An Australian Fort McMurrayite is looking to lend a helping hand to his homeland.
Local business owner Ben Annetts recently started a GoFundMe page, seeking local donations to put towards fighting the bushfires happening down under.
The fires have led to the deaths of dozens of Australians, and over a half-billion of the country’s wildlife population.
Annetts tells Mix News they will take any help that people are willing to give.
“If everybody could put their hands in their pocket and give as little or as much as you can, we know we’re going through a hard patch economically but with the price of a coffee and ten, twenty or thirty people – we’ll start to see some decent funds.”
Annetts originally hails from near Sydney and moved to Fort McMurray in 2006, where he started his businesses Northern Diesel Ltd. and First Fleet Maintenance Ltd.
Once he received word from friends and family about the state parts of Australia are in, he decided to act.
Annetts kickstarted donations with pledges of $5,000 from each of his companies to get the ball rolling.
“I was displaced in 2016 and so were many of my friends,” Annetts said. “It’s a big deal, it’s something no one wants to deal with in their life. I think once it settles down and they get set up again, it’s going to be a long, long road but nobody wants to deal with this. That’s why we’re trying to help out and just raise whatever funds we can.”
Having lived through the Horse River Wildfire in 2016, Annetts can sympathize with what’s going on in his home country.
From what he’s been hearing from those on the ground, it will be a long road to recovery for Australia.
“Smoke is effecting the built-up areas so, it’s just really a smoke problem but I have family in the country areas where they sort of have to water their buildings to keep the embers from causing their properties to go up”
You can donate by clicking this link.