Radio Technical Officers
Foreword
Acknowledgements
Preface
Introduction
Chapter 1: The Early Years
Chapter 2: The Training School
Chapter 3: Equipment Installation Records
Chapter 4: The 'Techs' in Antarctica
Chapter 5: The 'Techs' Tell Their Stories
Trevor Donald Tells It All; Life in the Bureau from 1947 to 1989
Ray Clarke Looks Back
Some Memories from Ralph Bulloch
Peter Copland Works in Meteorological Electronics
Some Titbits from Dave Grainger
A Very Modest Tale from Alf Svensson
Adrian Porter Pulls No Punches
Jack Tait Recalls
Some Stories by Colourful Freddie Soutter
Some Snippets from Noel Barrett
Stephen Courbêt Has His Penny Wworth
And a Flyspeck or Two from Lenny Dawson
Some Interesting Reminiscences from Jannes Keuken
Brief Stories from Phil Black
From Gloria West, Wife of the Late Bob West
The Life and Bureau Times of Graham Linnett
Tales Out of School from Bill Hite
Peter Copland on Cyclone Tracy
Peter Broughton Tells the Story of Maralinga
Appendix 1: 'Techs' Roll Call
Appendix 2: Trainee Intakes
Appendix 3: 'Techs' Who Have Served in the Antarctic Region
Appendix 4: Summary of Major Installation Projects
Appendix 5: Summary of Major Equipment Variously Installed at Sites and Maintained by Radio Technical Officers
Index
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Help
Contact us
Some Snippets from Noel Barrett (continued)
It was rather good to be back home. My parents were getting on; my mother actually passing away in 1981. The unsettling effect and challenges that I had experienced during the year as a full time student were still with me and this coupled with the Regional Director's old fashioned view of 'techs' caused me to look for a change. I applied for an Engineer Class 1 position with Telecom and left the Bureau to start with Telecom in February 1981. Although I was very sorry to leave the Bureau after 18 years, and all the friends I had made and worked with, Telecom wasn't as bad as I expected and I found I was working with people I had gone to school with (very Tasmanian that).In my time with Telecom I was soon an Engineer Class 2, and despite my background in radio and radar, have been involved mostly with telephone exchanges. For the last few years I have been a Professional 4 (equals Engineer Class 6 in the old system) responsible for the network planning and development in Tasmania. I have also relieved as Chief Engineer in our Western Region which covers Western Australia, South Australia and the Northern Territory, mainly because of my knowledge of those places gained in the Bureau.
In about 1993 I returned to Port Hedland for a weekend and to see the yacht club that I and others in the Bureau and DCA, etc, started 25 years earlier. It was now going very strongly. The old house in Kingsmill Street looked the same, but with much more iron ore dust. The old centre of the town had died. The Bureau's OIC was Adrian Redman. He was at Carnarvon with me and is now one of the last remaining Briefing Officers. The WF44 radar had been upgraded, and gone were the slide rules, PPI and RHI. There was a PC in their place. My old block diagram of the WF44, however, was still on the back of the transmitter room door, even after 25 years.
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© Online Edition Australian Science and Technology Heritage Centre and Bureau of Meteorology 2001
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