Fire Racing — A Tribute to the Firies
Updated: Sep 14
A long, long time ago, in 1986, I served in the United States Navy as a Damage Control Officer. At times, damage control meant becoming the ship’s firefighters when a fire broke out aboard. At sea there is no safe pavement to retreat to and no second building to move into. You beat the fire, because otherwise you may be swimming home—and that might be a very long, very unpleasant swim.
That experience left me with permanent respect for firefighters. Firies do not wait until the flames reach their own homes. They answer when it is somebody else’s home, business, paddock or town. They put on the gear, climb aboard an appliance and head toward an emergency whose size and shape they may not yet understand.
Here in Geelong, Humans in Geelong once told the story of a firie named Darrel. He had also moved from America, and in 2000 he joined Highton CFA as a volunteer as a way to give back to his new Australian community. He later became a professional firefighter and served across Belmont, Geelong City and Corio.
Darrel’s work grew far beyond putting water on flames. It included preparing crews for structural fires, wildfires, hazardous-material incidents, motor-vehicle rescues and emergency medical responses. What stays with me is his reason for doing it: helping people when they are at their most vulnerable. That is the quiet promise behind every call answered by a firie.
The 2019–20 Black Summer showed Australia the scale of that promise. Victoria endured an exhausting 90-day fire response. More than 1.5 million hectares burned, more than 400 homes were destroyed and five lives were lost. More than 8,200 CFA staff and volunteers responded, and some lost their own homes or livestock while they were fighting to save those belonging to other people.
The Geelong City Fire Brigade was among the brigades that battled the Black Summer fires. I made the original artwork behind this tribute during those 2020 fires. Its burning sky, dark water and lone firie came from thinking about what it means to walk toward something that everybody else needs to escape.
The song begins with the optimism and confidence of crews answering the call. The radio reports grow shorter, stranger and more frightening as the scale of the fire becomes clear. Then the song reaches the truth every station and every family fears: every engine may return, but not every firie comes home.
Fire Racing — Lyrics
[Intro music]
[Wurlitzer and Hammond rise over an engine-like drum pulse. Electric guitars enter as the arrangement accelerates into a confident road-driving groove.]
[Verse]
The station doors roll open (morning waiting pale and wide)
Boots hit steel and radios crackle (every firie climbs inside)
Red light spills across the houses (where the waking magpies call)
We don’t know the shape that’s waiting (we just answer when they call)
[Interlude — clipped radio transmission]
Control to all appliances—fire has crossed the highway.
Flame front is now wider than the township.
[Verse]
Dispatch says, “All-engine event” (every tanker, every crew)
Someone asks if that’s a mistake (no one here has heard it through)
Then a voice comes calm and steady (copy that, we’re on our way)
And the sirens pull the sunrise (through the edges of the day)
[Interlude — urgent radio transmission]
All stations respond. Repeat—all stations.
This is now an all-engine event.
[Chorus]
Fire racing down the highway (red and silver, side by side)
Every engine in the district (rolling hard into the light)
We don’t know what waits beyond it (we know who is on the ride)
When the whole town calls the firies (we go racing to the fire)
All-engine event is calling (every station, every name)
No one knows what we’ll be facing (still we answer all the same)
Trust the hands that work beside you (trust the heart beneath the gear)
We are heading toward the danger (so the town can wake without fear)
[Instrumental]
[Electric guitars and Hammond trade urgent phrases while the toms mimic engines changing gears. Low brass carries the all-engine motif beneath the rising arrangement.]
[Interlude — radio breaking through the music]
Warning to incoming crews—visibility is zero.
Structures are igniting ahead of the fire front.
[Verse]
At the turn the sky is different (black has swallowed up the blue)
Flame is running through the treetops (faster than the engines knew)
Crews divide without a question (hoses rise and radios ring)
Water arcs against the weather (every second changing things)
[Verse]
Someone finds a frightened family (someone clears a narrow lane)
Someone holds the eastern firebreak (someone drives into the rain)
Every order finds an answer (every mate becomes a wall)
And the all-engine event keeps growing (bigger than the first alarm)
[Chorus — bigger, with layered adult crew harmonies]
Fire racing down the highway (red and silver, side by side)
Every engine in the district (rolling hard into the light)
We don’t know what waits beyond it (we know who is on the ride)
When the whole town calls the firies (we go racing to the fire)
All-engine event is calling (every station, every name)
No one knows what we’ll be facing (still we answer all the same)
Trust the hands that work beside you (trust the heart beneath the gear)
We are heading toward the danger (so the town can wake without fear)
[Interlude — emergency radio call]
Emergency traffic only—roof collapse.
Two crews have stopped transmitting.
[Bridge — sung over a half-time drop]
The wind turns.
The roof falls.
The fireground disappears.
One voice breaks through the static.
Then another answers clear.
No one leaves a mate behind.
No one lets the line give way.
So the engines keep on fighting
As the smoke consumes the day.
[Interlude — broken radio call]
Mayday received.
Location unclear.
Signal lost.
[Verse — retimed with shorter lines and half-time weight]
Through the heat they keep advancing (step by step and line by line)
Every breath becomes a promise (hold the ground and buy the time)
Through the smoke they find the missing (through the dark they guide them clear)
Every frightened face behind them (means another reason here)
[Interlude — quiet radio transmission]
Control, commence emergency roll call.
One appliance has not reported clear.
[Verse — retimed as daylight reaches the fireground]
Daylight finds the blackened paddocks (steam is lifting from the ground)
Helmets lean against the tankers (no one makes a victory sound)
Names are called across the silence (each reply is low and clear)
One last call hangs in the smoke (with no answering voice to hear)
[Chorus — slower, with brass withdrawn and harmonies breaking]
Fire racing down the highway (red and silver, side by side)
Every engine in the district (rolling hard into the light)
We don’t know what waits beyond it (we know who is on the ride)
When the whole town calls the firies (we go racing to the fire)
All-engine event is calling (every station, every name)
No one knows what we’ll be facing (still we answer all the same)
Trust the hands that work beside you (trust the heart beneath the gear)
We are heading toward the danger (so the town can wake without fear)
[Outro]
The road that carried hope this morning (leads them through the smoke again)
Every window waits in silence (every family counts the men)
We will speak their names with honour (we will carry what they gave)
Every town will know their courage (every life they fought to save)
The station doors stand open (beneath a cold and fading dome)
Every engine finds the station (not all the men come home)
[The Wurlitzer holds the final chord alone. A low Hammond note enters beneath it, then both fade into silence.]
[End]
For Every Firie Who Answers
I hope we never see this type of event again. To every career and volunteer firie who trains, responds, protects, rescues, stays behind and comes home carrying things the rest of us never had to see: thank you.
Coming Soon
A powerful tribute to people who run toward danger when everyone else is trying to get away. The connection between shipboard firefighting and local firies works really well.