Smashed: Wombat Forest activists threaten salvage logging contractor

Activists smashed up a $350,000 logging excavator and daubed it with graffiti, warning its owner has “become a target”.

Activists daubed this message on the back of Colin Robin's excavator, after smashing it up.

Anti-logging activists have smashed up a $350,000 excavator being used to help salvage 600,000 tonnes of windblown trees from the Wombat Forest, daubing it with graffiti on Monday night that warned its owner had “become a target”.

Logging contractor Colin Robin, who is one of two VicForest contractors working with Forest Fire Management Victoria to clear the fallen trees, said the activists had cut his excavator’s hydraulic hoses, fuel lines and wiring loom – causing thousands of dollars of damage.

The vandals also smashed in a window on the cab and threw in an open 20-litre drum of hydraulic fluid, before scrawling graffiti across the back of the excavator stating: “Whether it be VicForest or FFM, if you destroy our forests, you kill our koalas, and you become a target”.

A window was smashed on the excavator and an open 20-litre container of hydraulic fluid thrown into the cab.

Mr Robin said a security contractor had been employed by the Victorian Government to keep an eye on his machinery, after two previous attacks last year.

But the excavator was left behind when Mr Robin moved some of the machinery to a second site this week, creating a window for the attack.

“They knew he (the security guard) wasn’t there, because they’re using a drone,” Mr Robin said.

He said he and his workers had seen the drone during the day and the security guard reported regularly hearing one at night, which he suspected was using a thermal camera.

Wiring, hydraulic and fuel lines were cut on the excavator.

FFM Victoria has been desperately trying to clear the thousands of windblown trees in the Wombat Forest, which were bowled over by a severe storm in June 2021.

But attempts by VicForest and the traditional owners, the Dja Dja Wurrung, to clear the trees have repeatedly been stalled, first by what industry sources said was the government’s own conservation regulator and then the Wombat Forestcare group, which took Supreme Court action last September against VicForest in September last year.

But while the court case has been sent to mediation, FFMVic has gone ahead with clearing the trees under its own legislative powers to reduce fuel load and thus the fire risk to the community.