This Adventurous Age

MONDAY 15 JANUARY     RV2

John had to have to Acco at RV1 by 7am, to meet a truck and collect a septic tank for the contractors’ offices here, and 7 air conditioner units. It meant a very early start for him – like up at 4.30am. He was able to scrounge a cereal breakfast before leaving. When he got back, helped unload the Acco and distribute the air cons to where they were needed.

News came that FMG had gained Heritage approval to dig proper rubbish pits at both camps, at specified locations. But they did not seem to have any idea how and when to do that. Guess there would have to be careful surveying and so on to be done first.

Ongoing refrigeration compressor problems. BB decided some heavy words were needed and phoned that company himself, from HO.

Lots of finishing off tasks happening here.

Our first aid building was now finished and occupied by the paramedic who had arrived the other day.

The ice machine at RV1 was repaired. Someone had decided that venting them to the outside of the building might reduce heat and help performance.

The pool at RV1 still was not approved, I heard – the chemical balance of the water was wrong. Spotless could not blame us for that! Pool upkeep was their job.

K was highly anxious about cyclones! He had me check the weather site, on the computer, each day, and spent time himself, poring over the weather maps.

SUNDAY 14 JANUARY     RV2

Apparently two of the doors on a SPQ unit that had been at the Fly Camp had been jemmied open at some stage and now would not close properly. No one owned up so it maybe happened over the Xmas break – outsiders looking for stuff to steal? The doors would need replacing.

John had to do a fuel fetching run to North Point Fly Camp. He took progress photos here for HO.

A totally new problem appeared – just for variety. Some of the SPQ unit doors were bowing outwards, due to the pressure of the air conditioning within. Outside my remit, totally  – would report it to HO.

There were ongoing problems with a kitchen freezer, and lots of smoke alarm false alarms.

John checked some smoke alarms. He did some riveting on SPQ doors, where the units had arrived with missing rivets. Poor quality control…..

WEDNESDAY 10 JANUARY     RV2

The temperature reached 46 today.

John was back by 8am, as seemed usual. He had the full day here, today, so it was a chance to catch up on some of his office work, and take photos recording progress, for HO. Also to bring his cash spending spreadsheet up to date. There did not appear to be any record left of how the money he left in December was spent – or what happened to it. Hundreds of dollars.

The Spotless cook gave us a punch list of unsatisfactory things in the kitchen/diner. What’s new! I asked HO – again – to order a new deep fryer for the RV1 kitchen. That issue had carried over from last year.

One of the coolroom compressors that was fixed yesterday was playing up again. Do some of these people really know what they are doing?

John and I walked around the whole place, checking out what fire extinguishers would still be needed. A lot of the ones that came with the SPQ’s were out of date. He put up fire signs and extinguisher brackets. Until doing this work, I never knew that fire extinguishers had to live in special plastic bags in places like this!

The FMG man from Hedland arrived, bringing out the paramedic who would be stationed here, and the ambulance.

It was nice to have John around, after work, to talk to! I was feeling much lonelier here than I had at RV1.

There was rain overnight.

MONDAY 8 JANUARY     RV2

The day was overcast and humid and around 40 degrees. So much for me hoping that the worst of the hot weather was over.

The Spotless manager at RV1 sent through a list of defects they’d had surface, plus some items best classified as wish list! But an urgent problem was a SPQ with a major electrical fault, and this needed urgent attention. K emailed HO asking for instructions about this. I wondered if it was the one that had been faulty weeks ago, when first connected up – and that the electrician was supposed to have fixed.

There were a lot of defective door locks being found here – as there had been at RV1.

Late morning there was drama at the rubbish pit. Spotless put a lot of rubbish into it and left it – presumably thinking our men would burn it later, with our stuff. But there were embers from yesterday’s burn and they re-ignited. The flames headed off north into the spinifex and burned some of the bush. When someone eventually noticed the smoke, K raced off with some of the men to put it out. He was not happy with Spotless. I was not happy with Spotless either – had to prepare an Incident Report for HO. Two of our men then had to stand by and watch the Spotless rubbish burn right down – it took them 90 minutes! It was a big “oops”, but kind of not our fault.

The Shire Health Inspector came to do inspections. He passed the kitchen – good news, because we can continue being fed! He found there was not enough open wall space in the wet mess deck area, and that fans would have to be installed as a result. He would not inspect the pool, because the lighting around it had not been finished! He headed off to RV1 to inspect their pool. I hoped it fared better, because that camp was fully occupied – compared to only a handful of people here – and they really wanted to be able to use the pool.

I sent off a request to HO to replace a dart board (wet mess) that had been damaged in transit, plus supply two sets of pool cleaning gear. Some of the trivial items we were supposed to supply still had me amazed.

John had to do a Hedland trip; enough stuff was needed that he had to take the non-air-conditioned Acco truck. Part of the order was for three drums of hydrochloric acid – apparently the guy who laid the sports court had used drums belonging to Spotless. John also had to pick up one of our workers from the late plane. They overnighted at RV1.

There was a really strong wind storm at night, but no rain.

SUNDAY 7 JANUARY     RV2

We worked. Without a vehicle to go anywhere on a day off, there did not seem to be much point in not working. Just sitting around in our rooms did not appeal, nor did sharing recreation facilities with the workers, when the place became properly functional. There was plenty of work to do.

I got a couple of the men to move the genset – had noticed its exhaust fumes were being brought into the office by the air con unit. Not healthy!

Not the best position for genset – under the A/C!

Despite it being Sunday, I managed to get onto the company in Newman that would come-  next week? -and fix five coolroom compressor units that were not functioning here – two in the kitchen, two in the extra kitchen storage containers, and one in the wet mess. They definitely did not travel well! I suspected the uncovering of faults was going to be a reprise of RV1 – with me in the firing line.

The men had dug a temporary rubbish pit – authorized by FMG – yesterday. There would possibly still need to be some loads taken to the Hedland tip, but the pit should alleviate some of the rubbish volume that had been an issue at RV1. The men gathered the burnable rubbish from around the site, took it to the pit. Late in the afternoon, K lit a fire in the pit and left it to burn down overnight.

John spent some of the day doing bunds – leak proof ground covering for stuff that was not to contaminate the soil. He did it for the genset diesel drum, and the fuel, oil and paint storage areas.

Sometimes, John got to use the big toys!

They should all, of course, have been done way back, before any spillable chemicals  were brought in but this was not the sort of detail that K was strong on overseeing.