The Montebello Islands, tread carefully.........

My apologies, this is another image from history. We went into Truro yesterday so my head is in cotton wool land. 

Never mind. During 1986 I was sent to Karratha in NW Oz to help initiate a system whereby North Sea pilots could relieve the Oz pilots while they came to Aberdeen to convert to new aircraft and up their skills. That’s not to denigrate them just a fact. 

We were supporting the nascent offshore gas industry, not too many flights per week to the platform but there were also perks, flights to places such as Barrow Island where a new oil and gas field, the Harriet, was working up. On my second trip to Barrow Jim Gumley and I picked up the Premier of WA, Paul Burke and Alan Bond the multi millionaire wide boy. They arrived in a private jet, dressed to kill, as if they were going to the Melbourne Cup horse race. Before winding up our Puma I clambered in the back, explained to the ladies that the life jacket and headsets would damage their wide brim pretty hats. I then stepped back and crushed Burke’s smokes. After squeezing the box back into shape I told him, “Sorry about that but you can’t smoke on this flight anyway.” Jim forgot the engines weren’t howling away so hooted with laughter. That’s where it started to go wrong.

Later we returned to the oil base to collect them all. If you have ever seen the crowd at the Royal Enclosure, Ascot, covered in dust and sand, you will understand what we created when we landed. 

One of our tasks was to take scientists and geologists to the Montebello Islands to conduct radiation checks. Those of a certain vintage may know this is where the UK government decided it was safe to explode atomic bombs for test purposes. Instant sunshine, as they are known in the trade. Warships were moored near the bomb sites, pillboxes made of concrete were built and vehicles planted in the sand. When we got there we had a nosey around first. There were huge holes in the ground and shoreline. The warships were stuffed and sunk, the pillboxes had been thrown around like dice and the vehicles had gone. 

Wandering around the place gave me an opportunity to contemplate the effects of an explosion on human inhabitants. These bombs made Hiroshima and Nagasaki look like sparklers. The islands were devoid of life, but the sea…….now the sea was full of fish and monster sharks. While I was there I heard that some dipsticks were planning to build a diving centre and hotel with a marina bridging two islands into a complex. That’s nice, I thought, shark feeding excursions. 

I love Australia, the people, the land, the wildlife and the oceans. Imagine flying over the sea and watching whales feeding on seas full of plankton, ahhhhhh, then watch in terror as huge torpedo shaped sharks hurtle out to sea from the shallows where they had been relaxing. We caught mud crabs by poking a piece of reinforcing steel into their holes, they would snap onto the steel and refuse to let go. This was done in shorts and bare feet, count your toes lads. Meanwhile the hairs on your neck would go up every time you heard a rustle, think of Crocodile Dundee and salt water crocs, you’ll get my drift. I could go on but I’d get maudlin and want to go back.