Learning the lessons of wildfires past: Twizel

18 March 2025

The scenic Mackenzie basin is home to the small rural community of Twizel. Surrounded by highly flammable vegetation like tussock, and inundated with wilding pines, Twizel and its surrounding areas are vulnerable to wildfires.

In Sept 2020, a couple of trampers in the area knocked over a gas cooker, igniting a wildfire that burnt roughly 3,000 hectares of land. While no lives were lost, multiple structures were destroyed in the blaze.

The Lake Ōhau wildfire in 2021 and the Lake Pukaki blaze in 2023 were other close-to-home reminders of the township’s vulnerability.

Since the fires, the Twizel community – alongside the local fire brigade, CDEM, and the council – has done a lot to reduce the risk and the impact of future events and take ownership of their own preparedness.

The Twizel Volunteer Fire Brigade led wildfire prevention sessions with council and the community to discuss how to mitigate risk, including what people can do to protect their properties such as reducing flammable fuels around structures. Time was taken to understand who lived in the community and what an evacuation plan could look like. As a result, the Twizel community have more awareness of the risks their township faces and what they need to do to mitigate them.

Twizel’s risk reduction and readiness activities are an excellent example of what can be achieved when a community, the local brigade and supporting agencies all work together to identify risks and get prepared.

The time to plan, and act, is now. We can help you prepare, just reach out to your local brigade.