The Namadgi National Park fire was accidentally sparked by a Defence helicopter's landing light, when the chopper was on a reconnaissance mission.

Defence came under fire after it was revealed the crew of the MRH-90 Taipan helicopter took 45 minutes to alert the ACT Emergency Services agency about the location of the fire.

The Orroral Valley fire burned through 80 per cent of Namadgi National Park.

ACT Emergency Services Commissioner Georgeina Whelan told an ACT government estimate hearing that procedures had been put in place for future events. She also said there was ongoing work with Defence.

"I can't guarantee you what Defence will do but what I can say the checks and balances that we've put in place as we have nationally would ensure that we would not be in a situation where that kind of event will be likely to occur, I can't say never never but I can say likely," she said.

Ms Whelan said her agency was working with Defence on training programs and that she had recently written to the Deputy Chief of Army Major General Anthony Rawlins to formalise the programs.

"We have been undertaking some ongoing training with our staff, we're also entering into a very deep cycle of incident management training and exercise planning where we'll actually invite the Defence personnel to come in and participate in those programs," she said.

READ MORE:

"The second thing is we all learnt from the Orroral Valley fire and I'm very confident with the exchange of information I have with Defence on their lessons learned program from their review of the event."

The Defence helicopter was in the park to clear landing zones for aircraft. It was not directed by the ACT Emergency Services Agency to land in the location it did.

"I will point out to that we did not ask Defence to land in that particular point of the Orroral Valley, it wasn't a directed task to land in that particular spot from my incident controller on the day... that was a tactical decision made by the pilot," Ms Whelan said.

Our journalists work hard to provide local, up-to-date news to the community. This is how you can continue to access our trusted content: