Brothers Kieran and Nathan Sullivan have done short stints fighting forest fires in New Zealand and Australia but the sheer size of Canada poses a new challenge.
The brothers will leave for Sioux Lookout, a town in the Canadian state of Ontario, tomorrow where they will be put in four-person crews to fight fires in large areas over the next six months.
Both work for Whangarei-based Forest Protection Services and this is the first time the company has been invited by Aviation, Forest Fire and Emergency Services in Ontario to send rural firefighters over.
Usually Canadian firefighters come to Whangarei during their offseason between November and March.
In the past two years, five Canadians have come to fight rural fires in Whangarei and they have also accompanied Forest Protection Services crews on firefighting duties to the Chatham Islands, as well as to Tasmania and Victoria.