Fire destroys historic outback pub, Baralaba Hotel
Organisers of a popular country music festival have urged supporters to rally behind it after a historic pub in their town was gutted by fire. PHOTOS, VIDEO.
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Organisers of a popular country music festival have urged supporters to rally behind it after a historic pub in their town was gutted by fire.
The 95-year-old Baralaba Hotel went up in flames in the early hours of Saturday.
The historic hotel, which had recently been refurbished, was completely destroyed in the blaze which broke out about 2.30am.
The Baralaba Bash is on next week and 4000 people are expected to attend.
Baralaba Hotel licensee Jason Simmons said the event would be going ahead and that he had been planning to readjust and move everything up to the sports grounds.
“We are asking for a few extra volunteers because we are using infrastructure in the street to help where we have no infrastructure now so we need to set up a lot of extra things to run the whole weekend,” he said.
“It’s a dream to keep Baralaba going.
“It’s a small town and the whole reason behind the Baralaba Bash was to get Barlaba on the map to make sure everyone in Australia knew where it was.”
Mr Simmons hopes to rebuild the hotel, saying on Sunday he “would definitely love to go back in the exact same spot”.
“That is the heart of the community,” he said.
“I guess we would be looking at 12 to 24 months for a rebuild.
“There would be a few changes but realistically we liked the layout of how it was done before. I think it was a great country little hotel.
“We will have a talk with assessors to see about the clean-up of all the rubble and then we will have to speak to liquor licensing to see what we can do to organise a temporary hotel or can we move to another venue within town to operate something.
Mr Simmons said the support he had received had been “overwhelming ”.
“I have supported this community quite heavily,” he said.
“I love this place.
“Everyone wondered why I turned up in Baralaba 12 years ago but I have come here and made it home and really enjoyed it and everyone has got behind me to make my businesses successful.
“It has been a tough time the last 24 hours.”
He said staff would be kept on for the next couple of weeks.
“We have other businesses we can hopefully offer so they all have jobs,” he said.
“We also have offers from other people in the industry who are willing to talk to them and utilise.
“There’s plenty of jobs available for them.”
As crews continued to water down and comb through the ruins on Saturday, Moura Fire Station Captain Patrick Hollands said 13 people had been evacuated from the hotel including two children.
He described the disaster as a “huge loss” for the town which is about 150km southwest of Rockhampton.
Mr Hollands, who responded from Moura about 40-50 minutes from the scene, said four crews from across the region including Biloela and Thangool arrived to support Baralaba firefighters.
“The fire was well involved when we arrived,” he said
“All persons were accounted for and evacuated.
“(They were) very intense hot working conditions … the premises has got a lot of age about it (and) crews worked hard to extinguish the fire.
“At this point in time we have made the location secure, extinguished hot spots and put the fire out.”
Fire investigators will now determine what caused the blaze.
Smoke lingered in the air at Baralaba into Saturday afternoon as one of the shattered owners surveyed the damage alongside police.
Power outages and smoke have also affected businesses in the area.
Banana Shire Mayor Neville Ferrier said the “whole community revolves around the local pub”.
“That’s where the school raises their money, the golf club, junior rugby league, everything … everything comes out of the hotel,” Mr Ferrier said.
“It’s a meeting place for everybody, women can come and get a good cup of coffee – everybody can come and have a good feed here.
“It’s really well known, it’s a real shame.”
Mr Ferrier said the council would do everything it could to help with the Baralaba Bash on next week.
“Everybody in town will be working to get this up and going,” he said.
While the area around the pub was quiet on Saturday, Mr Ferrier said shockwaves had been felt throughout the community.
“We’ve got 150-200 kids here playing junior rugby league at the moment,” he said.
“We will survive but it’s a real kick in the guts with only next week the Baralaba Bash coming.
“I started playing footy here in 1974.
“It used to be a Carlton pub back in those days, as a lot of country pubs were.
“They only sold Carlton and most of us were XXXX drinkers of course but we had to learn to drink Carlton.”
The Baralaba Hotel was originally licensed on April 3, 1929 as Mclellan’s Hotel then changed its name to Stewart’s Hotel on February 11, 1953 before becoming the renowned Baralaba Hotel on December 2, 1965.
The establishment was recently listed for sale for sale through offers to purchase for the first time since 1981.
It was leased until January 2028 and in 2023 was declared Central Queensland’s best pub for 2023 in a poll by The Morning Bulletin.
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