Australia's people are usually pretty smart and
ingenious, otherwise they never would have been able to settle
this country of vast distances, climatic extremes and poisonous
animals, but over the years they have made some real blunders
too, below is a small selection of them;
Books have been filled with Aussie blunders!
APEC security blunder
In September 2007 country leaders of the Asia-Pacific
Economic Cooperation (APEC) got together in Sydney for a week of
high level talks. Needless to say security was (supposed to be)
at an equally high level and $160 million was spent on this.
Imagine the embarrassment of authorities responsible for security
when members of ABC satire program The Chasers managed to drive
through all security with a fake motorcade. Their convoy of vehicles,
motorbikes and security on foot looked that professional that police
waved them through several checkpoints and only when one of them
got out of the car disguised as Osama Bin Laden was the whole prank
discovered and a TV audience of three million people had a good
laugh!
ASIO and Jack Roche
Jack Roche had overcome his drinking problems by converting
to Islam, but unfortunately this brought him into contact with some
hardliners and he went to training camps in Afghanistan where he
met Osama bin Laden and was instructed to film Israeli embassies
in Australia and gather information on a Jewish businessman from
Melbourne. Back in Oz he got some doubts about the operation and
rang ASIO, Australia's version of the CIA, and left a message on
their answering machine that he had just returned from a training
mission in Afghanistan and had some valuable information on terrorism.
Much to his surprise his call was not returned, so he rang them
two more times but ASIO never bothered to ring him back !!!
Two years later when the Sari Club in Bali went up in smoke ASIO
finally swung into action and Jack, who now lived a normal life
working as a teacher in Perth, woke up in the dead of night when
special forces in full combat gear smashed their way in to his bedroom
and arrested him, much to the surprise of his wife who knew nothing
of his past. In May 2004 he was put in jail for nine years.
Australia's biggest tree killed
Australia's biggest, most robust hardwood - 350 years
old - has died in december 2003.
At 79m and with a girth of 20m, El Grande stood alone in a patch
of cleared forest in the Tasmanian wilderness. Forestry Tasmania,
finally admitted to responsibility for its death through an "accidental
burning". Conservationists who have campaigned tirelessly to
protect the hardwood forests of this region are outraged, they had
already issued a death certificate in May - claiming the tree had
been "cooked" by Forestry Tasmania in the regeneration
burn - while Forestry Tasmania was waiting until spring to see if
the tree would regenerate.
Baby bonus bonanza
In June 2004 it was reported that Centrelink ( the
Australian Social Security Department) had made the blunder of paying
the baby bonus of $600.- to both parents instead of one, to that
many people that they had paid $1.2 milion too much. The government
responded by asking people to send the money back ( it was not far
before elections so they did not demand and threaten like normally
happens when people have been overpaid by Centrelink) . It remains
to be seen how many people will send a $600.- cheque to Canberra.
Cane Toads
Some anonymous contributor sent us this photo
of an awesome cane toad, they are not usually this big.
Australia nowadays has many introduced species of
plants and animals, some manage to co-exist without too much impact,
some create real environmental problems. Most animals were brought
in by your everyday people who had no idea what the consequences
would be but the canetoad would have to be the biggest blunder in
Australia's history as in this case scientists, paid by the Australian
government, went overseas to collect canetoads and returned to Australia
and set about thirty of them free in North Queensland in 1933. The
idea was that they would eat the beetles that were causing economic
damage eating the sugarcane but unfortunately the cane toads never
touched the beetles but helped themselves to everything else they
could find. Wildlife smaller than them they will kill and eat, wildlife
bigger than them will eat them and die from the poison they have
in glands on their back. The thirty toads that were introduced initially
have now multiplied into the countless millions and are spreading
across Australia and have recently arrived in Kakadu, Northern Territory
where it is expected they will devastate the place as there are
vast floodplains which are the perfect breeding ground for them.
They seem to be adapting to the Australian conditions/distances
too, scientists are studying the toxic pests' entry in to the NT,
clocking them hopping up to 2km in a single night, or more than
50km a year - five times quicker than their predecessors travelled
in the 1940s to 1960s. Some birds have actually adapted and learned
how to turn them over and eat their insides avoiding the poison
glands on the back. Ingenious Australians have also used the toads
to make wallets, stubby coolers etc. Hippies desperate for a thrill
but too broke to buy drugs sometimes cut the back with poison glands
off the toad, dry it in the sun and then roll it into a joint to
smoke ( don't try this at home!!) Some dogs are reported to have
turned into druggies by becoming addicted to "cane toad sucking",
getting high on the poison. Vet Megan Pickering said she has treated
more than 30 dogs suffering from the deadly effects of bufo toxin
at her Katherine Vet Care surgery. In an effort to reduce the numbers
of this toad Australians sometimes also get the golfclubs out for
a round of cane toad golf. Australian pubs in tourist areas often
organize cane toad races where
punters can buy a toad or bet on them in similar fashion to horse
races. . In the Northern Territory and in Cairns you can do your
bit to save the country by collecting cane toads and being paid
a beer per bag at collection depots.
Calling 911
In the 1990s the American TV series 911 showing the
daily happenings of American emergency services was popular and
so it happened that when a Sydney factory caught fire most of the
people present tried (unsuccesfully) to put out the fire while the
person given the task of ringing the fire brigade also spent his
time unsuccesful as the phone was not answered much to his frustration.
Later, after there was nothing left of the factory, it came to light
that all the time he had been ringing 911 while in Australia the
number for emergency services is 000 !
Canberra's Exploding Hospital
Usually when a big explosion is expected people move
away to a safe place but when the hospital in Canberra had to be
demolished by a big explosion the government thought it a good idea
to invite lots of people to come and watch this spectacular event.
Controlled explosions to demolish buildings in one hit are common
in the U.S. but just because Americans have a talent for blowing
up things does not necessarily mean Aussies are good at it too.
A first explosion was set off but not much happened, so crews entered
the building and made some adjustments to the explosives, and boy,
did this make a difference..
Nobody had been allowed within 200 metre of the hospital for the
big bang, even though 50 metre was theoretically a safe distance,
but soon after the second big explosion had sounded the calm waters
of the lake where people had gathered in boats and canoes for a
good view got stirred up by spectacular splashes as pieces of steel
and concrete rained down from the sky, up to a kilometre away from
the explosion.
Various pieces of hospital rained down on the spectator crowd resulting
in various injuries and even the death of a young girl who was decapitated
by a piece of metal. After the smoke cleared it took demoliton crews
another three months to remove the rest of the building and make
room for the new museum to be built.
Victims of this disaster had a seven year wait to receive compensation
from the government.
Cornelia Rau and Vivian Alvarez
Cornelia Rau
Cornelia Rau, has lived in Australia since she was
a child, but when she was found by Aborigines in north Queensland
in a confused mental state she was not helped with psychiatric help
but locked up in a Queensland jail for six months on the suspicion
of being an illegal immigrant. As if that wasn't enough she was
then locked up in South Australia's Baxter immigration detention
centre, a remote facility where they normally only hold boatrefugees
from Arab and Asian countries, and held there for another four months,
until the mistake was finally realized and she was taken to an Adelaide
psychiatric unit to be treated for schizophrenia. Her family, who
had reported her as missing to police a year ago, was very happy
to see her again. She was promised compensation but several years
later she was still waiting for this.
Cornelia was not the only Australian resident to get
in trouble with immigration. Ms Vivian Alvarez has held dual Australian/Philippines
citizenship since 1986, but after she was seriously injured in a
car accident she was mistakenly identified as an illegal immigrant
and deported in July 2001 to the Phillipines where authorities lost
contact her. It was only through sheer coincidence that four years
later an Australian missionary in the Phillipines recognized her
from a photo in the media and alerted authorities that she was staying
in a Catholic hospice near Manila. Her lawyers claim that the Australian
immigration department had been alerted a long time ago to their
mistake but failed to act and want the government to pay Vivian
$10 million compensation.
These blunders were so ginormous that at first treasurer
Peter Costello, and later even PM John Howard personally apologized
on national TV.
Daintree river ferry contract
gap
Ferry across the Daintree river
Cape
Tribulation, in the heart of the Daintree rainforest,
is one of Australia's top tourism destinations and people from all
around the world come to see this amazing place where ancient rainforests
run right down to pristine beaches and the Great Barrier Reef.
Unless you do a very very long four wheel drive trip around Cooktown,
the only direct access to this area is by cable ferry.
The local Douglas Shire Council has a contract with a ferry owner
to run this service. And even though they had known for the past
ten years that the ferry contract would expire on 21 March 2006,
they signed a new contract with another ferry company that would
start on 1 July 2006 !!! Around mid January the council tried to calm their constituents
and hotel operators with the news that they were making arrangements
to ensure this MASSIVE BLUNDER would not cut off people's acccess
to the outside world for over two months, and cost tourism businesses
in the area millions of dollars in lost earnings. However, in early
March with less than two weeks to go, still nothing was finalized,
by now it had been announced that council would buy the old ferry
from the operator for $540 000.- (it was estimated by some to be
worth about $240 000.-) but by 9 March still nothing had happened,
causing great concern amongst residents and resorts.
The council blamed this ginormous blunder on "an administrative
oversight", but current ferry owner Colin Andreassen said he
had notified council well in advance that tenders should be called
for the contract.
When 21 March arrived the ferry kept running, to the relief of business
owners and community, thanks to the council having spent a big amount
of ratepayers dollars buying the ferry for a good deal more than
it is worth only a few days before the cutoff date.
7 July update: the cost of this huge blunder is gradually becoming
evident, the local newspaper reported that council has started advertising
their $540 000.- ferry as they expect the new one to take over soon.
Their ad brought in one offer; Foreshore Marine offered $10 000.-
!!!
No word yet on whether the person responsible for this costly blunder
will be sacked or not.
The new ferry was finally delivered
and put in service in November and has since proven a reliable
service across the Daintree River
When you're on the ferry you may wonder what the above
resque equipment is all about. The orange block pictured above is
rated for 18 persons, obviously they can not sit on this block but
the way this resque equipment is supposed to save people is that
they swim next to it while holding on to the ropes on the side.
This makes some real good sense on a river where a dozen tour operators
make a living out of crocodile spotting tours. It appears even the
Titanic was better equipped for an emergency than this ferry.
Double army blunder
Jake Kovco was serving with the Australian army in
Iraq but on 21 April 2006 his own pistol discharged and killed him
with a bullet in the head, the exact details of this are still a
mystery and under investigation.
As if this wasn't distressing enough for his family the defence
department then returned the wrong body to Australia, when the plane
landed in Melbourne it had a coffin on board containing Bosnian
contractor Juso Sinanovic!
Jake Kovko's widow Shelley was understandably far from happy and
rang John Howard out of bed in the middle of the night and gave
him a whopping earful.
An investigation in to this blunder was launched by the defence
department, headed by their most senior female recruit Brigadier
Elizabeth Cosson. But, blunder nr.2; she left the disc containing
the confidential report in a public computer at Melbourne Airport!
The person who found the disc handed it in to a radio station where
Derryn Hinch broadcast the details.
Durians on the plane
In late 2002 Australia was worried about terrorist
attacks and a lot of places, especially airports, were on high alert
( for Australian standards). And so it happened that cargo handlers
at Brisbane airport discovered a powerful smell in the cargo hold
of a plane and raised the alarm. part of the airport was evacuated,
all sorts of people and security forces called in, only to discover
that the cargo hold contained a load of the infamous Asian fruit
durian!
Fresh Kut
A few years ago Woolworths had a good idea where they
would buy whole Dutch cheeses, cut them up into odd shapes of a
few hundred grams and sell them individually. The brand name assigned
to this was Fresh Kut. As the main customers for this line would
be Dutch immigrants it was very unfortunate that the word 'Kut'
is Dutch for Map of Tassie !
Invitation to Barrack Obama
In February 2010 Anna Bligh, who used to be Education
Minister, and now Premier of "the Smart State" Queensland,
sent an official letter to US president Barack Obama to invite him
to come and stay in Queensland, but she mis-spelled his name as
Barrack Obama with an extra r.
Mossman Swimming Pool
This one is unconfirmed but local legend in North
Queensland has it that the Olympic size swimming pool in Mosssman
can not be used for official records because it was built to olympic
size but the builders forgot to account for the tiles so after tiling
the pool is undersize!
Multiple orgasms in Parliament House
In June 2008 Victorian MP Jason Wood, Federal member
for Latrobe, was talking about genetically modified organisms
in his maiden speech in Canberra but ended up mixing up his words
a bit, much to the amusement of the crowd, and subsequently the
whole country. His embarrassing slip up was caught on camera and
available for your entertainment in this movie;
Early 2003 the Australian government was trying to
convinve the Australian public that all security measures were in
place to avoid any terrorist attacks, well known land marks in Sydney
even had special security guards. Yet on 18 march Sydney woke up
to an Opera House with big red letters saying "NO WAR"
painted high up on the highest sail. It cost $110,000.- to clean
up but it makes you wonder about the security the government had
assured us that was in place. Later the two peace activists; David
Burgess, 33, and Will Saunders, 42, were convicted of malicious
damage and sentenced to nine months periodic detention and ordered
to jointly pay $111,000 compensation to the Sydney Opera House Trust.
A year later other midnight artists painted the slogan "John
Howard, US bootlicker" on the side of an Australian Navy ship
in Wellington harbour, New Zealand, but this time The Australian
Defence Force took no action.
Northern Territory's illegal National Parks
One day a public servant in the Northern Territory
was sitting around reading how the law states that National Parks
can only be declared over vacant Crown Land that is not subject
to an Aboriginal landclaim. As just about the whole Northern Territory
is under landclaim he queried this with colleagues and the answer
was basically; eh, yeah, you're right, I suppose all those National
Parks we have declared the last twenty years are all invalid...
To avoid ginormous expensive court battles with Land Councils a
deal was struck where ownership of a lot of National Parks was handed
over to Aborigines.
Paul Keating
In the days that Paul Keating was prime minister he
managed to seriously piss off Malaysia's prime minister Dr. Mahathir
by labelling him a "recalcitrant". Despite numerous calls
refused to apologize for this resulting to cancellations of billions
fo dollars of contracts and trade, even at his retirement in late
2003 Dr. Mahathir was still grumbling about it and according to
the Bangkok Post he had been instrumental in many Asian trade conferences
to block trade deals with Australia so it will never be possible
to calculate how many billions of dollars that one word has cost
Australia. Paul Keating has insulted enough people during his career
to fill a website, so someone has put that together, see it here...
In 2010 he added to his list by calling Tony Abbott a nutter and
political nobody.
Peacetime bombing
Tony Travers, also known as Datto, next to the Toyota 4WD that
was bombed in an airforce blunder in 2000
Darwin has been bombed quite a bit during World War
Two but the most recent one happened during Operation Pitch Black
exercise at 9.15 Pm on August 3, when a dummy missile fell off an
airforce bomber. At the time Tony Travers was preparing a BBQ for
himself at his workplace and residence at # 2 Strath Road, Berrimah
( Datto's Rust Repairs), which unfortunately has gone out of business
since then due to all this.
This is Tony's eye witness account of the event;
All hell broke loose when a AIM-7-CATM { Captive
Air Training Missile } fell off a FA-18 Hornet
as it prepared to land at Darwin airport During Operation Pitch
Black on 3 August 2000.
It landed 20 metres from me and hit a 1974 Toyota Landcruiser directly
at the rear of my shed.
The ensuing destruction as the 250 Kg -12 foot Missile hit the Tojo
at approximately 500 Kph shook the dust out of the roof of the shed
as it sent a shockwave tearing through the shed.
The Boom was like a thunderclap directly overhead ,, Very Very Loud,,,
It scared the Crap out of me,,, { And My 2 Red Heeler Dogs } Upon
doing a search around the shed I found 1/2 of the Missile protruding
out of the ground beside the Now Destroyed Toyota,, Absolute Awesome
Damage ,, The Guidance Fin had cut the windscreen like a Bullet
going through a playing card and the engine had been Smashed into
a thousand pieces ,, You could see the pistons and internals of
the motor everywhere,, Totally Destroyed !!! Diff ,, Chassi ,, Cab
,, Gearbox ,, Everything in its path,, { It Probably hit # 5 Cylinder
Causing a massive backfire }
Upon Seeing this with my torch I literally Shit myself and uttered
F#*K many times over, Knowing that another 2 metres further towards
where I was standing and I wouldn't have had a chance ,, It would
have Creamed Me and the contents of my workshop,,,
The other 1/2 that broke off on impact smashed into another 3 cars
before hitting a fence,, and coming to rest next to my Nissan Patrol
Mudracer , The Re Occuring Dreams of this incident are still haunting
me to this day ,,,therefore being the subject of a Law Suit that
is still going on ,, and
,, on ,,
Tony is still in a court case with the airforce, it
took a long time before they coughed up part of the money for the
three cars of Tony's customers that were damaged, and his rust repair
business of 14 years has gone bankrupt.
Here are three pics of the carnage that Tony shot
that disastrous night in August 2000, showing the missile and the
totally rooted Toyo. ( Click pics to enlarge)
The wrecked Toyota 4WD, owned by Basil Roe who runs Berrimah Radiators,is
still on display outside the radiator shop on Berrimah Road, although
with an imitation missile, because the airforce took the evidence
back. After a very long time of haggling the airforce was finally
gonna cough up some money for the Toyo but only on condition they'd
get the wreck. Basil told them to get f#&%!d and kept it as
a display outside his shop.
Thanks to Craig Schneider for sending us these
two pics !
As if Tony didn't have enough bad luck being bombed
he also got done for drink driving in 2004. The judge was not convinced
by his defence that after surviving the 2000 bombing he had to drink
during every airforce exercise to keep his stress levels down and
handed him a prison sentence.
Tony is still in a legal battle with the airforce,
keep watching this site as Tony will keep us up to date..
Cops release saltwater crocodile in recreation area
Kununurra police got called out to a house where a
woman had found a crocodile in her laundry. It was later found the
croc was left there by her son who had caught it and on his way
to delivering it at a croc farm had parked it there so he could
go to the pub for a couple of beers. He thought his mum was away
but she came home unexpectedly early. The police picked up the crocodile,
photographed it and then, believing it to be a freshwater crocodile,
took the reptile to nearby Lily Creek Lagoon and released it. This
is a popular spot for boating, walking and bird-watching, with a
caravan park and other accommodation located on its shores.
The shit hit the fan when a few days later Department of Conservation
and Land Management (CALM) staff saw the photos and identified the
reptile as a salt water crocodile! Although it was under two metres
when released by police it had the potential to grow in to six metres,
big enough to eat people. Traps were set in the following days but
with the lake being home to thousands of freshwater crocodiles (that
are harmless to people) the job of catching one saltwater crocodile
was like finding a needle in a haystack. It took a couple of weeks
and plenty of man hours but they finally managed to catch the saltie
and relocate it.
Rabbits
A home sick English squire living in Victoria thought
he would be able to cope better with his new home if he would have
some rabbits to keep him company and remind him of Mother England.
So in 1859 the first rabbits were brought into Australia, only a
few but they immediately did what rabbits do best and that is breed
like rabbits so very soon their numbers became a plague. People
that used to eat them to survive sometimes called them 'underground
mutton'. At first the need for rabbit skins for Akubra hats motivated
hunters to kill them and keep their numbers down a bit but by the
1940s their numbers had grown to such proportions that the Australian
government put scientists to work to develop and spread the disease
mixomatosis that kills rabbits but leaves native wildlife unharmed.
Millions died but some survived and were now resistant to this disease
and by the 1990s their numbers had again increased to such levels
that a new disease was needed, the same government agency (CSIRO)
was working on the Calicy virus but before it was even fully tested
and approved it appeared in the wild and killed scores of rabbits,
fortunately it did not harm humans or other native wildlife. New
Zealand farmers, also pretty sick of rabbits, also wanted the virus
but their government said it had to be tested first and the farmers
threatened to get on thhe plane and pick up some infected Aussie
rabbits themselves to let loose between the sheep.
Scissors left inside patient
Pat Skinner, 69, had part of her colon removed at
St George Hospital in 2001 but didn't feel a hell of a lot better
afterwards. She continued to suffer pain for another one and a half
year until an X-ray revealed the reason; she was carrying a 17 cm.
long pair of scissors inside her body that the surgeon had forgotten!
The scissors were then removed but oddly enough this reduces her
chances of being paid compensation by the hospital!
TAB blunder
During the 2003 Melbourne Cup a man placed his bet
of a $6 box trifecta 20 times on the winning combination of Makybe
Diva, She's Archie and Jardine's Lookout to the TAB by phone but
the TAB operator , instead of keying in 20 times, accidentally keyed
in 203 times so instead of paying out around $250,000.- the TAB
ended up paying $2.6 million!
Wrong anthem
In the opening ceremony of the Davis Cup final in
Melbourne on November 28, 2003, Spanish tennis players and officials
exploded in rage when, instead of their current national anthem,
trumpeter James Morrison played a pre-civil war republican anthem
that had been provided to him by Tennis Australia.
Have you heard about, or made some, amazing Australian
blunder? Then tell us!
