Peter Copland on Cyclone Tracy (continued)

Things were starting to be rebuilt around Darwin. New roofs on the major buildings, including the MLC. There were teams working throughout the town on the power and water systems. Other teams were replacing the roofs on private (repairable) houses, usually a bit rough but waterproof. Made a lot more houses habitable again.

There were some problems when repairing our buildings though. One instance was in the endeavour to get the airport Dines anemograph operating again. The powers that be had decreed that the original guy anchors were not strong (thick) enough, and could be cut by flying tin in another cyclone. This was, of course, quite ridiculous; firstly they had not been damaged in Tracy, secondly it is not possible for a piece of tin to obtain that amount of energy at ground level, and lastly, if it did, who the hell would be around to care. But, it put back the airport Dines by at least three months.

We could not use the former IPS building at Emery Point 'til major tie down works were completed; they could have been fixed before the next wet season. Later the indestructible Dines anemograph was built 70 metres north of the radar building. It was a concrete block house made from 30 cubic metres of concrete with about half of that underground, and a ton of reinforcing steel to hold it all together. It was topped with a welded steel tower, so no cables. However, there is no way to protect the head assembly. There was another small problem for awhile; water ran straight through the walls and the hut was as wet inside as out.

Then came the indestructible radar building, to happily withstand 270 km/hr winds if I remember correctly. This was achieved by entombing the entire building in a new concrete structure marginally larger than the old building, with a 20 centimetre thick poured concrete roof. Cyclone survival was the only thing to matter. The fact that the entire building, having only a door at each end and no windows, was a perfect fire trap was of no importance. On pointing out this problem one idiot architect replied "no problem, push out the air-conditioners and climb through the hole from the inside". Eventually some light filtered through the intellectual cobwebs and it was decided to remove the old building from within. This must have been about the worst job imaginable; removing an iron roof half a metre below a hot steel J concrete roof with hardly any ventilation. I hope the guys were well paid.

Installation of tropical cyclone protection at Darwin Airport Meteorological Office, 1977.

Bureau of Meteorology