The Outback Wrangler

by Matt Wright

  But there was no real harm done. The ranger called off the search and remained in the camp for a day. When the drillers returned to pack up, I was feeling fit and reinvigorated. Unexpectedly, things came unstuck on the trip home.

  It was very late in the year and the wet season was around the corner. We packed up the rig, loaded our road trains and then headed back to Darwin. I was towing two large trailers, a medium trailer and a smaller two-wheel trailer known as a dog trailer. About an hour into the trip, the storm hit. There was so much water on the road, my wheels started to lose traction. It felt like I was driving on ice. Our lead driver got on the radio.

  ‘Nobody stops!’ he shouted. ‘If we stop in this shit, we’ll get bogged.’

  So on we ploughed. I was fighting the wheel, working hard to keep the truck on the road. I dropped down a gear, hopeful that at a slower speed I’d hold the road better. But the road was turning into a river. There were sections where the water came up to the top of my tyres. If I dropped my speed too dramatically, I’d get bogged. So I floored the accelerator. In retrospect, something was bound to go wrong.

  The first warning I had was losing one of my trailers. The sound of it coming loose was like thunder booming above the roar of the truck’s engine. I looked out the window and saw my dog trailer – which was carrying all the fuel – aquaplaning off the road. I slowed down but the dog trailer’s inertia carried it forward and was dragging my second trailer off the road too. From above, it would have looked like a giant metallic arm extending through the bush, clearing away scrub and trees. It was only a matter of time before one of those trailers tipped over. If that happened, the entire road train would be turned over. With all the fuel I was carrying, I’d be cooked.

  I put the foot down on the accelerator in the hope of dragging her back into line. It had no effect. The dog trailer was acting with a mind of its own. It started to inch forward so that it was level with the front of the cab. It felt like I was in a drag race. I didn’t dare adjust my speed. If I slowed too much, the dog trailer would speed past me and pull me off the road. If I tried outpacing the dog trailer and accelerated, I risked losing control completely. Luckily there were no tall gums lining the side of the road. If the trailer snagged a tree, the road train would be ripped apart. When a road train crashes at speed, the driver rarely survives. All I could do was hang on and hope.

  The rain eased a little, slightly improving visibility. The road ahead appeared to be clearing of water. But there was a worrying development. The side of the road was dropping away. I was now noticeably higher than the dog trailer. Maybe it was my imagination, but it felt as if the cab was starting to lean to one side.

  I looked ahead and swore. About 200 metres ahead, the side of the road dropped down into a large ditch. In about three seconds the dog trailer would fall into the ditch and the show would be over. For a split second, I contemplated opening my driver’s door and leaping out. The road train was travelling at over 60 km/h and the side of the road was hard and rocky.

  About 50 metres before disaster, the dog trailer hit a dry section. I felt the front cab shudder as the trailer’s tyres gripped the road and swung back in line. I dropped my speed. I was worried that the trailer’s little excursion on the side of the road would have damaged the axle or punctured tyres. There was still a chance it could tip over at any moment. After about 10 minutes, I was confident that the danger had passed.

  I fell behind as the convoy sped on to Darwin. I jumped out once I got on some dry ground to inspect the truck and its trailers. Incredibly, the only noticeable damage was a few gashes along the side of the trailer’s tyres. Otherwise everything appeared to be fine. I arrived about 30 minutes after the others and decided to keep that one quiet and not tell the boss what had happened.

  * * *

  The job involved more than just drilling for bore water. Sometimes the department sent us out to do repair work. The most interesting jobs involved fixing damage done by prospectors who’d headed into the red centre looking for oil or natural gas. This was in the early days of exploration drilling. Back then, mechanised vehicles weren’t built to go off road. So they loaded primitive drilling equipment onto the backs of camels, picked a point on the compass and went in search for their fortune.

  It was costly, time-consuming and dangerous work. These blokes were often heading into barren country that had never been explored. There didn’t seem to be much logic to where they dug their holes. There seemed to be only one guiding principle – the more remote the better.

  My most memorable repair job happened in the heart of the Simpson Desert. Eighty years earlier, exploration drillers had punched a hole in the earth’s surface hoping to find oil. Instead, they found the Artesian Basin. They abandoned the site after water bubbled up instead of black gold and were either unable or unwilling to plug the hole. The department was worried that the water was still gushing out. Our brief was to cap the hole.

  From Alice Springs, we drove south for 10 hours to the town of Finke and stopped overnight. At first light, we headed due east across the rolling sand dunes, following a GPS location. It was slow going. Road trains have a long braking distance because of the huge tonnage they haul. That meant we had to keep the trucks in a low gear just in case we had to stop suddenly. There was, after all, no way of telling if we were approaching a boulder or a sudden dip in the road.

  On and on we went, heading for a little pinprick in the desert. We came to our destination in the early afternoon. It was somewhere near the intersection of the Queensland/South Australia/Northern Territory border. This was the absolute definition of the middle of nowhere.

  I’ll never forget cresting that last sand dune and casting my eyes on one of the most spectacular and beautiful sights I’ve seen in my life. The hole those prospectors dug had created an oasis. Around the hole, there were a few hundred metres of native grass and shrubs. As we approached, birds took flight from trees that grew around a large network of lagoons and pools that had formed from the run-off. It was like a Garden of Eden in the Simpson Desert.

  In the middle of the oasis, we found the fountain of water bubbling away. It was a shame we had to put a cap on that hole. The moment the ground water stopped gushing to the surface, this pristine ecosystem would start dying. But this wasn’t a natural phenomenon. It was man-made. That hole needed to be plugged. The question was how to do it.

  The first task was to check the head pressure and measure the volume of water that was gushing up. To do that, we had to build a large platform above the hole, allowing us to lower a remote camera down to get a closer look. It was dangerous work. The water was coming up from deep below the earth’s surface. It was piping hot. If anyone fell in they would be scalded.

  On closer inspection, we saw that the people who had drilled this hole had attempted to cap it. But the steel casing had rusted out over the years and was woefully inadequate. We calculated that 50 litres a second was bubbling out of that hole. A disintegrated steel cap was never going to hold out against that sort of pressure. This was a job that needed a modern solution.

  First of all, we widened the breach with the drill pipe to reduce the pressure. We concreted the area around the hole before lowering an enormous nine-by-nine-metre casing. The casing was in two parts – an outer square and then a much smaller inner section – that had been welded together. One of the boys was working the crane, levering the casing down with the aid of guide ropes while the boss shouted instructions from the edge of the platform. The rest of us huddled off to the side, waiting with bated breath.

  The crane lowered the cap into place and the water flow abruptly stopped. We had just enough time to congratulate each other on a job well done before everything went to shit.

  The pressure blew the inner casing away and a huge column of steaming hot water shot into the air. Fifty litres a second was now being pumped through a hole with an eight-inch diameter and splashing onto the platform. My boss was knocked off his feet and washed beneath the platf
orm. He tried to get out of the hole, but the water was pouring down on him. He was going to drown. The bloke on the crane, meanwhile, had abandoned ship. He was worried that the entire rig was going to collapse.

  I jumped up on the platform and gritted my teeth as hot water splashed against my skin. I slipped over on the sodden wooden platform and ran over to the crane controls. I pulled back on the levers, lifting the casing off the hole, thereby reducing the pressure. The waterspout vanished and the hole went back to a bubbling hot spring. While I lifted off the cap the other boys helped the boss up. He looked like he’d been sunbaking on a beach without sunscreen. He was lucky he wasn’t killed.

  Enjoying a bath while working on a drill rig in the Northern Territory.

  8

  Kapooka

  After six months drilling, I felt I’d established myself in the job. It was time for me to join the army. I made a few phone calls and managed to get into a training module that coincided with the wet season. The boss was happy. Losing me through the off-season was no big deal. In electing to do my training through the hottest time of the year, I was asking for a tough slog. But I figured that after a year of drilling, I could handle tough situations.

  Everyone who takes the 10-kilometre bus trip from Wagga Wagga in New South Wales to Kapooka has a similar story. The NCOs – sergeants and corporals – meet you outside the bus and are all smiles and handshakes. They act like your best mates, reassuring you that you’ve made the best decision of your life. Then you pull into Blamey Barracks – the army’s recruit training centre – and everything goes to shit.

  This is exactly what I experienced. The bus came to a stop and a sergeant stood up, a dark shadow falling across his face. He eyeballed everyone on the bus before drawing in a lungful of air.

  ‘RECRUITS!’ he roared. ‘GET OFF THIS BUS! NOW!’

  After all the backslapping we’d just gone through, I initially thought he was taking the piss. I started laughing out loud. Big mistake.

  ‘WHAT ARE YOU LAUGHING AT, MAGGOT? GET OFF THIS BUS, NOW!’

  We all scurried off the bus and sort of huddled together like a bunch of scared children. The sergeant absolutely blasted us, telling us to properly form two lines. Eventually, when that was sorted out, we had to hand over our phones and any contraband – knives, cigarettes, food, and whatever else. All our personal items were shoved into bags. Then we were directed to our barracks. Each recruit was issued a camouflage uniform and physical training (PT) gear. We were ordered to change into our PT gear and prepare for our first march. It was stinking hot weather – high 30s, without a breath of wind. We marched back and forth across the parade ground for hours on end. The NCOs were relentless.

  ‘We don’t stop until everyone marches in step,’ they said.

  The moment I missed a step or tripped, a sergeant or a corporal would be in his or her face, hurling abuse. It took us three hours before we all found our rhythm. Before being dismissed, we were warned that there would be plenty of marching in the coming weeks.

  That night in the mess hall, everyone was assigned to a room, four people to each. A six-foot-high divider ran down the middle of the room for greater privacy and each person was assigned a locker that had to be kept in pristine condition. Lights-out was at 10 o’clock.

  Most recruits will tell you that the first night is daunting. Reality dawns when those lights are switched off. This was where we would be stuck for the next 80 days. Most recruits are fresh-faced kids just out of school. I didn’t hear anyone break down and cry on that first night, but I’m sure it happened. After an afternoon of marching, I was too exhausted to care. I fell into a deep sleep.

  In the morning I was wrenched awake by the sound of machine-gun fire.

  ‘What the fuck was that?’ asked one of my roommates.

  Off it went again. I stayed completely still while another round was fired. The first morning reveille was being announced with machine-gun fire in the hallway. They were firing blanks, of course. But it’s not the best 6 a.m. start. This was the morning alarm bell, Australian army-style.

  ‘GET OUT OF BED!’ roared the sergeant down the corridor. ‘GET UP! GET UP!’

  We’d been briefed the night before on what was to supposed to happen each morning. We had to tear the sheets off our bed and then form up in the corridor. Once everyone was accounted for, it was on.

  ‘GET MOVING!’

  We had 15 minutes to make our bed to army standard, fight for a shower, shave, get dressed and then wait for inspection. The sergeant barked, roared, screamed, shouted and humiliated practically all of us that morning. Everyone had to remake his bed. As punishment we went without breakfast, and were sent back out onto the parade ground to go marching.

  I was suddenly struck with the feeling that I’d made a terrible mistake in coming here. I couldn’t believe I turned my back on a job that I enjoyed to come to this place and get treated like a schoolkid. I would have walked off the barracks right then if not for one compelling reason to stay – I would have been arrested. The NCOs made a point of reminding us that the moment we’d signed up, we’d effectively handed ourselves over to the military.

  ‘By all means, leave,’ they used to taunt. ‘You’ll be thrown into jail.’

  Not only was the jail term longer than the three-month training course, you’d also have a record. It made sense that going AWOL was deemed a serious offense. But I couldn’t believe how heavily recruits were punished for offences that in normal life you’d consider pretty minor stuff.

  Take pulling a sickie, for example. This was something the army classified as ‘malingering’, aka a chargeable offence. I heard that the only way you could get out of the training was if you told the padre you were going to kill everyone on the base. They’d put you on the first bus out of there. But you also ran the risk of being charged by the police.

  So I was trapped in this place for three months. The letters I was writing back to Mum started out being very negative. ‘My sergeant is a cockhead!’ I’d write. ‘I want to get out of this bloody place.’ But then something strange happened. I started to enjoy myself.

  * * *

  At Kapooka, we were told that the infantry – soldiers who fight on foot – are an elite group. Only the best are admitted. To become the best, you have to train the hardest. I’d done jobs that had challenging moments – working as a ringer on a cattle station, working in maintenance on a resort, cleaning toilets and bedrooms in ski lodges and drilling bores across the country. I’d had my share of long, tough days. But this was different.

  Every morning began with physical training – pack marches mainly, over long distances. In the first couple of weeks, we’d walk three kilometres, lugging rifles, 10-kilogram packs and full webbing – the military belts, packs and pouches soldiers wear to store rations, water, ammunition, first aid, survival equipment and much more.

  The mornings became more gruelling the deeper into the training we progressed. Before the end of the first month, we were lugging 15-kilo packs, seven kilos of webbing and machine guns over 20 kilometres. We were walking across uneven ground in temperatures that soared into the high 30s. Inevitably, people started to come unstuck.

  Those first few weeks were undoubtedly the toughest for all of us. The people who struggled the most were those who were stuck in a civilian mindset. This wasn’t like normal life, nor was it a normal job. The trick was to adjust to the surroundings and form a different definition of what constituted a tough day. Only then can you really appreciate how far the human body can be pushed.

  I was learning lessons of my own. Top of the list was the importance of teamwork. We’d all been grouped into platoons – a unit-size of about 27 – and then split into sections of nine. As a section, you would do almost everything together, from weapons training to eating meals. It bred intense camaraderie. Those eight other people would become like family. If one person in your section fell back on the march, then the rest of you would stay back with him or her. It became clear to
us all that you are only as strong as your weakest link. This lesson stood me in good stead when I started my own businesses.

  Outward appearance counts for nothing. Big, burly blokes who talked tough were more likely to whinge and cry than anyone else. Often, it was the skinny, little fellas that would excel – never complaining, but instead encouraging the ones that showed signs of cracking. Most surprising to me were the female recruits. They were treated as harshly as the rest of us and I don’t remember seeing one of them lose it. At Kapooka, mental toughness counted for more than physical ability.

  Life at Kapooka wasn’t all torture. In fact, there were elements I really enjoyed. Weapons training was great fun. It’s not every day you get to fire a machine gun or a grenade launcher. The weapons-training simulation system – a 12-lane indoor small-arms facility where you learnt to shoot with laser guns in a computer-generated virtual reality – was a particular highlight.

  Everything we did – the physical conditioning, pack marching, weapons training, bayonet drills, building camaraderie – was all a prelude to what I felt was the main event: the war games. The games took place towards the end of our training. We went bush for three days loaded up with rations and survival equipment. Our mission was to ambush and capture opposing platoons.

  This seemed to me to be the right sort of training. It was the complete opposite to how I felt about parade drill. Essentially, our training was in preparation for combat. What good was being able to march in step or salute a superior officer when bullets are whizzing around your head? The answer I got back whenever I asked this question always referred to discipline, the one area in life I’d always struggled with.