Emergency & Rescue Training at Paluma

Last weekend Paluma Village was host to Jason Taylor and the team from Category 5 Emergency Care based out of Cairns. Jason conducted an Emergency and First Aid Training Course over several days at the Paluma Community Hall with emphasis on survival training and rescue in wilderness and remote locations. The course was well attended with over 20 participants. The Category 5 Emergency Care group specialises in teaching first aid training, event medical coverage, lifeguard courses and sports trainer education.

The training course included both theory and practical sessions with the participants actively engaged in several ‘mock scenarios’ in which they get to practice and hone their newly learned rescue skills.

Theory learning sessions took place at the Paluma Community Hall.

Practical sessions were held at the Village Green and one detailed ‘mock scenario’ on Sunday afternoon took place at the Paluma Weir. The emergency scenario as follows:-

 A group of weary bush walkers was returning from several days of hiking in the wilderness. Upon nearing the Paluma settlement there was an unexpected bridge collapse at the Paluma Weir. There were numerous casualties with a range of injuries from potential spinal injuries, to broken and sprained limbs, possible concussion, cuts and abrasions. Medical assistance would be more than one hour in arriving at Paluma. Those who were injured and incapacitated were rendered first aid by those who were not injured and/or who were at the scene, using only the first aid supplies and materials from their hiking backpacks.

Practical training in rescue skills at the Village Green.

The life-like emergency scenario at the Paluma Weir was fascinating to observe. The photographs below show the practical training in action.


You can imagine the complete surprise of a couple of unsuspecting tourists who came upon the grisly scene at the weir on the Andre Griffin Walking Track on Sunday afternoon, with injured and bloodied bodies strewn along and adjacent to the walking track! Much to their relief, they were quickly reassured that emergency and rescue training was in session.

You can watch a slide show of all the photographs of the Paluma Weir training scenario, at the end of the post.

Text & Photos by Michele Bird


Browse additional images below

TMR Range Road Update – Notice of Road Closures

The Department of Transport and Main Roads would like to advise that pavement repair works will shortly occur on Mount Spec Road on the Paluma Range. Works to be completed include the removal of damaged pavement and back filling with new bitumen and surface seal.

Please see work details below.

Mount Spec Road pavement repair works 

Work duration: Monday 20 April to Thursday 30 April

Workdays: Monday to Friday (excluding Saturday 25 April and Monday 27 April 2020) 

Work hours: 6:30am to 5:30pm (road closure 9am to 4pm – long delays)

Impact on motorists:

  • A road closure of Mount Spec Road will be in place between the hours of 9am and 4pm to undertake the removal of old pavement and backfill new road pavement in the most expedient and efficient manner.
  • Motorists who travel along Mount Spec Road between the hours of 9am and 4pm can expect long delays of up to 3 hours
  • Stop/go traffic controllers will be on-site at either end of the works zone to direct traffic through the works zone. 
  • Maximum wait time for motorists on Mount Spec Road from the hours of 6:30am – 9am and 4pm – 5:30pm is 15 minutes. 
  • A 40km/hr speed limit will be maintained along Mount Spec Road throughout the duration of the works.

Road users are advised to plan their journey ahead of time around the road closures to avoid long delays and travel times. Residents are encouraged to contact TMR on the details below should they have any further enquiries about the road works.

TMR would like to thank the local community and businesses in advance for their patience during these works. 

Kind Regards

Meghan

Customer and Stakeholder Management (Northern) | North Queensland Region
Program Delivery And Operations | Infrastructure Management & Delivery Division |

Department of Transport and Main Roads

Floor 6 | Townsville Government Office Building | 445 Flinders Street | Townsville Qld 4810
PO Box 1089 | Townsville Qld 4810
P: 1800 625 648 | F: (07) 4421 8711
E: engagement.northern@tmr.qld.gov.au
W: www.tmr.qld.gov.au

Outcomes of the PDCA Annual General Meeting

The PDCA AGM was held last month (March 13) in conjunction with a well attended BBQ lunch. This year we decided to change the date away from Easter and to offer residents a free BBQ lunch prior to the meeting. We received some positive feedback on this initiative and were delighted to easily exceed the number of attendees required for a quorum (although this may also have been due to Wilfred’s door to door encouragement earlier in the morning).

The official minutes of the meeting will be completed soon, but if you are interested in reading the President’s Annual report, or the History Project report, they are both available in our Documents section on the website.

All current PDCA Executive Committee Members were elected for another year.

Many thanks to all those who attended and contributed to the meeting.

PDCA Executive Committee Members for 2020-21
NamePositionemailph
Jamie OliverPresidentJ.K.Oliver@outlook.com0408 710030
Anneshka Brown1st Vice Presidentanneshka@protonmail.com0472 768 227
Juanita PolettoSecretaryjpoletto@gmail.com0410 202 968
Wilfred KarnollTreasurerwilfred.suzanne@bigpond.com0447 822 626
Jill MeadsCommittee Memberjillmeads55@gmail.com
Charlie AllenCommittee Member (SES)c-t-a@activ8.net.au
Ross HyneCommittee Member (RFS)ross.hyne@ergon.com

Community Hall Garden beds begin to take shape

Following a meeting in March on the establishment of gardens beds we now have a working group of residents who have made themselves available to help out with this new community project. The Townsville City Council has agreed to donate up to $900 worth of native plants to assist in the project.

After our first meeting a general plan of where beds would be located was agreed on and Graham Malpas immediately cleared out the rear side beds. It turns out there are some quite nice plants along that side but they were masked by a lot of weedy growth.

Following the PDCA Annual General Meeting some “muscle” was requisitioned to help collect some surplus logs from Anne Bruyeres block to the Hall to serve as garden borders. Colin Meads and Jamie Oliver, with assistance from Don Battersby, took two trailer loads of logs over to the hall where placement was overseen by Jill Meads and Anne. It all looked like so much fun that we even attracted a member of the public who was up with his family for a lunch at the picnic tables, volunteer to lend us a hand.

Tony Bligh’s ingenious creation, the “log dolly’, was invaluable in collecting and moving the logs, but one big one that we wanted as a feature piece was just too big to handle. However with the addition of a little brain to Colins’s and Jamie’s brawn, Tony showed us how it could be done.

The next step is to get a couple of truck-loads of topsoil to build up the new garden beds. The Townsville City Council (via Councillor Margie Ryder) has agreed to provide this, but with the new restrictions caused by COVID 19 the delivery has been postponed indefinitely.

Once the restrictions on gatherings has been lifted we will organize our third working bee to start planting! In the mean time Jamie has plans to lay out some irrigation hosing so that the beds can be provided with water during the dry season.

Vale Manuel Larrinaga 1949 – 2018

                  The Basque Man of Paluma and District.

A long-time resident of both Paluma and Hidden Valley, Manuel Larrinaga, died on 10th May 2018, aged 69 years, after 3 months of acute cancer illness.

Manuel was born a Basque, within the spanish  Francoist  fascist  State in 1949, into a family of long-established farmers just outside Guernica in the Basque Country, the site of the 26 April 1937 infamous Hitler/ Franco atrocity during the Spanish Civil War. (The subject of Picasso’s famous painting entitled “ Guernika”  of the same year – see Wikipedia).

Manuel was one of 11 children, some  of whom still live on the family farm, including Luciano, his elder brother with whom he fled to Australia, as a refugee,  aged 16, to escape forced conscription into Franco’s army, which was yet another attempt by the The Fascist Dictator to suppress the Basque Culture which has a feisty independent democratic tradition going back several centuries!

Franco’s death in 1975 was marked in Guernica with great joy.  Manuel, who covertly returned to Guernica for the expected occasion, would often recount how free refreshments flowed like water for days in Guernica in celebration of the Fascist Dictator’s demise, such was the not – forgotten  Basque revulsion over his crimes. (google “ Guernika”)

Manuel himself passionately hated Franco, accusing him of thwarting his plans  to become a Vet! Instead Manuel followed a life of very hard labour in the cane fields of NQ and construction work in Mt Isa and elsewhere in NQ from age 16 until he died 53 years later.

Manuel was a member of a cane- cutting gang established by Luciano in Ingham. He had to harden up from a wanna- be Vet student and despite  weeping  every night for two years from the painful consequences of manual cane cutting he became a very tough man excelling in Boxing and being a renowned hard manual worker , as well as a spell as a Pub bouncer keeping order among the thirsty cane cutters. Ingham Police dubbed him “The Bullfighter” while others called him “The Basque Terrorist”, titles Manuel proudly proclaimed!

The reality was that Manuel was a bit of a “softie” when it came to helping the less- fortunate. He also had strong views about injustice .

In 1976 he worked for Simon Carves Ltd in Mt. Isa in a multi-national gang constructing the famous smelter Smoke Stack during which time he was the macho man riding the crane loads as a rigger to the top of the stack as it rose to its 270 Metre height. His stories of pranks and escapades without safety harnesses on high were blood chilling and often led to acute anxiety attacks amongst the Health & Safety ground staff.

In 1978 he met Judy, his life partner of nearly 40 years and they ultimately moved to live firstly at Hidden Valley and subsequently to the Republic of Hussey Road  where Manuel constructed a large “Yurt” for Judy (a large Decagon house of stringy bark slabs cut by Manuel) which he subsequently re-erected at Hidden Valley, near the Furber Homestead,  after adding two wings…it is an impressive example of Australian Bush architecture which will some day end up in a glossy coffee table book on vernacular buildings of OZ.

Indeed, Many of his structures can be seen around our District. Manuel was an artiste with a chain saw and he could perform miracles with his “Skyhook” chain block and his trusty shovel severely worn down by the digging of numerous postholes over many years! Manuel produced a number of stringy bark slab tables which are memorials to his skill and labours in the forests around Paluma- Blackfriars – Mt Zero as a timber cutter and Mill worker with Mr. R. Brookes esq. (who can forget their red hair dye period?)

Manuel’s legacy is around us for all to see…including the Andree Griffin Walking Track sign and the “Trees in Memory ” slab both voluntarily erected by him.

No story about Manuel’s life is complete without mentioning his valiant attempts to conquer  the English language! He could construct alleged English sentences and adapt words so that they were but a shadow of their intended meaning but still understandable with a little prodding, poking and requests for repetition from those of us who could not understand a single word of the truly ancient Basque Language. (Please note : not Spanish!)

Indeed, it has been suggested that Manuel communicated in  Basque with an Australian accent! a very endearing aspect of his personality and perfectly understandable when one considers that his English language academy was the cane paddocks of Ingham where  the tutors spoke only Basque, Spanish, Italian , Sicilian , Serbian , Croat and Irish!

His persona of a tough hard- working battler remain in the memories of those who knew him, especially the super-critical working people of The Valley who were in awe of his prodigious work ethic and physical toughness.

May his memory be long respected in this District as one of those many oppressed refugees who have made a huge contribution to our present day Australian Culture .

Michael Drew

Vale Jean Garrett

It is with sorrow that we report the passing of former Paluma resident, Jean Garrett on Christmas Day, 2019 after a long illness.

Jean had a long association with Paluma, visiting the village regularly from the time she was a teenager, coming on a motor cycle with her then boyfriend, Graham.  They married in Perth, when Jean was 16, returning to Townsville soon after, and had a long and happy marriage.

Jean supported her husband’s enthusiasm for Speedway Side-car racing and over many years they travelled to many destinations to speedway meetings around the country with their children. They were a popular couple around the speedway, with many long-term friends.

Jean was a very capable woman with numerous other interests, especially within the Arts.  She and Graham owned The Palms Art Gallery in Townsville, from which they also ran a framing business.   Jean had a fine collection of porcelain, sculpture and prints.  Jean was also a keen gardener. An absorbing interest was jewellery-making, at which she was very talented, creating unique and lovely pieces in her studio at their home. Jean’sjewellery was in demand at craft shops and markets.

Graham and Jean bought Mist Haven units from Cec and Lois Carpenter, and later the brick house in Lennox Crescent where Jean and Graham lived until Graham’s death in 2008.  Jean was devastated by his death but remained here for several years.  However, with declining health and missing Graham deeply, she sold the house and moved to Patterson in NSW to be nearer to her children and grand-children.  Here, she quickly made friends and helped regularly in an art and craft shop until failing health forced her to retire.

Jean is remembered very fondly by her friends in Paluma and our sympathy is extended to her family in their sad loss.

A celebration of the lives of Graham and Jean and spreading of their mingled ashes, will be held by the family on 6th June in Paluma, where Graham and Jean had been so happy.  

Townsville Sketchers visit Paluma

Today the Paluma Pottery hosted a group of artists from the Urban Sketchers Townsville Group for lunch.

The group made a day of it, stopping at little Crystal Creek to sketch the only functional stone arch bridge in Queensland, and then visiting Len Cook in Paluma. Its great that Len is continuing to encourage artists working with various media to come up to the village and enjoy the mountain air, although today was not a good example of our normally cool temperatures!

A sample of one of the sketches by Alison McDonald is shown here. More examples of the results of their visit can be seen on their facebook page.

Paluma Rainfall (2019)

Over many years Don Battersby has been vigilant in recording the annual rainfall statistics at his property on Hussey Road on the western outskirts of Paluma Village.

Don has kindly contributed the following rainfall statistics for Hussey Road for 2019. The total rainfall recorded by Don for 2019 was 4205.5 mm with rain falling on 99 days of the year.

The stand-out months for rainfall were January and February with a total of 3069 mm of rain falling in these two months (equivalent to 73% of the total rainfall for 2019). In the latter part of 2019, the stand-out month for the lack of rainfall was September with not a drop of rain recorded at Hussey Road!

Are there other rainfall recordings for Paluma and surrounds?. If you have been recording rainfall at your property we would love to have your statistics!

Rainfall recordings by Don Battersby. Text by Michele Bird.