Hobsons Bay Crime Investigation Unit detectives are investigating a large grassfire at a wetlands reserve in Altona on Wednesday morning (Jan. 29).<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Emergency services were called to reports of a fire at the reserve near Bell Avenue about 2am.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Several hectares of grassland were burnt and the fire took over two hours to be deemed under control.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
No one was injured.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Investigators are working to establish the exact circumstances surrounding the blaze, which is being treated as suspicious.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Detectives will also investigate whether this incident is linked to a grassfire in the area on January 26 about 3.15pm.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Police will investigate and take action to catch those responsible when a fire is deemed suspicious, whether it was a deliberate or reckless action.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Anyone found guilty of recklessly or intentionally causing a bushfire faces a penalty of up to 15 years imprisonment.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Lighting a fire on a total fire ban day can attract a fine of up to $46,000 or up to two years in jail.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
The community also plays an incredibly important role in the prevention of bushfires and remains key in reporting reckless or suspicious behaviour.<\/p>\n\n\n\n
Police are keen to speak to anyone who witnesses concerning behaviour in relation to fires, or anyone who has been told about this behaviour taking place.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Hobsons Bay Crime Investigation Unit detectives are investigating a large grassfire at a wetlands reserve in Altona on Wednesday morning (Jan. 29). Emergency services were called to reports of a fire at the reserve near Bell Avenue about 2am. Several hectares of grassland were burnt and the fire took over two hours to be deemed…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":72,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_siteseo_robots_primary_cat":"none","pagelayer_contact_templates":[],"_pagelayer_content":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1421","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-police-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1421","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1421"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1421\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1422,"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1421\/revisions\/1422"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/72"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1421"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1421"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/dindi.com.au\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1421"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}