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I can't remember exactly how it came about, but after around six months operation, we ended up with my camp being dry, and after the experience of comparing the performance of the two crews over several months, and the issues that arose, the Manager in Alice Springs issued an edict that the company supply runs, either truck or light plane, would no longer carry private orders of booze. Since there was essentially no other contact between the crews and the rest of the world, that settled the matter.
I don't remember there being significant grumbles on my crew, but I understand there were a few on the other one. I mentioned that we had a bulldozing supervisor who had his own plane. (No, he did not indulge in any bootlegging I am aware of), but he did get to a Slim Dusty performance in Alice Springs. He apparently knew Slim, and asked him to include in his concert an alternative version of "A pub with no Beer" entitled "A camp with no beer", which he supplied the words for. And he recorded it. I have a copy of that recording - and I get a mention in it!
But perhaps the last straw for the beer supplies to the other camp was when a supply run to both camps ran into trouble. The vehicle was the Zeligson, mentioned above. I am not sure why it was used for the run, perhaps because of its greater carrying capacity than the supply truck, but more likely because it had rained and there were some pretty boggy spots only 100km or so from Alice.
I was aware of the run, but not exactly when it was leaving. It was, for some reason coming first to our crew if I remember rightly. When I had not been advised of its departure a couple of days after I expected to be advised, I raised the matter in my morning radio schedule with the Alice office. "Oh dear! Did we forget to tell you! They left four days ago!" It was a two day trip, or more likely one and a half. And it was January. So we sent out a search party. They found them about 150km from the camp. The Zeligson had a similar setup to, for example, a Defender. The neck on the LH swivel ball housing had broken clean through, as had the half axle at the same point. (This was not the first time!)
After a couple of days they had run out of drinking water. But not to worry - the supplies included an order of , I think it was six, cases of stubbies. There was about half a case left, and neither the driver nor his offsider had any worries! I suspect that having to pay for the beer got the Alice Springs manager into trouble with head office might have had something to do with the whole operation becoming dry.
Originally Posted by JDNSW
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