Playing with fire

My Year 11 schoolmates and I could barely contain our excitement as we waited for the departure date of our week-long Outback ‘survival’ camp. As we boarded the bus at dawn one Saturday morning, our backpacks filled to the gunnels, the group’s excitement was palpable. We were off!
              First stop were the beautiful Hattah Lakes at Hattah-Kulkyne National Park, north west of Melbourne, before travelling onward to Broken Hill where we planned to hike for four days. Like most school camps, sleep was the least important priority as boys and girls giggled and whispered in their tents after an evening of campfire stories and songs.
             The following day we started our four-day hike, departing from a homestead on the outskirts of Broken Hill. As the day progressed, our guides pointed out awe-inspiring sights, including Outback wildlife and Aboriginal rock paintings. And as the sun rose higher and the heat began to bite, some of the boys offered to carry the girls’ backpacks… chivalry was not dead!  Then a friend fell and injured her knee; two of us hopped aboard the back-up vehicle and rode with her to camp.
             That evening as we all prepared dinner, someone lit the camp cooker with methylated spirits, as was the way. Then another enthusiastic chef came along, and not seeing the meths’ blue flame, made the decision to add more spirits to the cooker’s small round receptacle. Whooosh! In a split second, the additional fuel burst into a Molotov-type cocktail and, instantly, the bottle containing the spirits was aflame. Naturally, the schoolgirl’s instinct was to discard the incendiary bottle; unfortunately, I was directly in its path.
              The flaming bottle hit me and immediately my clothes began to burn and within seconds my skin was on fire too. I kicked into survival mode and ran screaming through the bush.  The next couple of hours remain a total blank to this day, but I’m told that a boy from the group jumped on me and rolled me in the sand. This hero remains one of my best friends to this day. Eerily, he told me later that he had foreseen the entire accident in a dream.