Some more info on the Yarra Valley Tourist Railway from its President.

The disaster so far...

We have lost 5 of the 6 bridges including the heritage listed Yarra River Bridge from almost 
the start of the straight as Gas Works curve which is where the road veers away from the 
railway, right through to the Melba Hwy including the station yard has been destroyed by fire. 
Yarra Glen Station building survived by YVTR member Burnie Bragg who has lived at the 
station since it was last set on fire in 1998, fought the fire and embers away from the building 
until the CFA arrived to put out the hot spots including to the trolley shed at the Down end of 
the yard. All of our shed our Bridge Gang shed know affectionately as the "Snake Pit" for very 
good reasons, has been levelled and a majority of our serviceable sleepers and timbers are 
gone in the yard. The pictures attached speak for themselves and brought a lot of us to tears 
when we first viewed the damage in full.

We were then stuck by a second fire front at Tarrawarra which appears to have come over the 
hill from where the Tarrawarra Hilton is to be built. We lost bridges 20 & 21 on the flat at the 
33 1/2 MP on the railway. This fire took out all our track between Lubra Bend 32 1/2 MP to 
just short of the last curve into Tarrawarra. All up we lost 7 bridges on our line and around three 
mile of track so far.

Tonight Healesville has a fire that has been burning all day and has escalated into a major 
problem with residents being evacuated from the North and Northwest of the township. We 
are in attendance 24hrs at the moment at the Healesville station in case the worst happens 
tonight. With a good fire system at Healesville Station to protect the buildings and rollingstock 
as you can imagine we will fight like hell to protect. This is the one that could wipe us of the 
map if it turns which at present is unlikely at this moment, but we are ready for it if it does.

Some of our members have lost their homes and tonight's fire flare up seems to have claimed 
our longstanding life member Arthur Payne who was our original crusader for the Lilydale 
Healesville Railway and has a priceless collection of railway film and pictures which is 
simply irreplaceable as he is to us. We are praying he got out but knowing how stubborn 
he is we are concerned as you can imagine. You can see the pain everywhere and it is just 
the worse feeling around here which is hard to put in words. The media have really failed to 
capture the death and damage here in the Yarra Valley which in two places has destroyed 
the railway.

As far as anything the ATR can do I just don't have any idea yet. The YVTRS has prided itself 
on being a community player helping out others in our area with all sorts of things such as 
bbq's in vineyards to supporting in many ways events such as Carols by Candlelight etc and 
are always at the ready to raise money for other charities so it feels strange being in this position. 

The Yarra Valley Railway is now closed until further notice and will reopen in a few weeks with 
a mammoth task in front if it but we will be just that little more determined than ever to make 
our railway happen. The feeling within is positive and the work in the clean up just to make 
everything safe again going to take some major effort but we make it happen with the YVTR 
having a large supporter base in the wider community we will kick goals quickly as we do. 
Talking to most of our neighbours over the last few days has been an experience with most 
suffering losses in one way or another but in general the feeling of mateship is certainly evident.

In the meantime your thoughts and wishes are very much appreciated and although the next 
few weeks will be hard for us we will save all that we can. If you can convey this message 
to the ATR members to prevent any mistruths getting out in our sector. As a member of 25 years 
and a person who has fought so hard to protect these bridges all this time only to watch them 
burn to the ground in hours it was as you can see in the pictures one of the saddest moments 
in my life.

Steve Huntley
President