INFORUM — Most North American hockey players have never visited Australia and probably only have a notion of what the weather or terrain is like in the Southern hemisphere continent.
But Zach Okabe’s background and family are unique. Okabe is a 19-year-old on the St. Cloud State men’s hockey team. While he was born in Japan, Okabe lived about eight years in Blaxland, Australia, and his mother, Maree, is from Ararat, Australia. Ararat is about 130 miles away from Melbourne.
Blaxland is about 40 miles west of Sydney in the Blue Mountains of southeast Australia, and both of Okabe’s sisters were born in Australia. So news of more than 38,000 square miles being burned in wildfires on that continent has Okabe keeping up with the weather patterns there.
Read more: SCSU’s Zach Okabe is keeping close tabs on Australian wildfire
