Peter Clack

Peter Clack is an award-winning Australian journalist and author of Firestorm
Trial by Fire, providing crucial revelations into the causes of a bushfire that
destroyed 500 Canberra homes in 2003. This was the worst natural disaster in
Canberra’s history. Clack worked in newspapers in Queensland and Victoria
before joining The Canberra Times in 1989, where he was later appointed as
police reporter. He developed networks of trusted informants across the police,
fire and emergency services and this opened the way for extensive coverage of
police and crime. He realised it was impossible to cover on-going crime without
access to inside information from police, and that it was only possible by hiding
their identity. This sparked his intrigue in finding out more. He was awarded a
Churchill Fellowship in 1995 to study police reporting at prominent newspapers
in the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and Republic of Ireland.