By Patrice Fidgeon
Pictures: Gina Milicia
“Get in the car, drive and don’t stop… no matter what,” Arthur Evers told his wife Petra. Arthur was an adventurer who had already cheated death twice, but tragically died in the full force of the inferno that engulfed Kinglake.
The 57-year-old train driver ignored his partner of 35 years Petra’s pleas to leave his treasured Harley Davidson ? which was insured ? and flee their home together in their car.
“I had a call from Eden Park at about 2pm warning me about the threat of fire in our area,” Petra says, her voice shaking as she clings tightly to Arthur’s devastated mother Nadia. “Then a neighbour walked up to me in the front yard and told me there were spot fires about a quarter of a mile away.
“Arthur was up on the roof with the hose, filling the gutters. I told him to get down and said we should go, but he said I was panicking.”
Determined to get them both out, Petra quickly packed a few belongings.
“Suddenly there was this dreadful noise ? a vroom, like a tornado or the rush of a jet engine and the walls were vibrating, literally shaking. It was so scary.”
Grabbed their two dogs ? Arthur’s Jack Russell, Jackie, and Petra’s Maltese, Bobo ? Petra packed the car.
“By this time the wind had changed and the fire was roaring up the hill. It was dark as night.
“I said, ‘Arthur, this is it. We have to leave now,’ but he just looked at me and asked where his bike keys were.”
Despite Petra’s tears and pleas for him to travel with her in the car, Arthur was determined to save his bike.
“He told me to drive like mad. By this stage there were flames about six feet high in the front yard and as I drove off I heard Arthur’s bike start and could see him behind me.”
Tragically that final glimpse was the last time Petra would ever see Arthur alive.
“The roaring wind and choking smoke was everywhere. It was like a black fog. I couldn’t see anything. I tried to look out the back and I couldn’t see Arthur on his bike.”
Driving around burning trees and through walls of fire, Petra heard explosion she assumed her tyres blowing. In fact the noise was her headlights imploding with heat.
Finding a policewoman, who directed her to the St Andrew’s hotel, Petra arrived ? and waited for news.
“I told everyone he was behind me and would be here in a minute ? but he didn’t come,” says Petra, her face breaking with grief.
Walking down the hill to search, Petra was met with a horrifying sight of flames and destruction.
“It was only then I had some idea of the extent of the inferno. It was just horrific and I realised he would have had no chance. But I still hoped he would make it.”
It was early Sunday that Petra received the answer she had desperately hoping she wouldn’t hear. The police had found Arthur’s wallet. He was dead.
“I screamed and just collapsed on the road, sobbing. Someone from the hotel was good enough to pick me up and take me back to the hotel. It was just devastating.”
Petra and Arthur had been living at Mt Beauty when bushfires raged through that area two years ago.
“It got within two doors of our place. So we were both very fire-conscious.
“But this time there was just no warning and with those conditions ? unbelievably high temperatures and hot northerly winds gusting up to 100km per hour ? no-one had a chance. It wouldn’t have mattered what you did.”
And just a year ago Arthur Evers cheated death a second time when the 35ft catamaran he bought in Mauritius sank when he tried to sail it back to Australia.
“I wanted him to put it on a ship and have it sent back to Australia, but Arthur wanted the adventure of sailing it back from Mauritius.
“He hired skippers and was about 600 nautical miles out of Mauritius when it sank. I was back in Mt Beauty and Arthur was bobbing around in the Indian Ocean for three days while I was worried sick not knowing if he was still alive,” Petra explains.
“When he lost the boat we used the insurance money from that to buy our house about 6km from Kinglake six months ago.”
Petra doesn’t know what happened to the house.
“We haven’t been allowed back to see but I know 95 per cent of the houses in that road have been totally destroyed.
“But it doesn’t matter now. I just can’t cope with the fact that Arthur isn’t here ? that he didn’t make it. It’s just too awful.”
Petra is staying with Arthur’s mother Nadia until she’s allowed to return to her own place ? and discover its fate.
“Arthur’s mother is devastated,” Petra says, comforting Nadia. “She just adored her son. She says she has lost everything and can’t stop crying.”
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