Maralinga (21 page)

The One Tree test had been an unmitigated success. Operation Buffalo was off to an excellent start.

In the beer garden and canteen at Maralinga, those fortunate enough to have witnessed the event were the envy of others.

‘You could actually
feel
it! The
heat
! Incredible!'

‘And the shock waves! Like a bloody great punch in the back!'

‘Yeah, you wouldn't believe it, would you? Nearly knocked me off my feet.'

Men could talk of nothing else, and the luckless ones who'd been far from the action were already volunteering for duties that would get them as near as was humanly possible to the front-line of the next firing.

There were to be three more detonations over the ensuing month, and, weather conditions permitting, the next test, codenamed Marcoo, was barely one week away. Life had taken on a new meaning for the men of Maralinga. Boredom had become a thing of the past.

In the main conference room of the Australian Government Information Office (AGIO), situated on the second floor of an attractive Georgian building in Rundle Street, Adelaide, Nick Stratton was happy with the way things were going. It was two days after the firing, and this was the first of the open press conferences that would follow the four tests that constituted the Buffalo series. AGIO would play host to the conferences and Nick would be the principal spokesperson at each, with perhaps an occasional representation from AWTSC, or even an appearance from Sir William Penney himself, should it be deemed necessary. At the moment, however, all was going smoothly.

Nick was acquainted with most of the Australian press in attendance, and he'd met the five British journalists who were covering the series two days previously, at the One Tree firing. It had been instantly evident to him that all five were the variety of press he referred to as ‘tame' – clearly the British had vetted their own with great care. He had expected as much, but was thankful nonetheless. Nick himself had selected the Australian journalists who'd been invited to observe the detonation, and he'd been most stringent in his choice. The rules had been made abundantly clear to all. Ego-driven, investigative reporters who liked to cause trouble and those with a tendency towards sensationalism would not be tolerated. Any newspaper journalist privileged to witness a test firing did so with the joint per mission of the British and Australian governments and, as a specially invited guest, was expected to toe the line.

He was relieved now to discover that at this first major conference, the press at large appeared willing to behave responsibly and observe the rules. He'd anticipated some possibly tricky questions, but his answers to even those queries that could have become issues had been met with a ready acceptance. He presumed, and correctly so, that this was because each of the journalists was hoping to be on his next invitation list.

‘Has there been any radioactivity detected outside the restricted area of Maralinga, Colonel?'

Nick recognised the journalist – Bob Swindon of
The Sydney Morning Herald –
not one of those invited to observe the test firing, and not one of those likely to be. Bob was a good journo whose work Nick respected under normal circumstances – but these were not normal circumstances.

He responded in the respectful fashion he'd always found to be effective. ‘As you know, Mr Swindon, I'm not at liberty to release the specifics of any scientific data, but I can most definitely assure you that there has been no threat whatsoever to surrounding areas.'

The answer came smoothly – he was, after all, speaking the truth. The reports he'd received had stated categorically that the levels of radioactivity, which had been detected over vast distances, were minimal and presented no particular threat. Nick firmly agreed that any overreaction would be pointless scaremongering.

‘Stringent safety measures were maintained at all times, and we can rest assured that these safety measures will continue to be maintained throughout the series,' he said.

He wasn't one hundred per cent sure on that particular score, but that's what he'd been told, and he could only hope like hell it was true.

 

Maurie and Len weren't at all sure about the safety measures. In fact, Maurie, for all of his former braggadocio, had been severely shaken by the events that had ensued upon their return to base.

As ordered, they'd landed the Canberra at the south end of the runway, where the air-sample canisters attached to its wings were to be released for examination. Guided by ground crew, Maurie had taxied the aircraft into position, but several minutes later, when he and Len had opened the hatch, they'd found themselves confronted by men in goon suits and gas masks.

‘Jesus Christ,' Maurie had muttered.

‘Remain in the aircraft,' one of the goon suits had ordered, and the two of them had closed the hatch and stayed rigid in their seats, not daring to move a muscle.

The following sequence of events had taken on a surreal quality, like watching a B-grade science fiction film, Maurie had thought. Or, worse still, like observing something you suspect is about to become your own personal nightmare. Tractor-like machines with electronic arms had approached the aircraft from either side, men in goon suits operating the machines with deft precision. The electronic arms had carefully detached the air-sample canisters from the Canberra's wings and deposited them in open lead-lined boxes. The boxes had then been closed and locked by further men in goon suits, and loaded aboard a truck to be
taken away for radiochemical analysis, after which the washing-down process of the aircraft had begun.

It had been around this time that the science fiction film had taken its nightmarish turn, raising a series of questions in Maurie's mind.

Why aren't
we
in goon suits, he'd wondered, looking at his and Len's khaki combination overalls – we're the ones who were up there. The plane's not airtight – hell, it's not even pressurised. And then he'd noticed that the regular servicemen hosing down the aircraft were in shorts and shirts, and that jets of water were bouncing right back at them. Why aren't
they
in goon suits? There's something they're not telling us, he'd thought with a quick glance at Len, who, wide-eyed beside him, was plainly thinking the same thing.

‘Step down from the aircraft,' the chief goon suit had ordered, and Maurie and Len had climbed out of the cockpit.

As they'd jumped to the ground, Maurie had noticed the channel of black sludge making its way to the nearby soak-away ditch, but he'd become quickly distracted by the Geiger counter that had been held up to him and the fact that the needle was going off the dial. The Geiger counter being run over Len was doing the same thing. And then the nightmare had become a reality for them both as they'd been put through the showers. Again and again they'd been ordered to scrub themselves, harder and more vigorously each time. Over and over, their skin turning a raw pink, until finally their body readings had been reduced to a level of ‘reasonable acceptance'.

To the scientists conducting the examination, the level of ‘reasonable acceptance' plainly meant that
the safety measures had been observed. But Maurie and Len had been left with the distinct impression that there was a discrepancy between the safety measures in place for the scientists and those in place for the average serviceman at Maralinga.

 

Following the discovery of an Aboriginal family who'd wandered through the blast area two days after the firing, a spotter with field glasses was placed a mile or so from ground zero to keep watch. His job was to radio a warning to the patrol team should anyone, white or black, unwittingly approach the contaminated site.

Holy Mother of God, young Paddy thought as he gazed through his field glasses. He couldn't believe what he was seeing.

Eighteen-year-old Private Paddy O'Hare of the Royal Engineers had laboured on the construction of the tower. He hadn't been fortunate enough to score a front seat at Roadside and therefore witness the firing, but he'd seen the site in all its glory prior to the test. The ninety-foot aluminium tower had been a splendid sight in Paddy's eyes. There it had stood, a giant modern marvel in primitive scrubland, a testament to man's invention. Paddy had been proud that he'd played a part in it, minor though that part may have been.

But where was the tower now? Indeed, where was the scrubland? Every scrap of vegetation had been annihilated and in its place was a shiny, black-green surface, like glass. Paddy recalled the talk in the beer garden. One of the Australians who'd been at Emu Field had told them about ‘bomb glaze'. So this was it,
he thought. But surely there'd be a
bit
of the tower left, wouldn't there? Just a
bit
. He scanned the area with his field glasses. Perhaps he was looking in slightly the wrong direction, or perhaps he wasn't looking closely enough. But try as he might, Paddy could find no shred of evidence that the tower had ever existed. The ninety-foot aluminium edifice from which the bomb had been suspended had been fused into nothing.

Holy Mother, he thought, so this was what the black family with their little kiddies had walked through, barefoot and barely clad. No wonder the boffins had decided to set up a watch.

 

‘Do you have any idea what that would have done to them psychologically? A primitive people like that? They'd never even been in a truck before, let alone been showered and scrubbed! The woman was
pregnant
, for Christ's sake!'

Daniel and Pete were sitting outside the barracks in their canvas chairs with the mugs of tea Daniel had brought back from the mess. It was lunchtime, and Pete, who had just returned from the DC/RB area, clearly needed to get things off his chest. Daniel said nothing, just let him rave on.

‘The woman was terrified out of her wits. By the time they called me in there, she was virtually catatonic – I couldn't get through to her at all. They've piled the whole family into a truck now, and they're driving them to the mission at Yalata. They're Yankuntjatjara people who were heading for the soak at Ooldea – Yalata's hundreds of miles from their own lands. They shouldn't have been put through this ordeal. It's wrong! It's so bloody wrong!'

Daniel was wondering what possible alternatives the military or the scientists could have come up with. The family would have had to go through the decontamination process, no matter how terrifying – they'd been exposed to radiation. To return them to their own lands would have been physically impossible, and Ooldea, commandeered by the army as a water source, was closed off to all. Yalata, a hundred miles to the south, was the nearest mission, and surely the only option, particularly for the pregnant woman. Pete was being unrealistic, Daniel thought, and the reason was patently obvious.

‘It may be wrong, but it's not your fault.'

Pete's angry tirade came to a halt. He hadn't yet allowed himself time to feel guilty, but the kid, of course, was spot on. The military patrol officers under his guidance should have discovered the family well before there'd been any risk of exposure.

Daniel continued in earnest. ‘You do everything that's humanly possible, Pete. Your men can't cover every inch of this terrain.'

‘They'd hardly have needed to cover every inch in this case.' There was an unpleasantly sarcastic edge to Pete's reply. ‘The family was travelling slowly, with children and a pregnant woman – they must have been in the vicinity for days.'

‘You said yourself they have a talent for making themselves invisible.'

‘Yeah, yeah. I did. And it's true. Which makes it their own bloody fault really, doesn't it.' He shrugged. ‘Ah well, there's bugger all I can do about it now.' He stood and tipped his tea out onto the ground. ‘I need a drink,' he said, and he went into the donga to fill his
mug from one of the many bottles of whisky he kept stashed away.

Once again, Daniel was left bewildered. Pete, with his mood swings from passion to indifference in a matter of seconds, remained a puzzling man. Much as Daniel had grown to admire him, he found Petraeus Mitchell possibly the most complicated person he'd ever met.

In truth, Petraeus Mitchell was not complicated. He was angry. He'd been angry throughout his entire life. He'd been angry that his father, after fighting in the Boer War, had re-enlisted fifteen years later and died at the Somme. Hadn't one war been enough for the man? He'd been angry that the mother he'd adored, having been transplanted from her homeland and left with five children, had been literally worked to death by the age of forty-three.

But it was the army that had put the final seal on Pete's anger, turning it from the frustration and regret of his youth to a true bitterness. Many of those who had served as coast watchers during the war and had lived to tell the tale had been left similarly disenchanted. For the job of a coast watcher was a dangerous and lonely one, with little or no backup. It was a job where a man, if discovered, found himself at the sole mercy of an enemy known to be merciless. The coast watcher was not looked after by his own. The fact that Pete had survived such a job for three long years had been nothing short of miraculous, but his time in the army had left him with a cynical view of the world.
Look after number one
had become his creed.
If you don't, no-one else will, because no-one else cares. And why the bloody hell should they?