CANCELLED Field Service!

G’day All,

As most of you may be aware, it was my birthday on Monday. However, it wasn’t the best birthday I’ve had. I had to go to central Queensland, Blackwater, to do some field service. Well so I thought anyway.

Monday I travelled to Rockhampton via aeroplane then to Blackwater via 4WD. I spent the afternoon catching up on some paperwork, as I wasn’t due at the coal mine until 6:30am the following morning. I had dinner at the local pub.

Then on Tuesday I went to the coal mine and did the 4hr long induction (which stays current for 12 months). Upon completion of this, I then completed a shutdown specific induction. From here I went to see the contact person on site, only to find out the work had been completed by one of our competitor companies! GRRRRRRRRRRR not happy Jan!!!!!!

So I travelled back on Wednesday, not very happy about the lack of communication on behalf of the contract company doing the shutdown work.

On Tuesday afternoon, I took some photos of the Japanese Garden in Blackwater. I thought this a most unusual feature of the town, but quite nice all the same.

Cheers for now,
Damo

This is the Japanese Garden from the Capricorn Highway.

The plaque commemorating the open of the garden. In both English and Japanese.

One of the many stone monuments in the garden.

Another stone monument.

And another one! I'm sure your getting a bit bored now, so check out the next photo...

Here's another one of my infamous tricky panoramic shots. This pond is the centre piece of the Japanese garden.

This is the traditional raked gravel plot within the garden.

This tree is a boab, or bottle tree. These appear to be native to central Queensland. This one was in the Japanese garden to provide a "local" touch.

This is the garden viewing hut. I took a number of photos from here.

Here I am standing in front of an old drag line bucket. These buckets are used to collect coal from the open-cut mine bed and put in the dump trucks. I think the ones used in the local mines are actually bigger than this one!

Another photo of the drag line bucket, you can probably fit a 3 tonne flatbed truck in here quite easily!

More Visitors to The Groves

Hi All,

During the last weekend of September/the first weekend of October, my younger brother, Michael, and his girlfriend, Jess, came to visit Tanya and me.

We took them on a bit of site-seeing through the Sunshine Coast. We visited the macadamia nut factory at Yandina, drove along the coast and had lunch at Coolum Beach, went for drive through Noosa and then to the Glasshouse Mountains lookout near Beerwah.

On Saturday we went into the city to have a look around, we went for a ride up and down the Brisbane River on one of the CityCat catamarans.

Michael took a heap of photos over these 2 days, which I’ll try and get copies of to post on the blog.

Sunday was more leisurely. We went to the North Pine Country Markets at Kurwongbah. Michael and Jess bought lots of presents to take back to South Australia.

Tanya and I really enjoyed having Michael and Jess stay with us. I was doing my best to convince Michael to move to Queensland and get an environmental job up here; as there are plenty of them!

There are a few photos here, but I’ll try and post some more later.

Cheers for now,
Damo

Looking down onto the production floor of the Macadamia factory. This is the hand sorting and grading table.

This guy had a giant 2-stroke fan strapped to his harness as well as the parachute. He was able to ride the winds as well as change his direction with the fan. It was pretty cool to watch. We saw him at a beach we stopped by on the drive to Noosa.

Myself and Michael at Noosa

Tanya and Jess at Noosa

The Big Pineapple! We also took Michael and Jess here, near Nambour. Mostly we wanted to show them a pineapple plantation.

Pineapple fields...forever...

Ok, ok I know that's a lame Beatles pun!

Here's a teeny tiny pineapple beginning its life on the shrub.

Hot & Steamy Field Service

G'day everyone,

Well it's been a very long time since I updated my blog spot! I have been very busy working all over Queensland and even overseas since my last entry.

During July (20th to 23rd), I had to go to Tanjungpinang on Bintan in Indonesia to do a field service visit. I travelled via plane to Singapore (Changi airport) and then by sea ferry for 2 hours to the island of Bintan. Bintan is nowhere near Bali or Bandah Aceh, so I was pretty safe. It was to do final commissioning of a belt weigher and loss-in-weight system at a pipe coating factory.

The weighing systems weighed the sand and aggregate as well as the cement to make concrete. This concrete is then sprayed onto 12 metre long steel pipes. This increases the weight of the pipe from 2.5 to 8 tonnes! They can then be used to carry fresh water under the sea (they are heavy enough to sit on the sea bed).

I didn't have much time to look around, but one of the guys I worked with, Eric, was an Indonesian and he took me out for a traditional Indonesian seafood dinner. This consisted of chilli prawns, crunchy deep fried white fish (not sure of its type), and sea snails. The snails were actually very tasty.

I didn't get an upset stomach from the Indonesian food, but from the Korean food I ate. The Korean's actually own the pipe factory; and they supplied lunch for all the Westerners helping with the commissioning. I must have had a bit too much chilli :-(

Most people get around on small motorbikes that they run on benzine. I saw one motorbike with 6 passengers! Dad driving, 2 small children sitting on fuel tank, mum sitting side saddle, small child standing at dad's back and mum nursing a baby! Crazy stuff.

Anyway I really enjoyed my time there, and it would be nice to go back again some day. But I guess we'll have to wait to see how safe it will be to travel there.

Yes the weather was very muggy, especially after the huge down-pour in an afternoon storm and temperature around about 35°C!

Well there are a few pictures here, but I didn't get much of a chance to take many.

Cheers for now,
Damo

From the window of the aeroplane, I could see this active volcano on one of the Indonesian islands.

Flying into Singapore on the way over.

This is route the ferry took from Tanah Merah Ferry Terminal in Singapore to Tanjungpinang on Bintan.

This is a night shot of one of the many shops on the main road in Tanjungpinang. I took this after I had been out to dinner with Eric.

Some more night life in Tanjungpinang. There were many of these small street stalls.

This is the conveyor to the concrete mixer from the feeder hoppers. In the background are the two cement storage silos.

Here's the loss-in-weight bin for the cement and the two feeder hoppers for the sand and iron-ore aggregate.

Here's the ship that bought some supplies to the fatory while I was there.

Here's another one of my tricky panoramic shots. This is the quay where supplies were unloaded for use in the factory.

Here's Eric (on right) and one of the onsite electricians at the pipe factory.