take me to Burnley.
The dust wafted over the platform.
I was 15 yo and never seen anything like that before.
More gold from Gezza.
How could you forget that day of the dust storm if you lived through it.
I was in South Melbourne working as a labourer and we heard something on the radio about it and looked up. Holy smokes!!
In it rolled. After the main wall of dust rolled through I was swimming at South Melbourne Beach - it was hot that day - and , in the water, was burned by falling gum leaves.
I'll never forget that.
That drought in 1983 ripped right across the country and was as bad as I can remember.
Even in the mountains things were dry. Calicivirus had not taken hold in rabbit populations and I saw "moving paddocks" of rabbits near Eucumbene in the summer .
It was a hot summer, I am pretty sure we had water rationing around then as well. The factory I worked in we had 7, 50 foot long ovens that were used to dry the ink on the tin plate we had printed. I remember the bosses coming around with trays of gatorade and giving us cups while we were cooking in our combination overalls.Common sense prevailed and we all got sent home that day about 11am I reckon. Being kids we were off to the local pool.
Ash Wednesday, 180 fires across SA and Vic! Listening to that reporter watching and describing his home burn down in the Adelaide hills will never be forgotten.
This day I was 16 years old and was walking up a narrow street behind Swinburne Tech after class heading east toward home when I turned around and literally saw that cloud of dust coming toward me... In my life I’ve see Ash Wednesday and Black Saturday in 09. My Grandfather fought the 39 fires. This happens in Australia, it’s just the way it is especially in Victoria where it can be moist for a long time, but then drought hits and it happens.
Funnily I was at year 10 at Swinburne then.
I was 15. My class was 10E1.
I got to Glenferrie station at 3.33pm and while standing on the platform that red/orange dust cloud wafted over me.
Luckily my red rattler to Spencer street came soon after.
So you would have been in Year 11?
I wonder if you remember Donna French or Stuart Denovan?
I remember this day. We couldn't go home from school.
I did early morning shift that day and took a rest when I got home , slept through the whole bloody thing !!
Lol
I remember Mum telling me about Ash Wednesday when I was very young in the 90s it was the day after she moved over here in 83 from Ireland
Boy, do I remember that day. I was working at the Wentworth Hotel and in an American guests room when he asked, whilst looking out of a 45th floor window, " young man is this normal?" I followed his gaze to see a tidal wave of red dust swallowing the city. Later, in the pub ( The Arcade Hotel on Lt Collins Street) after work, news started filtering in about insane bush fires in the Dandenongs and all across south east Australia start getting out of control. By morning it was mayhem. RIP the country fire guys killed at Cockatoo that day.
I remember that day very well as it was the day I turned 21, my birth date is 08/02/1962
Happy birthday
I was a young guy working at Leader Newspapers office in Doncaster Shoppingtown and stood in the car park (seemed about 3.00pm), where you could see half of Melbourne looking west, and watched as the black cloud that stretched completely across the horizon, rolled eastward towards where I was situated (I had plenty of time to get inside, so just stood and marvelled at something I'd never seen before for probably around 15 minutes) It really was a surreal experience.
Yes. I got to Glenferrie station at 3.33pm and as I stood on the platform it wafted over. Red/orange colour. Then got home to watch Skippy on Ch 9 is when we saw all the fires unfolding.
Face masks would’ve been handy that day.
I remember it well !!!
Like others remember it well. Was driving home from visiting mum with my one yr old in car. Could see it in the distance getting closer. Got home before it totally engulfed. It was terrifying seeing it get closer and driving.
I remember the dust storm and I was walking home from school on that day and it was just unbelievable at 3.30pm. Came home with red eyes like a tomato with the dust.
Yes same here. I was 15 in year 10 at Swinburne Tech. Reddy orange coloured dust, real thick too.
A great summary of a surreal time.
I was working in a ground floor office in Collins Street when day turned to night.
My girlfriend (now wife) was working as a nurse at the Repat Hospital in Heidelberg, and watched the dust-cloud swallow the city.
You could taste it in the air-con for days.
Brian Naylor the news reporter in this story died is a bush fire himself in 2009 at his Kinglake property
I remember this day very well with the dust storm.
I also remember the bush fires,the hospital in Ferntree Gully my uncle and other patients were part of this story. Smoke caught many with respiratory problems.
Amazing, remarkable footage. A timeless record of that tragic day and those weeks. I was at Primary school in grade 4 and still vividly remember it to this day, choking on the dust storm at recess and lunch, wondering why our teachers had insisted we go outside. Great stuff!
What school. ???
Remember this day well and fighting the fires in the Otways.. The few days leading up to Ash Wednesday were stifling conditions
Rest in peace Murray Nichol. Rest in peace Brian Naylor.
I remember riding my ducati through Ringwood and the bushfire smoke was unbelievable. those poor volunteers caught in the fires at Beaconsfield was heartbreaking RIP
I was at the bushfire appeal match. Wow. Almost 40 years ago.
Remember the Dust Storm. Was around 16 yo. Was doing a summer temp school holiday job with Telecom (got via my dad) and we were driving in a van along Beaconsfield Parade heading to the CBD and saw it coming across the bay and then hit us.
Was working in the city the day of the dust storm, crossing Collins St saw it rolling in from the west, back to work and up to the roof of the the Sportsgirl building with a workmate to watch it, new one of those firefighters that lost his life on that sad Ash Wednesday
Never forget these two savage acts of nature as a Victorian..and then Black Saturday tore the heart out of the community. Thanks Gezza for sharing some sad bit eventful history with us again.
What important footage and presentation of this tragedy. Thanks.
Nobody mentions just how hot it was on Ash Wednesday and the previous week when the big storm came. 43 -44 from memory, just hell. RIP the good people who lost their lives that terrible Wednesday.
Remember it well was working at crittendens ssw ashwood and we all went out the front and got covered in dust
brilliantly captured Gezza,you've a gift
the 82 drought wasnt the longest but it was the most savage ive experienced.
Yeah I guess your right because I remember in year 9 at Swinburne Tech in 82 we went to the camp up at Bonnie Doon and I do remember how dry and parched the countryside was around Yea, Mansfield, Lake Eildon so in early 83 I guess it was perfect for fires.
40 years on and its the opposite.
My dad and uncle were at the beach that day.
Peoples memories are not always correct, it gets confused with time. The dust storm was in early February and the Ash Wednesday fires were on the 16th February. It was impossible to be swimming at South Melbourne beach on the afternoon of the dust storm, and be burnt by falling gum leaves as someone has commented.
Yes mate you are right it came from SA or the west. The fires were just over a week later. It was a very hot summer and we always get the weather from SA, I think at the time they had some bushfires they were dealing with but nothing compared to the carnage set to befall the Dandenongs a week later.
Yes, I remember the dust storm more vaguely but Ash Wednesday much more readily. So do not know the time difference but knew it in the same summer.
My main memories about Ash Wednesday was my classroom windows at school in Yarra Valley were all smashed in so I remember being off school for about a week and remember the radio updates as bushfires too close to our town to not be on standby to leave. But I remember that lasted for days. Never needed to leave but fires within a few kilometres of our house. I also remember some holiday time we had stayed in Lorne in something called the Cumberland. I think it was lost in fires in that town so many different parts of state had fires and so did South Australia. I was only a kid at time but for some reason it was worst disaster I remember but it was not just for one day. The worst of it was Ash Wednesday but there were fires around for many days.
As an adult 25 years later it seemed like should have learned better lessons but sadly too many lives lost.
I remember being sent home from work and a few of us going to the Preston baths for a swim. I was only an 18 year old kid and had no real idea of the horrors going on in the bush and was just happy to get a half day off work. The dust storm was so eerie and the smell of burning, I can still sort of remember it even today.
My mum taught me to swim in the diving pool at Preston bars. Now a car park, when passing always say thanks Mum.
@@perpetualgrin5804 Became a Tafe College I think, probably the carpark of the Tafe. I was more an Ivanhoe Baths boy living in Heidelberg, my mates from work were from Preston.
Awesome video Gezza! I remember this all so clearly! And how sad! Just like black Saturday! It should all never be forgotten!❤️✊👍🙏☝️✌️😳👌🙏🙏
I was there in 1983 and 2009 and recall where I was in Melbourne. I asked myself "What the hell didn't the Government learn from 1983??" - clearly nothing - Fools!! RIP to those that matter.
R.I.P. to all the victims.
My Dad said at his workplace , when the men saw the dust storm approaching they feared for their lives , and looked for places to hide .
Some were making the sign of the cross on their chest , as they didn't know what was coming towards them
We barely escaped with our lives. Directed by a misinformed police officer to just drive through a short wall of smoke and it would be fine. Drove through 1.5km of fire front. It was hard to explain to others what it was like, until I saw recent footage of bushfires taken by people and fire fighters as they were caught in its fire front. A surreal sea of red surrounding you, with everything on fire, and I mean everything, and embers constantly raining down.
Mt Macedon was never the same, all those pine trees gone.
I remember it well. I was at the Essendon baths and everything went dark. Lol...did I see Renee King playing for Collingwood.? He played for Essendon in 1983.....hhmmm
You're right, but he transferred to Essendon mid-season. Played 8 games at Collingwood before the move.
afltables.com/afl/stats/players/R/Rene_Kink.html#19830
@@hamishphistopholoes6540 oh ok great info. Didn't know you could change teams mid season. Lol....
@@nunziorose1749 I think it was pretty common back then. If I remember correctly, Collingwood sent Leigh Carlson to Fitzroy for Warwick Irwin in the middle of the '81 season. Different times.
@@hamishphistopholoes6540 definitely different times. Maybe they should allow it to happen now. Imagine that.....so in 1983 kink went to Essendon and played in a grandfinal. Lol
I remember the day - I had to unload a semi with a forklift in Dandenong. Ended up putting on a balaclava and oxy-welding goggles with the tinted lenses flipped up to stop the windswept dust getting in my eyes and mouth.
Later that evening (or the one after), we small twigs and smouldering leaves falling from the sky that were carried by winds from fires in the Danendongs.
It was pretty surreal.
Was in the city somewhere and ducked into a pub to get away from the smoke. It was awful
Had to wash down the dust with few coldies courtesy of the Old London Hotel. Its gone like the wind too.
where was that pub?
@@presidentxijinpingspoxdoct9756 cnr. Elizabeth & Collins
Tragically, Brian Naylor perished in a bushfire in 09.
Lol Cameron no he didnt ... Ha ha ha ... He lives across the road from me
@@COLEY72 Brian Naylor?? He definitely passed away in 09.
@@hamishphistopholoes6540 lol I'm just playin 😉
@@COLEY72 Well I'm sure there would be more than one Brian Naylor.
@@cameronwhyte7223 hmmm🤔😉
I was driving through the city when the dust storm hit. By the time I got home it the car was covered in red dust. I didn't know it at the time but my car's air filter got completely blocked which buggered up the whole cooling system and within a couple of days the water pump was pushing the fan into the radiator too. It was completely stuffed.
I was in HSC when this happened..... the sky went black when the dust storm hit and burnt leaves dropped from the sky after the bushfires and Melbourne was covered in smoke.
Huge upload cheers Gez
Channel 7 just uploaded their original 1983 news report of the dust storm today which would be exactly 40 years after the story originally aired.
Nine did that too. I was going to comment, but you saved me
Nine had some hilarious old guy interviewed in the street about the dust.
I had just left yr 7 and waiting at the train station (which was elevated) and could see the dust storm coming in, we were kinda scared because some idiot said a nuclear bomb must of gone off... anyways I hopped on the train and half way home (to Richmond) the dust storm hit and we could see outside all the dirt etc.... quie scary
Left where?
SO, we are talking about 2 distinct events are we?The Arvo of the dust cloud, where I nicked off early, to go to the baths. I couldn't go in & pay for a ticket, as baths were being closed. I drove back home with zero viz, with no sign of arvo hours , with all sreetlights on. All cars head lights on, and could not see each other trying to redrive back home, despite that ALL headlines were on
Next Ash Wednesday: I was studying dressmaking at CAE,could ONLY smell smoke coming through thr air-con.Got outside, in the city, not knowing what what was going on; did not know if Melb.city was burning Could hardly detect the faint full moon through the smoke, AND being stuck in the city.
For the time in my life, I felt distant from my family.
I remember a dust storm in 2003. Media made comparisons, but it was not as bad.
It's been forty years since that dreadful event being the ash Wednesday bushfires. For many its like it was yesterday and the pain and suffering of losing loved ones is still ever so raw. That dust storm that swept Melbourne was terrible. I've seen many photos of that. Around that same time a big dust storm swept through central West NSW. I saw a photo of that dust storm as it was raging near the town of Condobolin. I don't think it was as bad as the dust storm that swept Melbourne. Dunno which direction that storm blew in from but I'm sure someone knows more about it than I do as it was before my time.
Sitting in the dentist chair when the dust storm turned day into night Bentleigh. Melbourne
Great videos Gezz !
Great shots of the Collingwood players caught scragging their opponents Gezza.. ;)
Remember that day well spent the day at the studley park hotel abbotsford
Is that the same pub as the now park hotel on Nicholson st mate?
@@dalediamond no was on the corner clarke and studley park road abbotsford just before the Yarra River
@@trevorwendt7520 that place has changed hands so many times now. its like it cant find an identity
Your 100pc correct name changing and tries at reinventing at 1 stage Peter daicos had it for a short time
@@trevorwendt7520 Ahh Yes,its not a pub no more...had a bit of a history did it? DD
Back when we didn't blame everything on climate change.
I remember being sent home early from school because of the dust storm and being caught in it.
I remember the fire's and smoke as I lived on the east side of Melbourne in Vermont South.
The weather conditions for the 2021 fires in N.S.W I read in a scientific study were exactly the same as the Ash Wednesday Fires.
I remember i was 15 at the time and at school. We all saw the red dust cloud through the windows and being kids we were absolutely amazed. The teacher closed the curtains. I dont know why but i think that was a huge mistake on her part.
Maybe she thought the dust storm might break the windows? It was such an unusual occurrence that she could have thought anything.
16th of Feb 83' I turned 1
I was 2 months off turning one. Just had my 40th two weeks ago.
@@sp19822 wow Happy Birthday to us 🎁
Very sad day
It was a hot February day and I was in Grade 6 having a swimming lesson in the local Baths.
Everything went dark outside that I could see from the pool,
and they had to turn the pool indoor lights on.
The teachers told us to stay inside and they seemed panicked.
With the fear of The Day After Nuclear War movie,
I thought we had been nuked.
Afterwards everything was covered in an orange dust,
it was a really strange day.
40 years ago today
I just checked 16/2/1983 en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ash_Wednesday_bushfires
@@Gezza1967 I was referring to the dust storm
@@NorthsideHawk cheers, I was just watching channel 7 news and they mentioned the dust storm and immediately thought of your comment!! 🤗👍
@@Gezza1967 I had to remind myself of this by going on youtube and found this video and had to comment
1:49 ironic that Brian Naylor reporting on the 83 Ash Wednesday fires would himself die at his home in Kinglake in the much more deadly 2009 Black Saturday bushfires
👍
Ironically he didn't make it,but then in 1983 "Brian told us!"
Would rather then in Melbourne than with Dictator Andrews now.
grown ups were in charge in the 80s
@@presidentxijinpingspoxdoct9756 Yeah more empathy back then.
Then it all went back to normal.
I bet it took weeks to clean up after something like that.
Years
@@georgebronte840 wow that’s unbelievable. We have them over here in America 🇺🇸. But mostly out west in California New Mexico or Arizona. Not my state of Pennsylvania.
Seven News on the dust storm 40 years tonight :
ruclips.net/video/wK2pnuZQ1PU/видео.html
Nine might put one up later with a great old guy interviewed.
Was this audio clip used for a funeral lol