Bushfire arson investigations in Victoria: how the Arson and Explosives Squad does its work

Bushfire arson is one of the hardest investigative jobs in Australian policing. It happens in remote country, the crime scene is typically destroyed by the very fire it started, the evidence is microscopic, and the offender is often gone hours before anyone realises a fire was deliberately lit. Tom Whitford has spent the last fire season talking to the people who do this work, and what follows is a primer on how the Victorian system actually operates.

Victoria’s principal bushfire investigation unit is the Arson and Explosives Squad, supported by a network of around 277 Arson and Explosives Liaison Officers across the state and by Operation Safeguard during periods of heightened fire risk. The work spans intelligence, prevention, scene examination and prosecution support.

Where the squad sits in Victoria Police

The Arson and Explosives Squad is part of Victoria Police’s Crime Group. It is a centralised specialist unit based in Melbourne with statewide responsibility, but it does not work in isolation. Most fires in Victoria are first attended by general-duties police, the Country Fire Authority and Fire Rescue Victoria, with the squad coming in when the indicators of suspicious origin are strong enough to justify a forensic-scale investigation.

The Arson and Explosives Liaison Officers — known as AELOs — are general-duties officers across the state who have completed the squad’s training pathway and act as the local point of contact for fire-cause investigation. The 277 AELOs across Victoria carry a meaningful share of the workload for smaller fires, with the squad’s detectives concentrating on serious or complex matters.

The investigative toolkit

Bushfire investigation in 2026 sits across several distinct disciplines:

• Origin and cause analysis. Fire investigators read fire patterns, char depths and burn directions to triangulate the origin point. This is painstaking work conducted on foot, often in steep country, hours after the fire has passed through.
• Accelerant detection. The squad uses canine units and laboratory analysis to detect ignitable liquids. Canine detection is highly sensitive but is one input among many — laboratory confirmation through gas chromatography and mass spectrometry is the evidentiary backbone.
• Electrical fault diagnostics. A meaningful share of suspicious fires turn out to be caused by failed electrical infrastructure rather than human action. Specialist forensic engineers assess powerlines, transformers, conductors and clamps to distinguish faults from deliberate ignition.
• Witness canvass and CCTV. Even in remote country, dashcams, rural CCTV at properties and service stations, and ANPR data along key arterial roads are now part of the investigative picture.
• Intelligence and pattern analysis. Fire-setters often offend repeatedly. Intelligence work — including review of past convictions, persons of interest, and fire-cluster mapping — feeds prevention as much as prosecution.

How big is the deliberate-ignition share?

The honest answer is that the share of bushfire starts attributable to deliberate human action is genuinely difficult to measure, because cause is often unconfirmed when a fire is contained quickly and not deeply investigated. Australian Institute of Criminology research over the past two decades has placed the broad share of vegetation fires that are suspicious or maliciously lit at somewhere between 10 and 13 per cent, with another substantial share attributable to recklessness and accident.

Victoria Police’s published statement before the 2025–26 season noted that for the year ending June 2025, there were 59 offences relating to causing a bushfire, 23 of which involved reckless behaviour. That number understates total suspicious starts because many cases never reach the offence-charging stage. It does, however, give readers a feel for the scale of confirmed offending in a single year.

Operation Safeguard and the prevention model

Operation Safeguard is the squad’s operational umbrella for periods of heightened risk. It involves preparedness arrangements, intelligence-led patrols, deployment plans for known fire-prone areas, and structured engagement with persons of interest. Pre-season briefings between the squad and Country Fire Authority operational personnel align fire-service and police priorities before the season starts.

The prevention frame matters because the recidivism risk for some fire-setters is real. Identification, surveillance and engagement during high-risk periods is a more cost-effective intervention than post-fire investigation of a million-hectare burn.

What changed after Black Summer

The 2019–20 Black Summer fires triggered substantial reforms across Australian fire management. For Victoria, the relevant reform threads have included the establishment of Fire Rescue Victoria (consolidating the metropolitan Metropolitan Fire Brigade with parts of the CFA), a strengthened state controller arrangement, expanded use of inter-agency aerial firefighting, and continued investment in the Victoria Police investigative toolkit.

From an investigative perspective, the Black Summer experience reinforced the value of standing relationships between police, fire services and forensic specialists. When a fast-moving fire begins, the time available to capture origin-and-cause evidence before suppression activity disturbs the scene is short. Pre-existing relationships and protocols compress the response window.

Sentencing for bushfire arson

The legal framework for bushfire arson in Victoria is set out in the Crimes Act 1958. Section 201A specifically addresses intentionally or recklessly causing a bushfire and carries a maximum penalty of 15 years’ imprisonment. Where a fire causes a death, the more serious offence of arson causing death (section 197A) carries a maximum of 25 years.

The Sentencing Council’s published snapshot work shows that average prison terms for arson offences in Victoria’s higher courts in recent years have sat around 2 years 4 months — well short of the maximum. That gap between maximum penalty and actual sentence reflects ordinary sentencing practice: maximum penalties are reserved for the worst category of cases, and most cases do not fall into that category. Whether the gap is appropriate is a contested public debate that surfaces every fire season.

If you see something

The single most useful action a member of the public can take is to report what they have seen, even if it feels minor. The squad and AELOs receive intelligence from the public that, in combination with other sources, has supported successful prosecutions.

• If you see a fire being deliberately lit, ring triple zero immediately.
• If you have information about past suspicious fires or persons of interest, Crime Stoppers (1800 333 000) accepts anonymous reports.
• The Victoria Police bushfire arson reporting page provides a structured way to provide information to the squad.

What to watch in the rest of 2026

Three things will shape the squad’s environment for the remainder of the calendar year:

• Post-season debriefs from the 2025–26 fire season, including any prosecution outcomes for matters under investigation.
• Continued investment in inter-agency forensic capability, including canine units and accelerant analysis.
• Public debate over arson sentencing, which will surface again as the next fire season approaches.

If a fire has affected you or someone you know, recovery support is available through Bushfire Recovery Victoria, the Australian Red Cross and council-run recovery services. Lifeline (13 11 14) and Beyond Blue (1300 22 4636) are open 24 hours a day. If you are in immediate danger from fire, ring triple zero.