Fires Near Me NSW 4+
NSW Rural Fire Service
Designed for iPad
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- #177 in Utilities
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- Free
Screenshots
Description
Fires Near Me NSW is the official application of the NSW Rural Fire Service, providing information about bush and grass fires across NSW. The app shows incidents from all agencies including the NSW Rural Fire Service, Fire & Rescue NSW, National Parks & Wildlife Service, and Forestry Corporation.
Stay up to date on bush fires in NSW with the official NSW Rural Fire Service Fires Near Me application, providing warnings and incident information.
This app provides information on incidents across NSW attended by the NSW RFS and other agencies.
Staying up to date is a key step in your bush fire survival plan – so ask yourself. How fireproof is your plan? Find out at www.myfireplan.com.au
The NSW RFS recommends users of the app do not rely solely on the information provided in the app, and utilise other communications channels such as the public website (www.rfs.nsw.gov.au), the Bush Fire Information Line (1800 679 737) and local radio.
We are constantly working on improvements to the Fires Near Me NSW app. We’ll be adding more functionality on push notifications soon.
What’s New
Version 5.1.0
We’ve made changes to Fires Near Me NSW based on feedback from users.
The way we display fires is changing. You’ll see new icons for Advice, Watch and Act, and Emergency Warning.
This is part of the Australian Warning System, a new national initiative to bring consistency to warnings for bush fire, flood, cyclone, extreme heat and severe weather.
Over time, you can expect to see these icons used for more types of emergencies in more locations.
We’ve also improved the accessibility of the app, giving you dynamic font sizing.
Ratings and Reviews
A few tweaks needed
I think this app provides an excellent service to people living in, or travelling to, bushfire prone areas. However, living in an area that is currently threatened by bushfires, I have a major suggestion that would help improve the service a lot. The update frequency has been good as the fires developed over the last few days, but the information given on each report has been exactly the same for each threat level even though the fire has clearly grown and moved substantially in that time period. If you are going to provide people with this sort of information they are going to want to be able to rely on its accuracy. The information given (locations and size of the fires burning) should be as accurate as possible to allow people to visually understand the level of threat posed to them so they can make informed decisions about evacuation. I think the RFS are doing an amazing job on all fronts in trying to contain the catastrophe we are currently experiencing, this is simply a tiny bit of constructive criticism that could help save more lives and homes in the future.
Very helpful but...
Whilst I have found this app very helpful and informative, I have noticed that it really isn’t as accurate with updated information with regards to current situations, which increases my anxiety because I don’t know what to believe.
For example, due to lots of smoke in my area today, I checked the app, which showed a fire 4 Klms from me. However, when the local Fire Station put a status on Facebook, they reassured their followers that there are no active fires in my region and the smoke was from a fire outside of this area, which means that the app is wrong. It’s also confusing with the white diamond when it says it’s not applicable to me.
I also tried to add Watch Zones but when I use my current location, it said that it was for New South Wales only but... I AM in New South Wales.
I realise that thousands of people have obviously downloaded this app in the last few days due to the dangerous weather conditions, but it really needs to be more accurate with current events.
Great app, with suggested improvements...
This is a great app and hats off to the team responsible for this, especially during the big fires in NSW the latter parts of 2019. Some suggestions to improve the usefulness even more could be:
1. Allow the user to go back and review historical fire front overlays on the map. That way we can see where it’s moved in the past day, past week etc... and therefore see what’s changed over time, like when viewing rain radar information on any weather app. Some sort of slider bar would do the trick when in map mode. At present I have to remember where it was yesterday and try and compare that to what it looks like today.
2. Enhance the map view by (if possible) showing where the active fire fronts are in a different colour. The big fires of 2019 had enormous coverings of grey to indicate its size, but this doesn’t distinguish between where it’s burning now and where it may have been extinguished along its perimeter. For now we have to assume if it’s not moving then it’s been successfully dealt with.
3. Enhance the watch zones with circular rings instead of just a semi transparent circle indicating - say - each kilometre away from your watch zone point. This combined with point 2 above would help tell the story for the user as to how fast it is approaching, and how far away it is now. That, or a ruler would help.
These are just suggestions to make this already great and valuable app, even greater.
Thanks guys. PC
App Privacy
The developer, NSW Rural Fire Service, has not provided details about its privacy practices and handling of data to Apple. For more information, see the developer's privacy policy.
No Details Provided
The developer will be required to provide privacy details when they submit their next app update.
Information
- Seller
- NSW Rural Fire Service
- Size
- 56 MB
- Category
- Utilities
- Compatibility
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- iPhone
- Requires iOS 10.0 or later.
- iPad
- Requires iPadOS 10.0 or later.
- iPod touch
- Requires iOS 10.0 or later.
- Mac
- Requires a Mac with Apple M1 chip and macOS 11 or later.
- Languages
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English
- Age Rating
- 4+
- Copyright
- © State of New South Wales through the NSW Rural Fire Service 2017
- Price
- Free
Supports
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Family Sharing
Up to six family members will be able to use this app with Family Sharing enabled.