Flinders Chase cafe owner flags plan to help Kangaroo Island tourism sector rise out of the ashes
Joe Tippett says witnessing the devastation at his business, in Flinders Chase, was “gut-wrenching” – but now he’s working on plans to help rescue Kangaroo Island’s battling tourism industry.
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Returning to the fire-ravaged Flinders Chase Visitor Centre, Joe Tippett was blown away by the “lunar landscape” of devastation left in the inferno’s wake.
“I was just numb,” says Mr Tippett, who runs The Chase Cafe inside the centre at Rocky River.
“I just couldn’t believe that the fire could take so much. Walking around the building, there was just nothing, absolutely nothing, left.
“From a shop that was brimming full of stock and looked so nice, to just ash, it was heartbreaking.”
This month should have been peak season for Mr Tippett’s business, which also includes a souvenir shop popular with park visitors, including those taking on the five-day Kangaroo Island Wilderness Trail.
Instead the cafe is closed indefinitely, leaving him questioning how to make ends meet without a regular income.
He has also lost a house on Church Rd, Karatta – a stretch devastated in the blaze – which was used to accommodate staff who live on the island’s populated eastern end and travel to the west for work.
Making matters worse, he estimates he was underinsured by about $250,000 due to extra stock and equipment he built up at the business, which turns over more than $1 million a year.
Watching the visitor centre’s destruction on January 3 was a “gut-wrenching” experience.
The park and his accommodation were evacuated well before the flames hit, but back in Kingscote, Mr Tippett witnessed his business of 18 years go up in flames through security camera footage.
It showed firefighters backburning in the area before the situation became more and more dire.
“Within an instant all these leaves and debris started flying in front of the cameras and the embers were phenomenal and then the smoke – you couldn’t seen a thing,” Mr Tippett said.
“I switched the cameras and could see all the fireys running through the smoke-filled premises and then a couple of seconds later the cameras went out, so the power was cut and that was it, she was gone.”
With much of the infrastructure in the island’s west destroyed, Mr Tippett is working on plans to cater for tourists from a commercial kitchen in Kingscote, supplying picnic lunches for visitors – particularly those in tour groups.
Mr Tippett said his cafe was the island’s largest, catering for up to 180,000 customers a year.
Hanson Bay Wildlife Sanctuary and Kangaroo Island Wilderness Retreat, which also served meals, were also hit by the fires, and Mr Tippett said the island desperately needed to come up with new ways to feed the tourists being called upon to help save the region’s economy.
Seal Bay reopened last week and Mr Tippett expects Admiral’s Arch and Remarkable Rocks to follow suit within the next fortnight or so.
“Once they can get down there it’s pretty much business as usual for the tour groups so it’s a great step forward for our tourism industry,” he said.
But the visitor centre was likely to take at least two years to rebuild.
“It’s a changing environment and we’re just going to have to start changing with it.
“We’re going to have to learn lessons with this and look at locations of the new buildings, what it will be built out of and fire mitigation.”
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Mr Tippett said navigating the support available for locals had so far been tough, and welcomed news the Federal Government was providing concessional loans of up to $500,000 and grants of up to $50,0000 for businesses affected during the horror fire season.
“We’re a pretty proud bunch down here,” he said.
“We don’t like handouts, but a hand up is always helpful.
“It’s going to be a hard, long, road, but we’re pretty determined.”
A GoFundMe page has been set up to help Mr Tippett rebuild. For information, visit gofundme.com/f/flinders-chase-cafe