Elisabeth Goh is a volunteer firefighter of Hornsby Heights RFB (NSW Rural Fire Service) and Manager at EY Australia, leading the Oceania Emergency Management and Disaster Resilience (EMDR) Community of Practice.
A daughter of a military and policing family, Elisabeth knows first-hand the many challenges experienced by those in the uniformed services and is passionate about first responder mental health as she continues to navigate her own experience with Complex PTSD.
Elisabeth often takes on both operational and incident management roles with NSW RFS; it was her experiences on the ground throughout Black Summer that triggered her to rethink traditional approaches to support and engage with vulnerable and diverse communities, before, during, and after operations and incidents.
Her core passion for diversity, equity, and inclusion (DEI) has led to her drawing upon her own experiences as a young, queer woman of colour in emergency services to seek out and develop models of engagement to improve DEI in the EMDR workforce and to support better outcomes in the community. She has spoken at both the Australian Community Engagement and Fire Awareness Conference (ACEFA) and the Australasian Fire Authorities Council (AFAC) Conferences on DEI, encouraging the EMDR sector to strengthen its support and engagement with Australia’s diverse community.
Outside of firefighting, Elisabeth enjoys crocheting, bouldering, writing, and photography. She documents life as a bush firefighter on her website and on social media under the handle firehawkx_ .