This Adventurous Age

MONDAY 20 NOVEMBER     RV1

Over 45 today, and there were oppressive storms late in the day.

A lot happened yesterday.

A man from the electricians had to make a special trip up from RV2, for a while, to sort out the Pod 2 rooms that had electrical issues and get them ready to occupy. It seemed that B, the man from that company who was normally here all the time, had taken it upon himself to take the weekend off, without telling anyone. The SPQ building in Pod 2 that had the problems had already had six hours of man time spent trying to sort it out and the problem was still not found.

After all that, Spotless decided to cancel the hand over ceremony and its forty guests. Good!

Someone got the Landcruiser tyres fixed yesterday.

The kitchen fence was finished and those men left.

Fenced yard around the kitchen loading dock and cold units

The gym was declared set up and operational, but was missing two gym mats. So today I had to phone HO to find some and get them to us, somehow.

Some of the equipment int the gym

Spotless had occupation of the main part of the wet mess, but the roller door that would block off the bar counter when required was missing, and there was still some other work ongoing.

Inside the wet mess

I ordered a roller blind thing from a company in Alice Springs.

From the quarry company I was told to order shingle stone – a 12 metre side tipper load – for “landscaping”.

One of the men had done a tip trip on Sunday.

A SPQ donga that was still at Fly Camp was moved to RV2. Down there, they also received 4 office modules and 2 kitchen modules.

Two of the company workers who had been based here were moved permanently to RV2.

I inducted 4 pool company men, here to install the pool, and a man here to install the TV system.

The kitchen compressor unit broke down again last night. The drinks display fridge in the wet mess was not working properly. There were just too many electricals related problems it seemed to me! The cooling man came and fixed the drinks fridge but said we needed yet another new kitchen compressor.  He was sure the repeated failures were due to power fluctuations.

John went to Hedland to return the light tower now that the cementers had finished doing the incidental paths. He also took in some of the semi’s tyres to be repaired.

The sewer company man was working on the sewer and water plants. He said they would train the Spotless managers in their workings. Why didn’t they do that in the first place?

A problem was emerging that some of the smoke alarms installed in the SPQ rooms were going off for no apparent reason. The heat? It was making the Spotless managers really cross.

John had an unusual and unforeseen job today, in amongst his two trips to Hedland. Last Thursday, when BB overnighted here, he nearly went through the base of the shower recess in his bathroom. He was not happy and ordered that every one be checked. So John and the Spotless second manager went round and checked them, by bouncing up and down in each shower. BB was a rather large man, but…… Of the 232 showers, 44 were lacking  bracing. BB was still running the show at RV2, so he got to deal with the manufacturers, about that, for which I was grateful.

I was starting to dream of having a cool – or cold – shower! No such animal in these parts.

SUNDAY 19 NOVEMBER     RV1

Hot. There was an early thunder and lightning storm and it was really humid.

It was our day off. We’d now been on site for nine weeks. In some ways, it seemed to have gone fast but at the same time seemed  like ages. Had we been normal FIFO staff with the company, we’d have been out on break twice now, for a week each time. But apart from our few days at Eighty Mile Beach, we’d stayed here.

Did the washing – nice to have access to a proper laundry with lots of machines, and not have to queue for use.

Apart from that, just relaxed around our rooms and the van.

At one stage, earlier in our time here, when it was a bit cooler, we’d debated whether we should try to visit Karijini National Park on our day off, and do some walking there. But it was over 200kms to drive, each way, so neither of us could motivate ourselves to do that. Had it been closer……

FRIDAY 17 NOVEMBER     RV1

Low 40’s. It was humid, and there was some cloud. There were lots of fires in the area and much smoke about.

Part way through the day, BB went to RV2 and would stay there, in charge, while K was out on his week’s break.

The beer garden deck was being installed – so, apart from the usual type of enclosed large room, there was to be a roofed sort of outdoor section too!

Spotless reported that they fixed the bain marie and dishwasher themselves – there had been wiring problems. There was a gas leak in the old piping in the kitchen. That was fixed quickly!

Word came through that Spotless was now to be responsible for all the genset fuelling, ditto for the one at the bore. So, water, electrical and sewer operations were all up to them. Well, the two on site managers had to transition to that, sooner or later, since our crew would not be here that much longer. And they were not facilities that we had installed anyway.

Just to underline the point, all the main gensets went down in the morning. The phones were out too and possibly affected by a power spike. My office was not affected, since it was not hooked up to camp services. So I was invaded by Spotless managers needing to use the phone – again!

Two swimming pools arrived on a truck, one inside the other. For once, the crane service was on time, and it took off the pool for here, then continued on to RV2, with the truck, to offload its pool. I had to phone and order the requirements for the pool people to install the pool – crackerdust and a crane, again.

Yep – oversize load….

Swimming pools for both Villages

Brickie left for somewhere, with three trailers behind the semi.

The mechanic was back on site and fixed the Canter, amongst other work on the plant.

A new worker arrived yesterday – John had collected him from the airport and taken him to RV2. Turned out he was supposed to have his own tools and didn’t, so today John bought a set in Hedland and took them to RV2. He also took a load to the tip, had a part made for the forklift whilst in town, and brought it back. He really was proving invaluable to this project!

For weeks, R had been hunting for a disabled toilet room that was to be installed here. It was “found” by BB today – installed at RV2! Bloody K! He had repeatedly claimed it wasn’t there. His gut was bigger than his IQ. Now we had to wait for the one that was currently being built, in Perth, for RV2.

BB decreed that ALL company staff and our subbies were to be accommodated at RV1, as of today, regardless of whether the FMG people in Hedland liked it or not.

A big problem with the sewer became evident. Effluent was pouring out onto the ground. Not our responsibility, but in the absence of anyone else, P was trying to fix it, with phone instructions from the company that installed it. P was not a happy chappy! But he was definitely a smelly chappy! The Spotless managers were, it seemed,  white collar workers and getting their hands dirty was not their scene.

We could smell the effluent from our rooms and the van.

THURSDAY 16 NOVEMBER     RV1

In the low 40’s.

John had a busy day – two trips to Hedland and one on to RV2. About 700kms of driving.

BB arrived, in his Landcruiser. So did two more wet mess beer garden decks. The big gas storage bullet arrived and was installed. BB spent the day checking out the work progress here.

Decks that would form the beer garden

All sorts of oddments were being done about the place today, including installing the two new toilets John had bought yesterday. An ongoing job that started a while ago and was ongoing, as more buildings were placed and finalized, was making and installing tie downs to anchor the portable buildings. That job was occupying one of the men full time.

The four and six man dongas at Fly Camp that belonged to the company were packed up and loaded onto two trays of Brickie’s semi.

The deep fryer in the kitchen was not working. Spotless told me what they thought was wrong and I ordered the required new part they said was needed and  arranged for it to come express from Perth. They were getting very terse about all the equipment failures in the kitchen; most of that gear would have been used in whatever had been the kitchen’s prior incarnation – possibly on the Darwin Rail line building. But some of the issues were due to the power supply problems – and that was not our fault.

The electricals would not work on one of the SPQ’s in Pod 2; our on site electrician couldn’t work out what was wrong, but was adamant that the fault lay back in the building of it, in Perth. A dud fridge was found, too. Just one of the many, many little things to be fixed. A glazier I’d arranged came and fixed the broken window. I’d also arranged that the mechanic company come today to service various plant items; there was too much for one day, so they would be back tomorrow. More travel charges!

Unpacking and setting up Pod 3

There was a problem with the bore pump – something else that was not our issue.

Eating in the mess here was very different from the Fly Camp dining. The food was much more professionally done, for starters. There was a much bigger range of choice too. At breakfast, one helped themselves, still, to cold things like fruit and cereals, and cooked our own toast on a big, rotating toast maker. (That was one of the kitchen fitments I hadn’t been able to identify when collecting serial numbers!) There was a large range of cooked breakfast foods available from the servery. In a separate corner of the serving area, there were the lunch crib makings set out for one to assemble their own, to take away. Again, a really large range – lots of lovely salads, sandwich fillings and the like, down to hard boiled eggs, different types of olives and even artichoke hearts. At dinner, we queued up to collect our meal at the servery – a range of offerings including roasts, casseroles, steak cooked to order, other meats, vegetables and salads. There were desserts of course – choices amongst hot and cold ones. Excellent food.

Obviously, the camp set up was geared to workers doing hard physical work out in the hot sun, for at least eight hours a day, with nutrition to suit. This particular sedentary office worker needed to really resist the temptation to eat too much!

WEDNESDAY 15 NOVEMBER     RV1

I ate my breakfast as usual in the van, but John made the trek to the mess and reported that breakfast there was quite a lavish spread, with lots of choice.  I just appreciated that, without the drive between camps, I could sleep a bit longer.

Mess set up for meals

However, I did have to call into the mess on my trek to the office, to make up a lunch crib – from a surprisingly extensive array of options set out in the area to one side of the main serving area. Plenty of fillings for those who wanted to make themselves sandwiches. For this salad eater, some luxurious ingredients, like artichoke hearts! Who would have thought?

Area where crib makings set out

The temperature gauge in the van today registered a high of 49.4! Through all of this I had been impressed that the 12volt Vitrifrigo fridge had kept functioning beautifully. Every few weeks I had needed to defrost it, but that was normal. An amazing unit, really.

Brickie took a load to the tip. He and John refuelled the sewer pump and the bore genset. John went to Hedland to take H and M and N and S to the plane to go out for their breaks. He bought back the subbie doing the TV and internet installations and two toilet pans!

I was notified today that the pool would arrive on 17th – change of date. I phoned the crane company and changed their booking to suit.

Now the bain marie in the kitchen had stopped working!

An engineer I’d contacted yesterday, got back to me. The only solution to the ice machine problem that he could come up with was to try to cool down the incoming water by running it through water bubbler machines first. Urgent order went to HO to source bubbler machines for us. More power points would be needed in the ice room.

The wet mess was being set up (i.e camp word for pub!) The gym was being cleaned and set up, holes were being dug along side the paths for lights, the TV co-axial cabling was being done in Pod 1.

Wet mess at right; beer garden decks yet to be installed

Three more decks for the six deck wet mess arrived.

MONDAY 13 NOVEMBER    NORTH POINT CAMP

Temp felt well into 40’s today.

The genset problems seemed to be ongoing, and had been creating electrical voltage issues. As FMG were responsible for this installation, not us, they had been informed.

Refuelling the gensets and pumping out the sewer pit occupied 5 of our staff hours today.

The cementers were working at night again, so a light tower had to be fetched from Hedland again.

R thought the dishwasher coil blew out when it was first started due to the voltage problems – that was, not our fault! Nor cost for repairs.

Brickie took a tip truck load of rubbish to the tip. His semi still in Hedland being repaired.

Last week, I had phoned the Shire and arranged for inspection. Today, the Shire Inspector came, and passed the kitchen as usable. So it was now able to be occupied, officially.

Disabled ramp access to kitchen

So that was Stage 1 completed – on 13th, as earlier thought. I was amazed.

Looking like business now…..

Spotless would be catering for people tonight, for the first time – they planned to move their staff in. We would like to move in there too! But the FMG lady in Hedland said none of our staff could move to RV1 until she said so. Bit of a power thing, I thought. The men were annoyed. It would be so much more comfortable there. For starters – rooms with their own bathrooms!

Kitchen servery ready to function

R was due to go out on his week’s break, in a few days. He got me to change around the booking that HO had made for him, and book him out of Broome on Wednesday. That would mean he would need to drive up there tomorrow afternoon. Seemed like he couldn’t wait to get out of the place, and I didn’t blame him. He had been under so much pressure here, and there were ongoing ructions at home too.

R drove into Hedland for various supplies.

While he was away, a couple of people from BHP arrived, to “investigate” that fire that had happened a few days ago. One of them was an environmental officer. They were making it out to be a much bigger issue than it really was, and I couldn’t actually see what business it was of theirs – apart from looking for yet another way to make life difficult for us. But I was polite, explained some  (slightly edited) facts and allowed them to go and inspect what was only a few square metres of burnt spinifex. AFTER making them go through the formal site induction process, of course; two can play at that game! I did hope this was not going to become some sort of major incident. They made reference to the report they would write and made vague suggestions about further action….. I reported all that to HO, pronto.

John had one Hedland trip in the morning. In the afternoon, he did some work around the site.

The dishwasher was repaired. Then the instant hot water unit went on the blink. The cooler man came from Newman to fix the wet mess coolroom.

Fuel tanks were installed at the gensets. It took our men 2 hours to do that, and another 4 hours to fuel up the gensets. I was so busy, these days, keeping tabs of Variation Orders like that work.

Bulk fuel tank being installed for gensets

A temporary satellite dish was installed for the main office. Spotless could now use that, and their own phones. Hallelujah!

The Perth building company was sending up all sorts of oddments needed to fix the items on the punch lists: strip edging to go around the edges of desks, that had been missing from some, keys, door handles, locksets and the like. They would be sent in one of the units being despatched to RV2. They said that, as of today, they had 18 more units to make, to complete their order. The last of these should be ready for trucking on 4/12. It obviously had been a huge order for them.

A lot of our gear was now being moved down to RV2.

The sports court surface was laid.

It seemed there were supposed to be curtain sets for the mess and some kitchen windows. HO was adamant that these had been supplied and we should have them – but couldn’t actually tell me when or how, just that they would have come inside a building being transported, at some stage. Over the past week or so R and I had searched for these, asked staff if they had seen them – it was a lot of curtains! No one knew anything. Reluctantly, HO agreed to get new ones made up in Alice Springs and despatched to us, urgently. In this climate, windows definitely needed shading!

Kitchen was producing food

There was a bushfire burning to the NW, just across the other side of the highway. The Fly Camp manager seemed really worried and was trying to organize for a machine to make the fire break much bigger. It looked really scary at night.

We spent some time starting to dismantle our camp – taking down the tarps, packing stuff away. This was in hope that we would soon be able to relocate to the village.