The New South Wales Rural Fire Service (NSW RFS) is a volunteer-based firefighting agency and statutory body of the NSW Government. The NSW RFS is responsible for the general administration of rural fire management affairs including administration of the Rural Fire Fighting Fund, co-ordination with local government of the State's Rural Fire Brigades, design and provision of fire fighting equipment to rural fire brigades through local government, the training of volunteer Rural Fire Brigade members, community education in relation to fire affairs, emergency planning and generally taking measures for the prevention of loss and life and property from fires. The NSW RFS is responsible to the NSW Minister for Police and Emergency Services, currently Mike Gallacher.
The NSW Rural Fire Service's jurisdiction covers more than 90% of the geographical area of the state of New South Wales in Australia. The NSW RFS claims to be the world's largest volunteer fire service, with 70,448 volunteer firefighters forming 2039 volunteer brigades across the state, although this figure includes many inactive volunteer members. The service also employs 920 paid staff who fulfill the senior operational management and administrative roles of the service (current January 2009).
Read more about New South Wales Rural Fire Service: History, Structure, Brigades of The NSW RFS
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“There are two places in the world where men can most effectively disappear—the city of London and the South Seas.”
—Herman Melville (1819–1891)
“I just come and talk to the plants, really—very important to talk to them, they respond I find.”
—Charles, Prince Of Wales (b. 1948)
“We realize that we are laggards from the past century, still living in what Marx kindly calls ‘the idiocy of rural life,’ and we know that our rural life is like that of the past, not like that of much of the present.”
—For the State of Vermont, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)
“So much of left-wing thought is a kind of playing with fire by people who don’t even know that fire is hot.”
—George Orwell (1903–1950)
“Let the good service of well-deservers be never rewarded with loss. Let their thanks be such as may encourage more strivers for the like.”
—Elizabeth I (1533–1603)