This Adventurous Age

June 12, 2020
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2006 Travels September 25

MONDAY 25 SEPTEMBER NORTH POINT CAMP

It had now been confirmed that P would be the Site Supervisor here, K at RV2, with R overseeing the whole lot as Project Manager. I had already figured out, just in his few days of work to date, that P was much more organized and efficient than K, so it was smart to have him running the site that was ahead of the other, and thus ironing out at least some issues and problems along the way.

John had managed to persuade head office to set up company accounts with the local businesses he already knew we would be using often, like Bridgestone, Repco, the Hedland Emporium.

BB, K and some of the engineering contractors were still at RV 2, doing site preparation there. They had asked R to arrange to send down some machines and things that were needed . John was asked to drive the old Acco tip truck down there with that load. He was pleased at the chance to go to RV2 for the first time, and have a change from trips to Hedland. Actually, he could have done with a full day on site as the paperwork associated with his Safety Officer role needed work on organizing and filing!

Unfortunately, John decided to be a bit adventurous and take what seemed to be the shorter route south – along the maintenance road for the BHP railway, that he heard talk about, and which was the later part of the way to access RV2. He thought he would do it from here, rather than take the highway south to the Marble Bar/Hillside turn off, which was the normal way. Always one for exploring, John!

Rough location of RV2 – just north of Redmont Camp

But he did not clear this with R – or anyone, first – and duly set off. Unfortunately, what he had assumed – God knows why – to be the rail access track, was not. The BHP rail access track, in fact, very logically, ran alongside the BHP railway, which we both knew was a few kms further east of our locations.

We had, in driving between the camp and the highway, crossed a somewhat roughly graded line. For some reason, John decided this was the access track, and headed off south on it, with the loaded Acco. It was, we discovered later, the marked line that the FMG railway would take. It would have been a challenge for a 4WD vehicle – the Acco had no hope and John was soon stuck. He had no option but to walk back to the site – a few kms – confess his folly to R and get him to take out one of the machines that could pull the Acco back to the road.

Then John continued on his trip to RV2 – via the sealed main highway and then the BHP access track, south of the Hillside road. This was, incidentally, the only part of that access track that FMG related vehicles had permission to be on! He was away for much of the day. He reported to me that the RV2 site was located in rougher terrain – among some low hills – and felt much more isolated.

RV2 access track

I just kept my rather embarrassed head down at my work and hoped R realized I was not responsible for John’s foolishness. Later, when we were alone at the van, I took him to task, asking him where on earth logic and common sense had departed to!

I had to establish contact with a quarrying company in Hedland, on behalf of the engineering company, and arrange for delivery of gravel needed for their cement batching plant.

Today, I learned about a thing called a Variation Order – which I was to get to know very closely in the months ahead. This was to claim extra money above the contracted amount, for unforeseen variations to the work and contract. My first encounter with this came when one of our men had to clear a fire break around the site perimeter. Such had not been originally specified, but it was now agreed that it was necessary. Hence, I had to prepare a Variation Order to go to head office for them to process and deal with FMG over.

I decided I could really get to like this work. The detail appealed.

BB wanted his own 4WD, which was here because he had driven here, relocated to Broome airport, after he flew out of Hedland tomorrow. From there, he and his family would be able to collect it, at some future time, after flying in from Alice Springs via Darwin – there was a direct Darwin to Broome service.

There was some discussion about how this could be done. It was settled that John would drive the vehicle to Broome – some 700kms – stay there a night, then catch a bus back to Hedland, where someone, probably me, would collect him. Just a pity for John that the country between Hedland and Broome was so tedious to drive through.

It looked like our company would now be employing H, the manager of the Fly Camp. He had approached BB to see if there was a job for him. I didn’t know why he wanted the move – maybe he thought the Fly Camp role would end soon, maybe the pay was better. In a sense, once the Fly Camp had been set up, there was not a great deal for him to do anyway.

June 12, 2020
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2006 Travels September 24

SUNDAY 24 SEPTEMBER NORTH POINT CAMP

Our day off.

We had come a long way in a week, in terms of knowledge and knowing what we were doing.

Today was John’s birthday – 66. A very low key occasion, this one. It was enough just to have the day off!

Sunday was a good day for me to have off because head office was closed, and so much of what I had to do was based on communication with them – and with other businesses, usually also closed on Sundays.

After a sleep in, and an unpressured shower – the other camp occupants being out at work – I had my usual grapefruit breakfast at the van – having gotten John to replenish the stock on one of his forays into Hedland during the week. He went across to the cook van and scrounged something from them. I went over and put together a couple of lunch packs.

Then we set out to drive to Port Hedland. This was a repetitive outing for John, already, but for me, it was most enjoyable to see the outside world!

Sign at the access road/highway corner

We explored the old town a little. There was much more character in the old buildings here, compared to the more recently built service centre of South Hedland, but it gave off an air of some neglect. This was at least partly due to the coating of rust red dust that had permeated everything, drifting across from the iron ore loading dock.

The town dates back to origins as a harbour for pearling luggers in the 1860’s who found suitable moorings in the channels surrounding a promontory of land that was cut off from the mainland at high tide. Settlement began on that island. Some thirty years later, the island was linked to the mainland by a causeway across the tidal flats – roughly the area where the salt harvesting operations are now.

The old town section contains a few buildings that date from the late 1800’s/early1900’s, such as the Esplanade Hotel, but termites and cyclones are not kind to buildings in places like these. Neither, really, is its kind of boom and bust history: boom in the early gold rushes to places like Marble Bar, again in World War 2 when it was part of the front line defences of northern Australia and was bombed by the Japanese. Now there is the current, massive iron ore boom. In between those times, it reverted to a pastoral service town.

We parked as close as we could and watched iron ore being loaded into bulk carriers. This was the core business of the Pilbara region – digging up the ancient land and shipping it off to China.

It was the BHP loading facility that we could see at the end of the long, narrow promontory of land that the old town was built on.

We had already learned that there was great rivalry – emnity – between the older established BHP and the newcomer of FMG. The ore body that FMG planned to mine was in the Chichester Ranges, to the north of Newman and the BHP mines. It was, by comparison, a lower grade ore body that FMG believed could be profitably exploited.

It seemed that FMG had wanted to use – initially at least, BHP’s existing railway from its mines at Newman to Port Hedland, and also the ore loading facility there. BHP – understandably – was not going to encourage a competitor in any way, and refused access. Although FMG was pursuing this in the courts, the company had decided not to wait for the slow legal processes, and was building its own railway – essentially parallel to the BHP one and only a km or two apart. It was also building its own port facility on Finucane Island, across a narrow channel from the BHP port. So this was how we came onto the scene.

Obviously, since returns to FMG would not begin to happen until they were actually exporting iron ore, there was great pressure to get this infrastructure completed ASAP. It was clearly a costly undertaking and we gained the impression that there were plenty who thought the venture would not succeed, that financing had been hard to come by, that better known contractors had no faith in the viability of FMG, which was why a small company based in Alice Springs had gotten the nod to build the construction camps.

We were to find that BHP were not welcoming or encouraging of anyone or anything to do with FMG, to the point of actions to obstruct or delay the project.

John had already, on his trips in here, found a pleasant small park by the sea and the boat ramp, and he took us there to have our lunch. We were able to set up the laptop on a table in a picnic shelter and do a download. He would try to do this every week or so, on one of his regular trips in.

Resize of 09-24-2006 01 Download at Pt Hedland

Lunch in Port Hedland. Ore loading port in background

There were lots of iron ore bulk carriers, lined up on the horizon, waiting their turn to come in for loading. I was really surprised at how many were out there.

Refuelled truck in Hedland – $1.46cpl.

Drove back to camp in time for tea.

June 10, 2020
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2006 Travels September 23

SATURDAY 23 SEPTEMBER NORTH POINT CAMP

I was now keeping a Register of visitors to the site, on the computer.

BB arrived today – driving himself in his own 4WD vehicle. Think he had been down at Leonora, where the company had some sort of business operation going. Flight details for him came in from HO, so I gave them to him. He was going to be constantly moving between the various project sites, it seemed.

BB, K and two of the engineering firm men, went to RV2 to sort that site out. They were overnighting at the Fly Camp there.

I did the usual range of tasks and administrivia. There was a little less to do today, because HO only worked half a day. And also because BB was not on the office!

Rarely did anyone tell me in advance what buildings or traffic would be arriving on the site that day. I think that often, at this end of things, no one really knew. I would hear the noise of something arriving, and go out and try to figure out what it might be.

The batching plant and machinery that would make all the concrete paths and such, arrived on a very, very long road train. Any traveller who got stuck behind that lot on the highway would have been mightily unhappy. The majority of the engineering company’s staff who would do that work were starting to come in by plane – a few were already here.

I didn’t know road trains came this big…….

It would be a while before they were all set up and ready to start the work. Materials had to be delivered, yet, for the cement, too. Water was an issue, as there was no supply to the site as yet. It seemed that FMG had arranged for that to be trucked from the Wodgina Mine site, on the western side of the highway and several kms from here. That would be an extra cost that would go onto the unexpected extra costs above and beyond the contract – which I was learning were called contingencies, to be billed to FMG by our company.

There seemed to be trenches dug everywhere

As instructed by HO, I reminded R that he must fill in the Milestone 2 Progress Report tomorrow. He was using some type of computerized Project Management software – looked very interesting, but I did not get a chance to play with that!

R had not been here long, but he was already getting regular phone calls from his wife – sometimes several each day – that left him hassled. She had just started up a small business and did not seem able to manage it without his input and problem solving! Bit feeble, I thought.

Daily trips to the plane were a reality of John’s life. Sometimes he would do two trips a day, in and out. We could now see why the old bongo bus was an essential piece of the plant.

John at work

June 10, 2020
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2006 Travels September 22

FRIDAY 22 SEPTEMBER NORTH POINT CAMP

John finalized the setting up of a spread sheet he would use to record his ongoing expenses for site stuff.

I did the usual daily faxing. Made up files for each of the sub-contracting companies. Was beginning to get my head around these, and what part of the project they would be working on – it was really quite complex and required all sorts of specialist skills.

Prepared Airbags of paperwork that had to be sent to Darwin and Alice Springs, from K. I wished them luck deciphering anything he’d had a hand in! John would mail these from Hedland PO.

John had been asked by wife of BB – boss lady – to take photos of the site as was and virtually every day, so there was a photographic record of the progress and work.

The construction site. The two cleared rectangles at rear would be two pods of bedrooms; in front of those were kitchen foundations. One building in its permanent place would be the first aid centre. Note the stacks of roofing iron – scene of a nasty incident to come….

In order to take proper over view photos of the site, John was raised up high on a forklift!

My office, from on high. Satellite dish for my phone, internet, fax. Our Truck, with its mandatory orange flashing light mounted on the roof rack. The bongo bus.

Another task he was given was to list all the plant on site, with identifying numbers and mileages, hours etc. This was to be done twice a week. Was not as easy as it sounded, not the least because at any one time, some of said plant was in use on various parts of the site. As he got to know which machine was what, it got easier.

I typed up some material related to Heritage matters, that was to become part of the Induction process.

I still did not have a toilet on site – and had taken to sneaking off behind or in between the delivered buildings in the lay down area. At least this was away from where most of the work activity was happening.

I was working out the building identifications and functions, gradually. The bedroom portables were obvious and easy. But there had been some structures that appeared on site early on – before I was taking notice – that I had no idea about, and could find no paper work for. They were basically just a floor and a roof, with some supports for same, and framing to brace same in travel. Eventually, I was to realize that the big kitchen and mess building, and the wet mess (bar) building, would be made up of a lot of modules – called floors – ultimately joined together.

So the six funny structures I was fretting about – and trying to identify for HO – were the six floors for the wet mess. The kitchen and dining mess would have sixteen floors! Some of the buildings had belonged to the company for a while and had been used in other places and projects, like the movable camps for the construction of the Darwin railway, so their identifying marks or plates were inconsistent or missing. It didn’t help!

I had a run-in with a FMG man who came out here to take photos. He went straight out onto the site, without reporting to the office or to K out on site. He came back again to fetch his camera, which was when I spotted him, and told him that he needed to wear a hard hat on site – and also report in on arrival. It was apparently his third visit to the site, so he should have known better. John had put up plenty of signs – which he found in a container of company equipment – at the entrance, about all visitors reporting to the office, etc. He argued the toss with me about wearing a hard hat, but eventually put it on. I was about to call K for support in dealing with him, when the latter appeared and took him out onto the site. Arrogant man!

We had a supply of hard hats and high vis vests, for visitors, in the office.

The site work that was being done today was digging trenches for the communications lines, and setting up the foundation frames for the kitchen building.

Foundations for the kitchen/mess building

June 10, 2020
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2006 Travels September 21

THURSDAY 21 SEPTEMBER NORTH POINT CAMP

John had to be up really early, to take Mc to the morning plane from Hedland to Perth. From there, Mc would connect to a flight to Darwin – his home base. With no direct flights from Hedland to Darwin or Alice Springs, it meant that when the men were going off on their week of leave, the best part of two days of that week was spent travelling.

Today, I took some photos of the road and the scenery from RV1, and a view of it, at the current time, from the road.

RV1 site from the Access Road, with already-delivered buildings

HO sent me a new pro forma for the Daily Activity Sheet. Apparently, it had been developed by the guy who was in charge of the SA project, for his use there, and HO thought it would be a better one to use for here, too. It certainly made it clearer what information I was to provide on it.

In view of that, I made up a sheet for each of the men to complete, when they were signing on in the morning, briefly summarizing what work they had done the day before. I couldn’t see any other way of gathering this information, since I really had no grasp of what was happening on the site. It should not be too onerous for them – just a few words, like trenching, levelling ground, unloading truck, welding tie downs, etc. From that, I could make up the DAS. I also had to put in things like temperature, wind speed estimate, any accidents or safety issues, and anything else relevant that I could think of!

Also completed and faced back to HO the paysheets. I liked that we were already on there, with some impressive hours tallied up already! Also faxed them our fuel dockets from the trip down for reimbursement.

When attempting to tidy up the offices – the mess left by the whirlwind that was BB, plus the chaotic K – found more invoices and sent them off. I still had to try to chase up some One Steel invoices from K! HO knew he should have had them, but needed to actually see them…..

I inducted two sprayers (for termites and pests in general) and a FMG man from Perth who was checking something to do with water supply.

Two more bedroom portable buildings arrived on a truck – a large truck! Now I knew to get their serial numbers before they were “laid down” in the large, flat, holding area off to one side of the site. Here, they would be arranged in close-together rows until such time as they could be put into their intended proper positions.

The lay down area – building storage. Some 25 accommodation portables already delivered. At right and back were some mystery buildings…..

A new task today was to clean and tidy the men’s eating area and the fridge. Can’t escape bloody housework work!

P and son arrived on schedule. It had taken them two nights and three days to cross from Alice Springs, on the Gary Junction Road, crossing the Canning Stock Route, through Punmu community and Telfer Mine area. They camped in swags beside the tracks for those two nights.

John was in Port Hedland for much of the day. He was going to get to know that part of the highway really well! One of his tasks was to get a flat tyre fixed, from the golf buggy used to get about the site.

After tea, enjoyed talking with P about his trip across the desert tracks. Travelling on some of those had interested me, for some time, ever since reading some of Len Beadell’s books about the surveying and grading of same. I was always keen to gather any information that would confirm which routes would be ok with our van. P seemed to think that the way he came would not pose too many issues.

The road “home at the end of the day. Down the hill, across the dry creek channel, then Fly Camp on the right.

June 9, 2020
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2006 Travels September 20

WEDNESDAY 20 SEPTEMBER NORTH POINT CAMP

The nights here cooled down a bit, which was pleasant. The days were hot – into the 30’s.

The camp generator, which was a constant background noise, went off about 4am this morning. The silence woke me up! There had been some wind through the night, which made the shade cloth and tarp flap around a bit.

When I checked phone in the morning, had a text reply from daughter. So phone had worked last night. I was pleased – did not feel quite so isolated now.

View to west from RV1 site – access road.

I did the room schematic and recorded where our people were staying. An ongoing task would be to keep up to date with the movements of our staff and subbies and liase with the FMG contracted staff who ran the Fly Camp, to ensure they had space available for them.

Emailed a copy of the Excel spread sheet with building numbers off to M at head office, along with yesterday’s Activity Sheet. Still wasn’t sure I was completing this properly.

As requested, I collected the men’s pay sheets for sending to Head Office (HO). One of the men, Mc, was flying out tomorrow for his week off. He had been here since the beginning. I had to tell him his flight times, as arranged by HO. I gave him a hard copy of this that had come through on the fax and also put one in his file. In my previous “proper” career, we had been meticulous about keeping every note made and every bit of information about each student, in their file – just in case something came back years later, to try and bite us on the bum. It was just second nature to me to file any relevant thing here.

The two high ups from FMG were back again today, along with their Port Hedland head person. John inducted him.

At HO’s request, I had to chase up K’s record book and invoices he’d received while he’d been in charge of the show here for the past few weeks. He was a very unorganized person, it seemed and had no idea where these might be. It eventually turned out that Mc had them.

BB told me to find out and list who had the various keys and spare keys for the company’s plant and equipment on site here. I found this hard to do – more poor organization meant no one seemed to know!

BB left today – he was driving his own vehicle.

Fly Camp tea tonight was corned beef, mash, peas and carrots, zucchini and squash in a white sauce, followed by chocolate muffins. I would not record any more meal details – had done enough to give a representative sample of the quality of meals we received. To date, there had been ample quantity and I hoped that would continue as the camp became fuller.

Resize of 09-20-2006 Fly Camp Sunset 2

June 9, 2020
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2006 Travels September 19

TUESDAY 19 SEPTEMBER NORTH POINT CAMP

I worked 6am to 6.30pm.

John had to take some people to the afternoon plane out of Hedland. He left our site at 2.30 and got back to camp at 7.30pm. I was so happy we were being paid by the hour!

The big event of today was that the comms man, working remotely from Alice Springs, somehow got the internet working! Yay! But the printer was still not working, though. But at least, with the photocopier, internet and fax, I could do much of the stuff needed.

One of the first documents through from head office, when the fax was working, was a document for me on company reporting procedures. These related to:

* Delivery dockets for buildings being brought to the site. It seemed that everything would be portable and made elsewhere. The docket process varied depending on whether the buildings came on a company truck or via another transport company. Delivery dockets came in duplicates and triplicates – why make it simple?

* Building numbers – every building delivered should have a company serial number on it and a manufacturer’s number. These were to be recorded as they came and sent daily to head office. (I wondered just how many would be coming each day?) Of course, the only way to make sure such numbers were correct on the paperwork, was to trot outside and play hunt the numbers on said buildings.

* A Daily Activity Report was to be completed and faxed to Head Office each day. Something else I had to figure out. I could think of some things that came under that heading, but some of them were certainly not the company’s business!

* Weekly Milestone Progress Reports were to be completed each Sunday and faxed through to head office. Not by me, I hoped……..Milestone? Progress?

* Milestone Completion Certificate – to be completed as soon as it was considered that the Activities had been achieved, and faxed to Head Office. This would support the company’s Tax Invoice to FMG. These had to be countersigned by a representative from the FMG Team. (Worry about all that later, since nothing looked like being completed for a while yet.)

Yes, well……For someone with no prior knowledge of the building and projects industries, these instructions raised more questions than they answered! I just had to hope that all would become clear in time, and before I stuffed up something important.

Camp locations (Zoom, current). Shows the Great Northern Highway, the now completed railway, only a rough graded line when we started; scars where Fly Camp and RV1 were once built.

Some of the instructions the secretary back in Darwin had tried to give me, had related to delivery dockets filing and keeping records of same. I could not really follow her system then, but decided now that from what I had understood, it was unnecessarily convoluted and that I would work it out for myself. She was dealing with different sorts of deliveries up there, anyway.

I decided to tackle the easy seeming things first. Faxed my updated contacts list to Alice Springs, along with a $3000 bill from a Hedland forklift company. Hoped someone there knew how same had been incurred, because I didn’t – it was just lying around in a heap of papers on a desk.

I found a template document amongst the papers I’d been given in Darwin, for Daily Activity Report. Aha – meant to be a summary of work done and by whom, and any other relevant information, like accidents. So filled that in as best I could – not really knowing what work had taken place the day before, who was even working here, and there not being anyone I could ask. That information was going to have to come to me, somehow, in the future.

I phoned the Shire to notify them that we had started site work. Despite my reminder yesterday, the boss had not done so.

Several times, the boss asked me to make phone calls to check on things – and I really had no idea what I was asking about! But I was definitely learning fast.

I decided to tackle head on the business of the building serial numbers. A few buildings had already been delivered, before we had access to the site, and these had been put down in the parking area at Fly Camp. I made a start by walking around them and finding the plates with the numbers on and recording same.

Resize of 09-17-2006 Buildings were brought in.

Already delivered buildings

With John’s help, I organized a spreadsheet to keep track of these records. I would be able to update it as more buildings rolled in. There would be a lot to keep tabs on, as RV1 was to have 70 four room sleeping portables alone, plus all the other buildings for things like a gym, an ice room, first aid room and so on.

I had found a diagram of the proposed village layout, in the office, and been amazed when I studied it, at the facilities that were going in, and at the sheer scale of it all. And the company was putting in a second one of the same, some 150kms south of here – RV2. It had been explained to me that this would be staggered a few weeks behind RV1, so that sub contractors would finish their work at RV1 and then stage down to the other site. There was a Fly Camp set up down there too – South Point – but I gathered it was even more primitive than ours.

Some of the big guys from FMG visited the site. As John had gone to Hedland, I had to induct them onto site. Talk about the blind leading the blind!

The Fly Camp boss had asked me to sort out which of our staff were occupying which rooms at the Fly Camp – and to work with them about keeping track of this as workers moved in and out. So I got a drawing of the camp from him this evening, so I could make up a room allocation schematic.

R arrived, having driven from Darwin – good to see him again.

Tonight’s camp meal featured a meat curry and two types of meat stew, rice, pappadums, Greek salad, curried cooked green beans, sour cream, yoghurt, followed by some sort of peach crumble. Really good food, at least.

Discovered that our mobile works – a bit – outside, at night. A matter of wandering about out there, keeping one eye alert for any bars on the phone and the other alert for stray death adders. Snakes hunt at night, don’t they? I texted daughter to test it out.

Sunsets here were pretty spectacular. In fact, the whole environment was beginning to grow on me. I really liked returning to Fly Camp from the site, with the low hills of whatever range it was, in the distance.

Resize of 09-20-2006 Fly Camp Sunset

June 7, 2020
by wendyviney 2 Comments

2006 Travels September 18

MONDAY 18 SEPTEMBER NORTH POINT CAMP

I worked from 6am to 6pm, with only 15 minutes off!

As the men started work at 6am, so I must too. I could see that it was going to be early to bed at night – which was ok as there was not much else to do.

So it was up at 5am, into our distinctive work gear, then breakfast. I tended to eat mine in the van, from our own supplies, but John was attracted by the cooked breakfasts on offer at the kitchen. We both had to pack a lunchbox (crib) from supplies set out in the kitchen van – could make ourselves sandwiches or meat and salad packs.

Leaving for work in the very early morning

Then we drove ourselves 3kms along the road to the construction site, and my new office. This was a long portable building, divided into three rooms. On one end was the office of the boss and whoever was in charge of the site. At the other end was a kitchenette, with some tables and chairs – the mens’ lunch area, also a general storage area. In the middle was the office space for John and me.

Resize of 09-29-2006 FMG RV1 1 oct 06 001

The lunch room end of the office donga

It would do. There was no water hooked up so that – for coffee and tea making – came from big cooler bottles that had been sent down from Darwin with the load of office supplies. Power came from a generator outside.

There was no toilet at all – a situation I had to do some thinking about!

Someone had begun to set the offices up in a basic way. Computers had been set up for me and boss, but as yet there was no fax or internet, or a working printer. But there was a working phone in each. Comms were via a satellite dish – being done by a Port Hedland company.

The phones were very busy today – mostly with calls for BB, or being made by him. But some came in for me, from head office, with various instructions and bits of information. I was asked to remind BB to phone the local Shire to inform them that the company had commenced work on site.

BB clarified John’s job for him – as per the description following – although the letter containing this did not arrive until later, and was dated 19/9! But John now felt he understood much more of what he was expected to do. I wished I could say the same.

John’s job description included:

“As a guide only, your duties will include:

Safety Assistant
Store control
Local purchasing
Transport to and from Port Hedland
Documentation of site progress – daily – both photographic and written (the latter soon devolved to me!)
Travel assistance

You will be expected to work hours as required, with half hour for lunch break…..without payment of overtime penalty rates. Your employment is based on 6 days on, 1 day off.”

Initially I remained quite confused about the specifics of my role. Those instructions or information that BB gave out, seemed to assume that I knew a lot more about the construction industry than I did – which was basically zero! It was a different language….

Eventually, like John, I received a letter formally setting out my role:

“……duties will include:

Managing all site visitors, including redirecting them to relevant staff members as and when required
Answering phones, including taking messages and redirecting calls.
Managing the company’s mail system, collecting, opening, recording and distributing all incoming mail, preparing and posting outgoing mail. (Ummm……I hadn’t noticed any postman out here in the scrub!)
Providing general office administration support, as and when required including: Records Management – creation of new files, filing documents, storage and retrieval of files, assisting with co-ordination of activities and staff.
Undertaking costing and purchasing research on behalf of the project staff
Managing office reporting requirements on behalf of the company
Keeping Occupation Health and Safety Records
Co-ordinating and recording all site meetings
Maintaining payroll records as directed by __
Other duties as required.”

That last one was interesting – i.e. everything else we haven’t thought of!

What the hell had John gotten me into?

BB sent John off to Port Hedland, driving a company vehicle, a small bus, about a 12 seater, called the Bongo Bus – to pick up the boss of the engineering sub-contracting firm, from the 9.20 am plane. This was to be the first of many plane passenger transports for John.

Through the day, some trucks trundled in – big trucks – carrying some portable buildings, a shipping container and assorted other “stuff”. The pace of activity seemed to have ramped up.

One way to make sure the message wasn’t missed!

I got through a lot of odds and ends, mostly on instruction from BB or people in head office. Before one could use their own initiative, they had to have some understanding of what they were doing!

I typed up emergency numbers for display in the office, also contact names and numbers for the company staff working on the SA site. Had to phone Port Hedland Police and hospital for their details. I prepared a notice for the men about remembering to hand in their keys before going off the site for breaks, discovering this way that they worked three weeks on and one week off.

I could not print any of that work yet, though.

I also made a mud map of the location of North Point and RV1 (Rail Village 1) to send to sub-contractors and the like, who might be driving themselves here.

Unloading was interesting to watch – the first time; a few hundred loads later, ho hum……

I made phone calls to get full contact details for some of the contractors, whose names BB gave me. It seemed a lot of the construction details and suppliers were still being pulled together. Some of these surprised me – a Turf company, swimming pool installer, gymnasium equipment. Clearly, there was a lot more to these sorts of camps than I ever would have thought.

BB and one of the men were having a discussion in the office and studying maps. It seemed to involve camp locations and cyclone ratings. Hmmm – that was something I bet John hadn’t thought of. Caravans and cyclones do not mix well.

An office person at head office was trying to get the internet and fax stuff sorted, and whatever software was needed to get the printer working.

I had to phone a FMG person in Port Hedland to find out the name of FMG’s Purchasing Officer, and also phone some electrical suppliers to find out where they were based.

John was to get a cash float from BB, then from head office for purchases in Port Hedland. If he had to use our credit card, he would be reimbursed, they said. But if a large sum was involved, he was to get the store involved to contact head office for a direct debit. John was to keep a record of money spent.

P – who was supposed to supervise one of the two sites – should be arriving Thursday. With his son, who would also be working here, he was driving across the desert track from Alice Springs – the Gary Junction Track and then through Telfer. Sounded interesting and was certainly the shortest way – if not the easiest.

R would be here from Darwin tomorrow, then BB would leave.

When briefing new arrivals, I was to warn them about the death adders that lived in the spinifex clumps of the site!

Resize of 09-22-2006 Surrounding country side 3

Spinifex clumps frequented by death adders

I phoned the Royal Flying Doctor Service to find out how we stood, in an emergency. They were happy to consult by phone at any time. They said there were no landing facilities in the area, as the landing strip at the Yandeyarra Community was unserviceable. We needed to find out if there was a functioning airstrip in the area of our second site. This would be easier if I knew where that second site was!

Had started to unpack the boxes of office equipment that had been put together by the Darwin secretary. There seemed to be an awful lot of supplies and much duplication. I worked out that it was all supposed to supply both RV1 and RV2 site offices – when the latter was set up – but there still seemed to be mountains of pens, pencils, post it notes, files, every sort of office oddment one could think of. Boxes and boxes of printer paper – would be good if we had a functioning printer! Memory sticks. You name it. I was to realize later that someone at Alice Springs had assembled boxes of office supplies for the place, as well as the Darwin lady doing so. Crossed wires. Quadruple supplies.

John was already spending his float! He recorded that he bought engine oil for the golf buggies used to get round on the sites, hydraulic fluid for a forklift, alcohol for BB, and a carton of cigarettes for one of the men – OK’d by BB. Looked like John would be doing a lot of shopping!

Back at Fly Camp, after eventually managing to get in for a shower, we joined the small company group, sitting outside the boss’ donga, for happy hour drinks – BYO. Got to know the man who came in this morning, who ran the company that would be doing the earthworks, and that sort of stuff.

Tonight’s camp meal was another good one: garlic bread, mixed salad and pasta salad, lasagna, spag bol, followed by a sultana cake with lemon icing. I guessed the cooks had to go to Port Hedland regularly for supplies.

Also in camp tonight was another female – I felt much better that I was no longer the only woman in the place! She was a sort of house keeper for the camp – cleaning and the like – who had been on her break period when we arrived.

After tea, I wrote an email to son, thinking John could take the laptop to Hedland on his next trip there, and activate it to send my mail.

June 7, 2020
by wendyviney Leave a comment

2006 Travels September 17

SUNDAY 17 SEPTEMBER NORTH POINT

It was obvious that days began early here – like pre-dawn!

There were probably only about twenty people in the camp, but they were up and about really early and headed off – to which tasks I had no idea at that time.

We made our way to the eating area for breakfast – no shortage of food on offer, it seemed. As well as fruit, cereals and toast there were hot offerings for those so inclined.

K had said last night that we were to take a day off today, because nothing was happening at the construction site. We could have taken an extra day to get here!

The big boss of the company – BB – would be here later today. We hadn’t met him yet. It would be all go, from tomorrow.

Apparently, yesterday, the installation of a donga that would be the Site Office, was completed. Later, I obtained a photo of it at this stage. It was to be removed once the Village was built, so it was positioned at the edge of the site, out of the way of the building work. Beside it was a shipping container holding company tools and other gear.

Site Office, storage container, generator, company fork lift and site transport

We did some more setting up of our camp. Draped shadecloth all around the annexe, to create a cooler and more private space.

We had been told that there could be quite ferocious storms here, particularly as we moved closer to summer. So we made sure our establishment was well fastened down. I was shown some photos of the aftermath of a storm that went through just over a week ago. There had been much rain, as well as winds. The cleared red earth that the camp had been plonked down on, became red mud really easily.

Storm at Fly Camp. White donga at back was for the boss.

Fly Camp kitchen/dining area after the storm

In that storm, a large and heavy cooler was picked up by the wind and flung so hard against a donga that it had made a big dent in the side!

Airborne cooler!

We met the big boss, after his arrival. He was a large man – physically and in personality. Very forceful. Found out that one of the dongas, sitting a bit separately from a row of them, was for the use of boss when on site. The company had trucked it in – as opposed to most of the others, which the FMG team had sourced. The boss had his own shower connected up – lucky man!

It was kind of indicated that this was the largest project that the company had yet undertaken. It sort of seemed that they had been surprised to get the contract. As a result of this, they found themselves in the complicated position of also having the simultaneous job of constructing the mining camp for a big new copper mining project being started up in remote SA. So they had two really big jobs going at once. No wonder they had been hiring staff so desperately! They’d had to rapidly expand staff and gear.

I could already see one difficulty with Fly Camp life – the limited number of showers and toilets! I was surprised to find that everything was provided here, though – even down to soap, shampoo and conditioner. But I guess that made sense as few of the workers here had independent transport – or the time to go to distant Port Hedland to shop.

Dinner was roast lamb and beef, roast potatoes and pumpkin, peas and baby carrots mixed, a broccoli and cauliflower mix in white sauce, gravy. Afters were apple crumble with walnuts in the crumble, and chocolate icecream. I couldn’t fault the food to date, for sure. The two cooks were only young guys, but seemed to really know what they were doing.

June 5, 2020
by wendyviney Leave a comment

2006 Travels September 16

SATURDAY 16 SEPTEMBER EIGHTY MILE BEACH TO NORTH POINT CAMP 355kms

Eighty Mile Beach Caravan Park

We were back travelling in good time.

More dreary country to Port Hedland.

Reached there in time to go to the shops at South Hedland and get some weekend papers.

Refuelled there – $1.54cpl.

Port Hedland was a town in two parts. The older town and the original port facilities were on the coast but recent times had seen the main residential section and associated shops built several kms away, at South Hedland. The two were separated by swampy ground and extensive salt harvesting flats. The highway went by the new part.

There was a message on the phone, when we came into range again. It said we would be paid for our days of travel, as well as for fuel and accommodation. Yippee – because we had certainly racked up lots of travel hours!

Took Highway 1 out of Hedland, then the Great Northern Highway to the south. The country was marginally more interesting.

Followed our directions to – at about the 100km range from the highway junction – watch for the second turn off to the right, to the Yandeyarra Community. It was rather more than 100kms, but as predicted, opposite that there was a small sign to North Point, by a track that went to the east.

We took that dirt/gravel track, which was in quite good condition. Drove through the dry river bed channels of the Turner River, then about 3kms further on, there was a cluster of buildings that had to be our destination?

Pulled into a large parking area and went looking for our contact, H. He proved to be of retiree age, like us. We got the impression he had not known we were coming, but he walked around the establishment with us. Showed us the dining area – tables set up on bare ground, under tarps, outside a catering caravan. There were two shower/toilet dongas, one with a washing machine in – a total of two toilets and two showers, only, and unisex. I didn’t know how many people would be using this camp and was starting to wish that our little caravan had its own bathroom facilities!

There were a couple of rows of dongas containing bedrooms – all looked very pre-used. Other donga type buildings were scattered about. There was a tent too – apparently some of the visiting aboriginals did not like being inside the rather confined donga rooms.

Fly Camp

Rough “paths” of gravel linked the buildings. A big generator powered the place. Its noise was a constant background.

It was not a camp set up to fill one with great confidence!

H warned us that death adders abounded in the surrounding spinifex bush, so walking about out there required care. Lovely!

H decided that we could park the van right up at the end of a row of dongas, where there were also a couple of old caravans. We could plug our power lead into a power box on the end of the dongas. It was essential that we have power – already it was hot enough to need air con.

Our power source – quite a few plugs hooked into that one power box

It was obvious from the tour that we would be fed – there were a couple of catering/housekeeping staff.

So, this was a “fly camp” – a temporary, initial camp. It had been set up for some weeks already – by Fortescue, not our company. It had been used by FMG people and those doing environmental and native heritage assessments and surveys. All the start up stuff. Now, our company people were allowed to be “guests”, too, while we worked to get the Rail Village 1 to a point where the company people could move there while finishing off the place.

We followed a track around the camp perimeter to our designated spot and parked the van at the end of the donga row.

Resize of 09-16-2006 Fly Camp 4

Unpacked and set up. Plugged our power lead into the box along with several others. Because the lead had to cross a path to the van behind, John dug a trench, found a piece of plastic pipe and fed the lead through that, under the path. In the process, he disturbed a very pretty, well camouflaged little gecko type reptile.

Resident reptile

John took some photos of our van and the camp from up on top of the roof rack.

Being right at the edge of the camp set up, we were not far from the scrub that surrounded the camp. It was a pity that our van windows had to look out, though, on close by old vans and dongas, rather than the bush!

Resize of 09-16-2006 Setting up Fly Camp 3

We have camped in more attractive surroundings than this…….

Went to our first dinner at fly camp. It was served buffet style. There was a mixed green salad, potato salad, a mix of prawns and snap peas, hot rice, fish and chips, followed by a Boston bun style cake. Not bad at all.

Had no real idea who was who amongst the handful of fellow diners. Got the impression that there were not many company people here yet. One guy, K, did introduce himself – I thought he might be the site supervisor.

Resize of 09-16-2006 to rv1