 The full force of Cyclone Debbie started to hit this morning. Ferocious winds smashed the Whitsundays, Hamilton Islands in the firing line, tourists and residents taking shelter as the system slowly moved over. Good afternoon and welcome everyone to what is a very important day in recognising our people for their efforts and presenting our class for the Cyclone Debbie to our National Emergency Medal. The National Emergency Medal was instituted by letters Peyton by Her Majesty the Queen. It's an operational service medal which recognises significant or sustained service to others in a nationally significant event. So we're not talking about a minor award here, it's something that's commissioned by the Queen in recognition of national significance. Ladies and gentlemen I'd like to call forward first Colin James Brown. Deployed to Mackay from the 30th of March 2017 through the 5th of April 2017, Colin performed the role of operations officer within the incident management team based in Mackay. As operations officer he was responsible for the coordination of emergency services resources, people, vehicles and aircraft who were responding to the impacts of the tropical Cyclone Debbie. This role had the responsibility for the safe and efficient use of available resources and ensuring the crews working on the ground were kept safe, informed, briefed and effectively doing their duties to those communities. So ladies and gentlemen it's a pleasure today for me to present Mr Colin Brown, he's class for Tropical Cyclone Debbie to the National Emergency Medal, congratulations. The next recipient of our National Emergency Medal class is Peter Guy Greek. Deployed to Brisbane from the 31st of March 2017 through to the 5th of the 4th 2017, Mr Greek performed the role of Victorian Liaison Team Leader at the State Operations Centre at Kedron. This role had oversight of all Victorian resources deployed to Queensland and ensured the Victorian teams were able to provide the required support to Queensland agencies. So it's certainly a very challenging role and Peter I think you've performed exceptionally well and subsequently today will be acknowledged by the class to your National Emergency Medal for the Tropical Cyclone Debbie. So congratulations. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you very much. Our next medal recipient is Scott Douglas Hamilton. Again deployed to Brisbane on the 30th of March 2017 through to the 5th of April. Mr Hamilton performed the role of Logistics Officer at the State Operations Centre Kedron. The Logistics role at the State Operations Centre was responsible for managing the activities and resources necessary to provide logistical support to the centre and deploying crews from Victoria. The role also provided guidance to the regional and some management teams to ensure their needs were met. You did a fantastic job and certainly looked after our crews and for that and your service to those communities. Today you've been awarded your class for Tropical Cyclone Debbie to your National Emergency Medal. Thank you very much. Congratulations. Thank you. Our next award recipient for today is David James Harris. Deployed to Mackay on the 30th of March 2017 through to the 5th of April. Mr Harris performed the role of Planning Officer within the incident management team based at Mackay. This Planning Officer Mr Harris was responsible for providing current situation updates, future incident predictions, anticipating recourse requirements and obviously helping the Logistics Self put together the operational orders as part of the incident action plan to ensure that those were deployed to assist those local communities were effectively tasked and used. James, and again similar to Logistics, when you're doing that function in a state and territory that is different to where you're normally working with this certainly poses many challenges so and you've lived up to that challenge and delivered in spades so I'll ask you to call you to come forward to receive your class to the National Emergency Medal for Tropical Cyclone Debbie. Thank you very much. Final award recipient today is David William Stevenson. Deployed to Brisbane on the 30th of March 2017 through to the 5th of April. Mr Stevenson performed the role Logistics Officer at the State Operations Centre at Kedrin. The Logistics role at the State Operations Centre is responsible for managing activities and resources necessary to provide logistical support to those in the field. The role has also provided guidance to regional incident management teams to ensure their needs were met and keeping those supply ups and ensure that our people and the emergency services in those areas are able to perform their task efficiently and effectively and likewise I'm sure there were many challenges in performing those roles interstate and certainly from all accounts the roles were performed exceptionally well and subsequently today that's why I call you forward to receive your class to your National Emergency Medal for Tropical Cyclone Debbie 2017. Thank you very much and congratulations. So ladies and gentlemen I'll ask for a round of applause for our award recipients today. We'll do a group shot. So thank you very much so everyone look that concludes the formal part of our presentation today and I'd like to on behalf I guess of the country's higher authority in my role as Chief Officer is to thank and congratulate every single one of our award recipients here today.