From Allan’s daughter, Lorraine Thomas (nee Ritchie):

My Dad, Allan, worked for the OTC at Doonside & we lived at Staff Cottage No 8 up to about 1969, when we moved to Baulkham Hills. Dad commuted to work from there before his retirement. I think he retired in 1979; I remember going to his retirement “do” in Blacktown.

I have been able, thanks to your initial help, to find many men who worked with him & I am so moved by the responses I received. Each man remembered him as a wonderful “teacher” & problem solver & a real gentleman, & he was. In particular, I have been having ongoing email conversations with Neil Yakalis. What a wonderful man! He has quelled a lot of curiosity I had about Dad’s time at the station. My Dad died on 29th July 1997.

Is it possible to include him in your “vale” section of your veteran’s publication.  I never knew the high esteem in which he was held. I suppose I would like something  concrete regarding Dad’s time with the OTC. For me, as a child & up to the age of 17 when we moved, it was the most wonderful part of my life! Dad never discussed his work & Neil has filled me in on a lot of things.   There are some men who remember him clearly.

 OTVA Newsletter June 2013

 2013 NSW AGM

Date: Friday 14 June at 11.30

Venue: Level 2

NSW Bowlers’ Club

99 York St, Sydney

RSVP: president@otva.com

By 7 th June 2013

call/SMS 0411 260 542

Interstate Vets are welcome to attend.

 

PRESIDENTS MESSAGE.

Fellow Members of the OTVA,

I hope that this newsletter finds you and your families in good health and enjoying all that life has to offer.

Well another 12 months has passed since last year’s AGM. The 2013 AGM will be held on June 14 at the Bowlers Club in York Street Sydney. We are looking for a new editor for the OTVA Newsletter as Bob Emanuel who has been performing that role over the past few years who has asked to be replaced so that he can focus on other activities that require his time and attention. If you would like to volunteer to perform this role please email me at president@otva.com to register your interest.

It is a very rewarding job especially as you get to see first-hand many wonderful stories about the people that made OTC a great place in which to work as well as details of things that happened during the OTC era. Unfortunately not all of these stories can be printed for legal, moral and ethical reasons.

The web site https://www.otva.com/blog/) contains a list of all financial members of the OTVA and an email containing the same list has been circulated to all of the email addresses that your committee has on file. If you did not receive an email please email president@otva.com so that your email address can be added to the email distribution list. Your email address will be kept private unless you specifically ask for it to be shared with others.

The OTVA web page (http://www.otva.com) and the BLOGs (https://www.otva.com/blog/) continue to be a great source of enjoyment for our members. The number of hits each month is consistently high and your committee continues to receive correspondence from ex-OTC personnel, their families and members of the public asking questions about many aspects of OTC. Many of these emails are from overseas from ex-OTC personnel living abroad or persons interested in the history of OTC.

Email continues to be a great source of communication with you our members. If you send an email to president@otva.com I will review it and where appropriate email it out to those on the email distribution list as well as upload it to the BLOG site where deemed appropriate.

Regrettably the project to digitise Transit and Contact magazines is not yet complete. Copies of the missing magazines continue to trickle in requiring us to delay the final release of a DVD to get a more complete compilation of magazines. Your committee intends to make the DVD available to financial members of the OTVA upon request.

I extend my sincere condolences to the families of our ex-OTC brothers and/or their partners who have departed this life since I last addressed you. We are saddened by their passing but are gladdened by the fullness of their rich and long lives. May They Rest In Peace

Warmest regards,

Peter Bull

0411 260542

peterbull@otva.com

________________________

 

COMPAC 50TH ANNIVERSARY

The 50th Anniversary of the opening of traffic on the COMPAC Cable is in 2013 and you are invited to join in.

A subcommittee has been established. If you wish to contribute, contact Peter Bull, president@otva.com

________________________

Carnarvon SES – a brief history of the early days

By

Jim Harte

The “raison d’être” for the OTCA Carnarvon satellite station was to provide a reliable communications link between the NASA/AWA tracking station located on the southern end of Brown’s Range at Carnarvon, and NASA control in the USA. In 1966 the tracking station was relying of Telecom landlines routed via a Meekatharra bearer system, and a back-up troposcatter (Troposphere scattering propagation – Ed) system to Geraldton.

When commissioned (early 1967), Carnarvon provided 7 AVD circuits to the US via the Comsat Brewster Flat earth station. Although Carnarvon had additional capacity, the number of circuits leased by NASA remained virtually static up until the tracking stations closure in the mid 70s following rationalisation of their deep-space support network. Even with the commissioning of the CVN 2 antenna (Mitsubishi 97ft antenna) in 1970, the number of active comms channels did not significantly expand, apart from a brief period where the station provided some temporary Perth –Sydney capacity while Telecom carried out upgrade work on the East-West microwave system (late 1970?), and in the late 70’s where CVN 2 was used to uplink the WA Remote Area Television (RATV) signal as part of the Government’s Homestead and Community Broadcast Satellite Service (HACBSS) initiative (the forerunner of the AUSSAT service).

The early station build was carried out by the Geraldton Building Company, who provided the station buildings and infrastructure (communications – comms – building, power house and plant workshop), road works, the initial 12 staff houses, and the antenna foundation works.

The satellite earth station equipment, one of five similar earth stations, the others being Andover, Brewster Flat, Paumalu and Philippines, was provided by Page Engineering (a subsidiary of Northrop?) as part of a turn-key installation, with the newly trained OTC staff providing the technical labour support to Page.

At the time the OTC technicians arrived on site for their OJT (on-the- job-training), the concrete antenna podium had just been completed, and the antenna components were being un-crated in preparation for assembly. Everything including our accommodation was essentially still WIP. Our first job was to lay the station earth mat, which involved several days at the bottom of some very sandy trenches (the whole site was built on one large stabilised sand dune – Brown’s Range), hammering in numerous earth stakes, then connecting them up to form the earth mat. This was carried out while waiting for the three trailers of electronic equipment to arrive on site from Perth. A good shower and a few beers were required each day to wash down the red dust.

Our accommodation at this time was the three of four houses that had been completed – three to four techs to a house, fending for ourselves, which was not too easy as we (about 8 of us) only had use of a couple of Commonwealth cars pending arrival of our own vehicles. A couple of days after the delayed arrival our cars (the transporter was forced to drive across the Nullarbor as an earlier one had lost some off its load off the high-speed freight train as the cars had not been tied down, resulting in an embargo on car transporters) we had an un-seasonal downpour and most of them were bogged outside the houses in the clay road-base mix used for the station road works – there was nothing else available in the area.

With the arrival of the 3 van/trailers on site (40ft comms and maintenance vans, and 20ft power van), and the other electronic equipment boxes/containers), our technical work commenced. As the equipment had already been integrated in the US, it was essentially matter of racking all the equipment in the comms van, then running all the interconnecting cables (mostly pre-cut to length in the US) between the vans, and the antenna mounted equipment (up and down converters, HPAs, LNAs and tracking equipment.

Unfortunately for some who were not too comfortable with working at heights, the cable running on the antenna required cable brackets to be drilled into the antenna yoke structure necessitating a couple of lucky fellows to spend much time hanging from a wooden scaffold/platform drilling and tapping holes for the brackets up to 15m above ground. The other poor sods had to put up with working in the air-conditioned vans, and coming out into the heat periodically.

At this early stage in the life of the station, apart from having to acclimatise to the heat and the dust, we had to put up with the continuous scream of the 150KVA GMC 2 stroke diesel engine that provided the source of 60Hz power to the US supplied equipment until the town mains driven permanent 50/60Hz motor converter set was delivered from England and commissioned as part of the station power work. The GM diesel remained on site in the van as the 60Hz back-up supply till station closure.

The on-site OTC project engineers were Gus Berzins (since returned to Riga, Latvia – see next item), and had Don Kennedy as his junior engineer. As this was OTC’s first satellite station there was quite a stream of Engineering and Ops visitors during the installation and commissioning phase.

(Jim Harte, if you didn’t know, was Dux of the Year twice at the DCA Technicians Training School and was also the most outstanding Technician-in Training for that year. Jim won the bits and pieces to build a stereo amplifier – do you still have it, Jim? Dennis Grant was co-runner up and was awarded a subscription to Radiotronics, the AWA valve design magazine – Ed)

________________________

Letter To The President

Dear Peter,

Not sure if we have ever met, but I am Guntis (“Gus”) Berzins and from 1960 to 1980 I was an engineer in OTC(A).

In late 1966 and early 1967 I was responsible for acceptance testing of the initial Carnarvon Earth Station, as well as being involved with the Carnarvon – Goonhilly TV transmission, which took place at the time and which was the first real time TV exchange between Australia and an overseas country. Late last year I saw in Engineers Australia that a Space Museum had been established in the earth station in Carnarvon and this stimulated me to write down my recollections of this time, as well as to collect all the photographs which I still had.

My intention was to submit all this material to the Space Museum, and I would also be glad to contribute it to the OTC Veterans Association web site. However, before signing off on it I wanted to see what else had been written about this period, so I could cross-check some of the facts, and I therefore wanted to ask if I could be given access to the restricted part of the OTCVA web site.

If necessary, I would be glad to pay the $10 and join OTCVA, recognising however that geography would probably preclude me from attending any functions in person. After leaving OTC(A) I worked for 13 years in London with Inmarsat but in 1993 returned to my original homeland Latvia, where I now live in Riga.

I still retain many fond memories of my years with OTC(A), it was a fine organisation and a great bunch of people.

With best regards,

Guntis (“Gus”) Berzins

________________________

Historical Submarine Cable Remnants Glimpsed Near Fremantle.

Along the rocky foreshore at Cottesloe just north of Leighton Beach are some corroded artefacts which in their time were highly significant for Australia’s external business and defence communications. They are the remains of submarine cables which traversed some 1721 nautical miles between Cottesloe to a relay station at Direction Island, one of the Cocos group in the north eastern Indian Ocean, and thence to other parts of the British Empire. The first cable to Cottesloe was activated in 1901, the year of Australian federation. It was owned by the Eastern Extension, Australasia and China Telegraph Company (EEAC). In WW1 the cable’s strategic significance was immediately recognised by the Germans. A raiding party from the warship SMS Emden tried to close down the Cocos Islands facility in November 1914, but were thwarted when HMAS Sydney which had been escorting the first convoy of Australian and New Zealand troops (ANZACs) to the Middle East, diverted and destroyed their ship. The undersea circuit was extended in 1920 with the laying of a cable 1,525 nautical miles from Cottesloe to Adelaide in South Australia. This was omitted from a map on a cast-bronze commemorative plaque currently on display at the Cottesloe site. In 1926 another cable was laid between Cocos Island and Cottesloe. This coincided with the opening a grand purpose-built relay station overlooking the ocean at the Western Australian end. On the domestic scene, a small cable was laid from Cottesloe to nearby Rottnest Island in 1900. A larger replacement became operational in 1935. The main overseas cables and the Cottesloe relay station ceased operation on 31 July 1966. By then it had become owned by the federal government’s Overseas Telecommunications Commission (OTC). The building still stands today, but is known at the McCall Centre. It’s become a state government residential facility for children with severe emotional and behavioural conditions. Last week I noticed the storms had exposed two differing sections of redundant cable I hadn’t seen previously. Because they were slightly south of the main terminal building they may have been related to the Post Master General department’s 1935 Rottnest circuit.

Of particular interest to me was the cleanly cut cross-section. The black rubber component still had some flexibility when squeezed with my thumb. The green verdigris (Copper Chloride as the cable is near the sea – Ed) betrays the presence of the copper conductor. I went back to the area at low tide yesterday with my wife and our 17 year old daughter to take some photos of the remains of another three cables still visible on the shallow but jagged limestone reef further north, directly in front of the old Cable Station.

________________________

NASA SUCCESSFULLY LAUNCHES THREE SMARTPHONE SATELLITES

MOFFETT FIELD, Calif.

From Gary Hausfeld via Peter Bull

A recent NASA test launch included 3 HTC Nexus One smart phones, with extra batteries and high power radio, which they are calling “Phonesats”.

These phones will take pictures and send these back to earth in bursts of data packets which then need to be stitched back together.

Amateur radio operators around the world are asked to try to receive the data packets and forward them to NASA for processing.

Details on web site:

http://www.phonesat.org/

April 22, 2013 MEDIA RELEASE: 13-32AR NASA SUCCESSFULLY LAUNCHES THREE SMARTPHONE SATELLITES MOFFETT FIELD, Calif. — Three smartphones destined to become low-cost satellites rode to space Sunday aboard the maiden flight of Orbital Science Corp.’s Antares rocket from NASA’s Wallops Island Flight Facility in Virginia. The trio of “PhoneSats” is operating in orbit, and may prove to be the lowest-cost satellites ever flown in space. The goal of NASA’s PhoneSat mission is to determine whether a consumer-grade smartphone can be used as the main flight avionics of a capable, yet very inexpensive, satellite. Transmissions from all three PhoneSats have been received at multiple ground stations on Earth, indicating they are operating normally. The PhoneSat team at NASA’s Ames Research Centre in Moffett Field, Calif., will continue to monitor the satellites in the coming days. The satellites are expected to remain in orbit for as long as two weeks. Satellites consisting mainly of the smartphones will send information about their health via radio back to Earth in an effort to demonstrate they can work as satellites in space. The spacecraft also will attempt to take pictures of Earth using their cameras. Amateur radio operators around the world can participate in the mission by monitoring transmissions and retrieving image data from the three satellites. Large images will be transmitted in small chunks and will be reconstructed through a distributed ground station network. More information can found at:

http://www.phonesat.org

NASA’s off-the-shelf PhoneSats already have many of the systems needed for a satellite, including fast processors, versatile operating systems, multiple miniature sensors, high-resolution cameras, GPS receivers and several radios. NASA engineers kept the total cost of the components for the three prototype satellites in the PhoneSat project between $3,500 and $7,000 by using primarily commercial hardware and keeping the design and mission objectives to a minimum. The hardware for this mission is the Google-HTC Nexus One smartphone running the Android operating system. NASA added items a satellite needs that the smartphones do not have — a larger, external lithium-ion battery bank and a more powerful radio for messages it sends from space. The smartphone’s ability to send and receive calls and text messages has been disabled. Each smartphone is housed in a standard cubesat structure, measuring about 4 inches square. The smartphone acts as the satellite’s onboard computer. Its sensors are used for attitude determination and its camera for Earth observation.

________________________

THE COMMERCIAL BRANCH, INTERPLEX AND OTC’S NEW YORK OFFICE – Part 2.

By

Tom Barker

OTC had become the unwitting victim of the Cable and Wireless MSC (Message Switching Centre) in Hong Kong, a battery of Univac 418 mainframe computers, engineered to handle private telegraph networks, customised to the needs of each individual company. Such systems and services were being offered by many international carriers, at that time, but the C & W MSC had embarked upon a campaign to target Australian telex customers, probably because they knew that OTC did not have this capability. It was apparent that OTC would continue to lose business this way, unless it had a computer-based message switching system to offer its customers, so that a network of private lines, connecting to every major office of any corporation around the world, could communicate, via the Sydney-based switch. This entailed selling the service, not just to our Australian customers, but to the corporation’s (usually multi-national) whose headquarters could be based anywhere in the world.

After OTC management were made aware of the competitive disadvantage that OTC was suffering, in this situation, it was decided to install a message switching centre for private line networks and it was to be called Interplex. At first the Interplex system comprised a number of small, stand-alone computer systems, allocated on a one-per-customer basis, but this arrangement proved too inflexible to meet all our customer needs, so an arrangement of General Automation (GA16/64) mini-computers, called “Mini-Plus” systems, was installed at Paddington, and these were capable of meeting a much wider range of customer requirements.

From that time on, the competition between OTC’s Interplex service and the C & W MSC was very keen. We won some very good accounts and we lost some important ones to our competitors. It was an area of OTC’s business which was truly engaged in competition for business with an aggressive alternative supplier, an unfamiliar scenario for many who had spent their entire careers employed in monopoly carrier situations.

One of the facts which became apparent to those of us engaged in this business, was that 45% of OTC’s corporate business was with companies based in the USA. We began to participate in International Telecom Expos, (such as the ICA) in the U.S and we soon realised that OTC needed to have a permanent presence in the U.S. if we were to succeed in this area of business. At that time, OTC management was not enthusiastic about having a representative office in another country, to talk to customers, because there was a mindset that OTC was a monopoly and didn’t need to compete for business. Fortunately this did not apply to people like George Maltby, who took the proposal to establish an office in New York, to the board a number of times, before finally gaining approval, in 1984.

The proviso which we were obliged to work with, was that no capital expenditure could be made, so everything had to be leased (presumably so we would not have to write anything off if the venture failed). I walked the streets of New York, trying to find somewhere to hang up OTC’s shingle, and finally took a space in a serviced office business, located in Fifth Avenue, near the Rockefeller Centre. I was assisted in the task of setting up this office by some good friends in British Telecom International, who were setting up their own New York office at that time, a much more elaborate, permanent and impressive affair than OTC’s modest presence.

This being OTC’s first overseas-based office, a number of things had to be considered which were unprecedented in its experience. One important detail was the selection of staff and the length of their terms in that post. I decided that three years was probably the most sensible term length, as it takes some time to become accustomed to working in a foreign country and also time to prepare for ones return home, so three years would allow a useful time in the job, once settled in. Trevor Duff was selected to fill the Manager position and Ravi Bahtia his assistant.

For our official opening, George Maltby prevailed upon an old friend, the Australian Ambassador to the United States, Sir Robert Cotton, KCMG, to officiate, and George selected the Waldorf Astoria as the venue. Our OTC PR section arranged for a New York firm to set up the location (the Ballroom) and the catering for the event. Inviting Sir Robert to officiate was a masterstroke. Although Americans are proud not to be part of the British Empire (or what’s left of it) they salivate at the presence of Royalty or British Nobles. Their responses to our invitations were overwhelming. On the night of the event we were blown away by the number of industry leaders who attended. It was a stunning success. For me, the two biggest thrills were when I talked for some time to Warren Buffet (about his buying Western Union Telegraph) and when Mike Ford, the head of British Telecom International, said to me (very quietly) “You beat us, Tom”. They had held their New York Office official opening a week before us and we both knew that what Mike said was true.

The opening of the New York office not only gave OTC a permanent presence in the USA, which was appreciated immediately by our many corporate customers and US correspondent carriers. It made possible the scheduling of regular visits to them and also set the stage for the opening of OTC representative offices in London and Wellington shortly afterwards, which were to be followed by others in Japan and Vietnam, etc, in the years that followed.

The serviced office facility which we leased in Fifth Avenue served as OTC’s office for nearly two years, by which time any doubts about the success of the project were long gone and Trevor Duff was able to move to a much nicer and better equipped facility in the main street of White Plains, outside Manhattan, but located very conveniently to many of our customers and US correspondent carriers and much cheaper than a downtown Manhattan location.

As fate later destined (unexpectedly), I was to spend the last two years of my OTC career in that office and I was able to observe, first hand, the advantages of being in a position to deal with issues which were important to OTC’s business, in the same time-frame as those people with whom we were dealing.

Sadly, a number of OTC’s corporate customers were located in the World Trade Centre twin towers and we would spend many days in meetings there, with those people, so it was horrifying to witness the destruction of those towers, on television, from my home in Australia, many years later and to hear the stories of friends who lost members of their families in that tragedy.

________________________

Practical Jokes in the MRSC

By

Bob Emanuel

I was reminded recently in an email from Jeff Bultitude and Ian Warby of an innocent April Fool’s Day prank in the Message Relay Switching Centre (MRSC) at Paddington that had the funniest outcome.

It involved the UNIVAC Fastrand drums used to store the International telegrams to and from Australia in the era when telegrams were king.

There was no telephone IDD then and the telex exchanges were about to take over from telegrams as the main means of international business communication.

These amazing devices consisted of two large drums of metal weighing 2.25 tons, one above the other, with a magnetic surface that could have data – telegrams – written on it and then read back for sending overseas or back to the PMG. They were massive devices; no-one who worked at the MRSC can forget these magnificent units. Visitors were quite impressed, particularly the non-technical.

One was called Drum A and the other was Drum B.

It was 2350GMT – 09:50 AEST – and it was a quite April Fool’s Day in 1975. I wrote a log entry that said that Drum A had jumped out of its bearings, smashed the unit’s walls and gone through the wall of the top floor of Paddington building, falling down into the square bounded by Isenberg’s and crushing cars and people as it rolled down Oxford St.

At 0001GMT – 10:01 AEST – the log entry was “Drum A returned to service”.

The other staff thought it mildly amusing and we went on with the day.

The following morning, a few of us were in Keith McCredden’s office when an urgent call came in from an Engineer in H.O. in a very distressed voice asking why hadn’t he been told about this at the time!

Well, Keith with a huge grin, held his hand over the microphone, told us who it was and what it was about, trying so hard not to laugh.

Allan Mason, Jake Kouciba and I all spilled out into the equipment room, piddling ourselves laughing, trying to hear the one-sided conversation as Keith, showing amazing self-control in not braking up in laughter, patiently explained it was an April Fool’s Day joke, and if the Engineer had read the following log entry he would have seen the entry for what it was, an April Fool’s Day prank.

Keith then joined us in the equipment room and laughed his heart out. It was great to be alive that morning in the MRSC.

I was asked not to do it again. I couldn’t top this effort, so I didn’t.

As George Maltby and Maurie O’Connor said at one reunion, the best stories can’t be written down. There are more MRSC stories I can tell, but only after a few beers at a reunion…

________________________

 

POSITION VACANT – OTVA NEWSLETTER EDITOR

This is my last edition as the editor of the OTVA Newsletter. Increasing demands of my time in Blackheath means that I must pass a few things on. The OTVA Newsletter is one. To edit the Newsletter you need patience and the ability to edit copy sent in by members, often with outrageous formatting that you will need to format into the style of your Newsletter.

You will need to select your own Style.

You will need to browbeat, bully, and otherwise persuade Vets that they do have interesting stories to tell and that you can clean up their writing – I have certainly done that on many occasions whilst keeping the style of the story teller intact – that is most important. You aren’t telling the story, someone else is doing so. I can certainly continue to help in that regard given sufficient notice.

You will have to source stories from non-technical vets as well as Techs and Engineers. You must do this!

You will need to research and write stories yourself.

I liked the OTC Personality story from Brian Collath last edition and think that should be pursued – but the new editor might not want to do so.

It has been a Real Joy, an Honour and Privilege to have edited the OTVA Newsletter, but the time has come for me to go. It is time for a new editor to impress his or her style on this august journal.

And an August Journal it is – the OTVA Newsletter is circulated to a much wider audience outside OTVA, I have found out, as former colleagues from various telcos around Australia and the AsiaPac region have read it and commented favourably to me directly – but they aren’t Vets!

A pity they will not subscribe as you do.

________________________

THE OVERHEADS

Office Bearers 2012–13

President: Peter Bull, president@otva.com

Phone: 0411 260 542

Secretary: Will Whyte, secretary@otva.com

Treasurer: Vacant, but … treasurer@otva.com

Newsletter Editor: Vacant, but… editor@otva.com

Phone: 0412 062 236 or 02 4787 5558

OTVA Membership Subscription:

$10 p.a. is due in May each year.

Please check your mailer as the indication “5/13” or earlier indicates that your subs are now due.

Mail Address for Subs payments.

PO Box 702 RIVERWOOD NSW 2210

Email to:

president@otva.com or treasurer@otva.com

For online bank deposit details.

 

From Peter Burgess:

Peter,

It is with great sadness that I have to let you know that Brian Calder passed away early this morning in a Sydney hospital after a relatively short battle with cancer.

No further details at this stage.   Appreciate if  you could send this to the OTVA team.

—
Regards
Peter W Burgess

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

From Des Kinnersley:

Ron’s daughter, Debra Gaye, rang me on Sunday 14 July 2013 to advise that Ron Cocker has passed away.

The funeral details will be in the West Australian in the next couple of days.

Ron had been in poor shape with fluid on the lungs and had been in respite care for a few weeks. He passed away peacefully.

Kevan could you please circulate this info to all the WA OTC Vets.

Debra Gaye’s e mail address is soloment@bigpond.net.au if you want to get in touch with her.

She can also be contacted on Ron’s telephone number 9362 1170.

Des Kinnersley.

(Picture 1: Ron is on LHS of above photo with Des Kinnersley on the RHS)

(Picture 2: Ron is on LHS of above photo with Kevan Bourke on the RHS)

(Picture 3: Ron and his daughters (Julie, Debra Gaye and Tracey) that Brian Woods took at the Wireless Hill  (Applecross) Centenary held in 2012.)

It is with deep regret that I advise you of the passing of Dave Wood on 10 July 2013 aged 58.

I went through training with Dave at the Dept Civil Aviation Training School at Waverton NSW between 1971 and 1975 and found him to be a very nice guy who will be remembered fondly by all who came into contact with him. May He Rest In Peace.

Empire Bay man, 58, dies from serious head injuries after bus crashed into his home on NSW Central Coast

The bus driver who apparently suffered a fatal heart attack before his vehicle crashed into a house was yesterday identified as 60-year-old grandfather Phillip Ferris.

 

From: McKnight, Tom

I am deeply saddened to announce that Murray lost his battle against cancer on Friday night.

His funeral will be held at 1.30pm on Thursday 20^th June at Pinnaroo Valley Memorial Park. Service 1.30 – 2.30pm. Burial 2.45 – 3.15pm.

The service will be held in the Burial Cemetery Chapel (East). The request from Murray’s Wife Pat is to wear colour rather than black.

Best Regards,

Tom

To view 81 photos provided by John Oxley please click on the below hyperlink

http://www.facebook.com/l/bAQHDmIPmAQErQAmzoMa5ew3aZBo_PuVI_8al3m5g4B6fEw/https%3A%2F%2Fplus.google.com%2Fphotos%2F110988687784606635062%2Falbums%2F5752659690298061825%3Fauthkey%3DCLOhq4W3qaq5BA

 by

Guntis („Gus”) Berzins

Background

As part of its space programme the United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) in 1963 established a Tracking Station on Brown Range, about 10 km outside Carnarvon.  Subsequently, the USA embarked on Project Apollo, the project to put a man on the moon, and great emphasis was then placed on security, including security and reliability of communications.

With communications via satellite becoming technically feasible, and in order to enhance security, NASA developed a plan to connect its principal overseas tracking stations via satellite communications links with the various control centres in the USA.  To implement this plan NASA intended to let a contract for the provision and operation of the satellites, earth stations and all other necessary facilities to the Communications Satellite Corporation (Comsat), an entity established by the US Government in 1962 for developing satellite communications.   The plan envisaged the establishment in twelve months from October 1965 of three satellite earth stations in the USA (Brewster Flat, Washington State, Andover, Maine and Hawaii) and at three non-US locations – Ascension Island and the Canary Islands in the Atlantic and Carnarvon in Western Australia.   However, OTC(A), as Australia’s international telecommunications operator and Cable and Wireless as the telecommunications operator for the U.K. overseas territories (including Ascension Island) made it clear that under their national telecommunications laws Comsat would not be permitted to establish and operate commercial telecommunications facilities in their territories and insisted that they should be the operators of the planned earth stations.  Telefonica of Spain, as the responsible operator for Spanish territories later joined this stance[1].

OTC(A) thereby took on the responsibility of providing an earth station in Carnarvon, to be ready for service by October 1966.  Given this very short time scale, and since Comsat had already developed a specification for a transportable earth station including a folded cassagrain horn („sugar scoop”) antenna, OTC(A) essentially specified a similar station and let the contract to the same company as Comsat – Northrop Page Communications Corp.  This was to be Australia’s first satellite communications earth station; the first of many.

To provide the satellites for the system required by NASA, Comsat had negotiated an agreement with Hughes Aircraft Company for the development and construction of four satellites, based on the successful experimental „ Early Bird” satellite (later renamed „ Intelsat I”), which had allowed early tests of satellite communications over the Atlantic, between the USA, UK, France and Germany.   These were drum shaped satellites, with the drum covered with solar cells and the communications antenna projecting from one end.  Since the antenna radiated a doughnut shaped beam, the satellite had to be correctly orientated toward the earth for maximum strength signals and this stability was achieved by the gyroscopic effect of spinning the satellite.  The satellites were to be place in a geostationary orbit, i.e. an orbit about 36,000 km above the earth in which they essentially appeared to be stationary above the same point on the equator.

Although Comsat had negotiated the agreement for these satellites, they proposed that ownership and operation of the satellites be taken over by the „Intenational Telecommunications Satellite Organisation” (Intelsat), an intergovernmental organisation established in 1964 to provide international telecommunications by satellite.   Although the organisations was established by governments, the shareholders (so called „ Signatories”) were in most cases the countries’ telecommunication entities. Comsat was the US Signatory as well as the Manager for the organisation whilst OTC(A) was Australia’s signatory.  Intelsat took over responsibility for the satellites and they were duly named Intelsat II, with the initial satellite to be launched for Pacific service.

Preparing the Carnarvon Earth Station for Service

In February 1966, as a relatively young engineer, I was appointed to the position of  „Senior Engineer” in OTC(A)’s Planning Department to be part of the team planning the establishment of the Carnarvon Earth Station.  This appointment put me into the then very new field of satellite communications, which was personally both a most interesting and challenging job.  As a result during 1966 I attended meetings in London, Washington and Madrid, as well as Sydney, in which the organisations owning the earth stations for the NASA communications network agreed on various aspects of operating and maintaining the network.   Whilst in Washington I also visited Page Communications, to observe and discuss progress in construction of the earth station equipment.

To prepare for operating the earth station, it was necessary to select staff who would man the station as well as provide training courses for them, since satellite communications was a totally new field for OTC(A) and it did not have any staff with experience in this field.  Consequently we not only selected staff from our various other stations, but also tried to find technicians from outside OTC(A) who had some experience in this field.

In September 1966 OTC(A) transferred me to their Operations Branch and I was designated to be the on-site engineer responsible for acceptance testing of the Carnarvon Earth Station, i.e. testing to ensure that Page Communications had met the defined specifications, and in general for commissioning the earth station to be ready for service.  In carrying out these duties I was in Carnarvon from the 29 September 1966 until 9 February 1967 and was assisted by Donald (Don) Kennedy, who was an Engineer Grade II at the time and stayed in Carnarvon about the same length of time.  He now lives in the UK.

The Station Manager of the OTC(A) Carnarvon Earth Station at the time it was established was Leo Mahoney, a worldly wise personality with extensive experience and technical knowledge, who was assisted by the Deputy Station Manager Jack Gray a good humoured man with long technical experience.  The technicians on the station had been selected to be young and capable of absorbing this new technology and comprised Terry Etherington, Jim Harte, Roy Hunt, Terry Nipperess, Al Pilgrim and Tony Wallbridge, and Senior Plant Officer Dave Reynolds.

At the time I arrived in Carnarvon most of the equipment was in place and the construction was substantially complete and the emphasis was on getting the equipment and the whole station operating.   The main building and the power house had been costructed, the transportable vans were in place, the folded cassegrain antenna had been constructed and the staff houses were close to completion.  In addition a „boresight tower” had been erected in a field on the far side of the Gascoyne, some kilometers from the earth station, sited precisely north.  The boresight transmitted a signal, which simulated the tracking signal from the satellite.

The earth station equipment, although not necessarily state-of-the-art in all aspects, nevertheless in some areas was quite demanding and station staff had to be quite proficient to understand how the equipment functioned, how to maintain it and how to repair it when it failed.  Most of the equipment was located in three transportable vans – Operations, Maintenance and Power van provided by Page Commnications. The main receiver was a parametric amplifier, certainly a state-of-the-art device at the time whose operation depended on being cooled to 17⁰ K by a special gaseous helium refrigeration system to achieve the requisite sensitivity.   For transmitting the station had two power amplifiers that used water cooled klystrons and could deliver 12 KW of RF power.  The folded cassegrain antenna had an aperture of about 13 metres square and consisted of two reflector surfaces, a parabola and hyperbola, which required very precise alignment to achieve the design antenna performance. The antenna was on a mount, which moved in azimuth and elevation („az-el mount”) and was driven by a hydraulic control system.  It could be steered in three modes – by following a tracking signal from the satellite, by „programme tracking” using data received by telex from Comsat and recorded on punched paper tape,  or thirdly, purely manually by moving a joystick on the control panel.  The tracking system was fast and powerful and could turn the 25 ton antenna at a speed of 5⁰ per second and the effect of using the joystick to simultaneously turn the antenna horizontally and raise it in elevation gave the appearance of the antenna screwing into the sky.  Needless to say such an extreme maneouvre was not required to track geostationary satellites and was simply a demonstration of the antennas capability, and sometimes resulted in blown power fuses.  The earth station was planned to provide seven voice/data circuits to the USA, one of which was subdivided to give three telegraph circuits.  In addition, there was a separate orderwire circuit. To pass the communications and tracking, telemetry and command signals to and from the NASA Tracking Station at Carnarvon, the earth station was connected to it by means of duplicate telephone cables laid on Browns Range.   The station was connected to the Carnarvon town power supply, but it also had two emergency power systems in the event of problems with the town supply.   The whole earth station, including equipment, buildings and staff housing had cost OTC(A) about $3 million.

During October and November 1966 the Page Communications engineers from the USA, with the assistance of the station staff were getting the equipment operational and lining it up.  However, there were many difficulties – with the antenna tracking system, with the power amplifiers (transmitters), the parametric ampliefiers and the emergency power system.  A note of humour was added by the Post Office in Sydney, who readdressed our mail to the „OTC Satellite Faith Station”, an address we thought aptly captured the mood during this period.

Launch of Intelsat II-F1 satellite

The Intelsat II-F1 satellite, which was due to be placed above the Pacific Ocean and used for Carnarvon – USA communication, was launched on 26 October 1966.  In a letter dated 30 October I wrote: „The construction of our station is considerably behind time but the Americans are trying hard to more or less get it ready for service.  For the first two days after the satellite launch we tried to receive the satellite signals but without success, but on Saturday (29 October 1966) we finally received the signals and everyone was very elated”.  My diary entry for 29 October reads: „Satellite first acquired between 1130am and 1200 am” (probably should have read „1200pm”).

Communications satellites are positioned in a circular geostationary orbit by having the launch rocket initially place them in a long elliptical orbit, called the transfer orbit, whose apogee (highest point) is at the same height as the geostationary orbit.  Following orbital calculations and after some time in the transfer orbit, a small solid fuel rocket motor built into the satellite called, the „apogee kick motor” is fired when the satellite is at its apogee to place it in the circular geostationary orbit.

Unfortunately, when the apogee kick motor was fired on Intelsat II-F1, the motor nozzle blew off and the satellite remained in an orbit similar to the transfer orbit.  So, although the communications functions in the satellite worked perfectly, it was useless for its intended purpose as it was not stationary above the Pacific, as required, but rather precessed around the earth in its elliptical orbit.  From our viewpoint, failure of the satellite was probably fortunate, as we kept having various difficulties with the earth station and in reality it was far from being operational.   Nevertheless the satellite, even in its errant orbit, could be used on an intermittent basis for testing the earth station.

My diary entries record the following significant events:

12 Nov. 1966: „Acquired satellite and for the first time looped signals through it, using a power of about 4KW.  This occurred around 0400 GMT”.

13 Nov. 1966: „ Established first contact between Carnarvon and an overseas station (Hawaii) at 22.21 GMT (12th Nov.)  Initial contact was by o/w (voice) but later communications carriers were also transmitted and received.  Antenna initally tracked successfully on autotrack but later autotrack suddenly failed and manual tracking was required”.

Historic Carnarvon – Goonhilly TV transmission – 25 November 1966

Transmission of TV by satellite had been demonstrated in the early 1960’s across the Atlantic via the Telstar satellite and across the Pacific in 1964 between Japan and USA with the Relay satellite. OTC(A) had designated Cyril Vahtrick, an engineer by profession and one of its senior management staff, to examine and lead the development of satellite communications by the organisation.  As a result of the overseas demonstrations he recognised the public importance and impact of making a TV transmission between Australia and overseas. He also recognised that the impending launch of the Intelsat II-F1 satellite provided an opportunity to attempt a TV link between Australia and the UK, using the Carnarvon earth station[2].

It was intended to establish the Australia-UK link-up by transmitting the TV signals to the Brewster Flat earth station in the USA, carrying the signals terrestrially across the USA and using a trans-Atlantic satellite link to reach the UK.  This had the added complication that the originated TV signal in Carnarvon would have to be the US NTSC 525 line standard.

Some time before the satellite launch date, a team of ABC engineers arrived in Carnarvon and together with the Page on-site engineers we worked out the necessary arrangements to hook up the ABC outside broadcasting equipment with the earth station.  Presumably via OTC(A) Head office we also agreed on the detailed engineering arrangements with Goonhilly.   Consequently,  five days after the satellite was launched, on 31 October 1966 two OTC(A) engineers – Jim Robertson and Ken Howe – arrived in Carnarvon from Head Office in Sydney together with the necessary additional video equipment .  However, this was also the day when the apogee motor was fired on the satellite to place it into geostationary orbit. Unfortunately,  the motor failed and the satellite remained in a highly elliptical orbit.

Nevertheless, the next day, according to my diary, the ABC proceeded to set up their outside broadcasting equipment, which had come by road from Perth.  To link-up with Goonhilly, one of the upconverter/downconverter sets, of which the earth station had two, had to be retuned to the common frequencies agreed for the transmission, leaving the other set available for testing with the USA.   Even though the satellite was not available, it was possible to loop the transmit and receive directions of the earth station and demonstrate that the TV transmission worked back-to-back.  In my diary I recorded: „surprisingly good results”.

News of the possible TV transmissions was known in Carnarvon and there was a general air of expectancy and excitement. However, after some days, recognising that the TV transmission was put back for an indefinite time, the ABC people departed and the town was again its usual quiet.

After some days the orbit of the errant satellite had been recalculated and tests confirmed that communications wise it operated satisfactorily.  Furthermore, its new but unplanned orbit was such that until 26 November, for some hours each day, it would be visible from both Carnarvon and Goonhilly, the earth station in the UK, after which there would be no mutual visibility for a lengthy period.  Consequently OTC(A) Head Office again considered that the TV link-up with Goonhilly should be attempted. Calculations indicated that such a transmission would be feasible towards the UK, because Goonhilly had a large antenna, which could easily receive the TV transmission from the satellite, but would be marginal from the UK towards Carnarvon, because its antenna was considerably smaller and hence the received signals would be weaker.

All would have been well but the earth station continued to experience one problem after another and after taking stock of the situation I telexed OTC(A) Head Office on 21 November recommending „that no engineering tests be performed with Goonhilly during this mutual visibility period” only to receive a reply the next morning „TV transmission Carnarvon – Goonhilly scheduled for 25 November”.  So much for recommendations!  Fortunately, thanks to the efforts of Page engineers and the station staff, the earth station was made more or less operational in the next days and preparatory testing for the TV transmissions commenced at 14.00 local time on 23 November, with a loop TV transmission through the satellite.    As predicted by calculations, the picture quality (as recorded in my diary) was „very noisy”.

The next day we tested with Goonhilly, exchanging TV test patterns and pictures from 0530 to 0700 UTC (13.30 to 15.00 local) and my diary says: „Received picture very noisy, but Goonhilly receives good picture”.   The testing with Goonhilly was coordinated via a telephone circuit, which had been set up using the Compac submarine cable.

On the day of the actual broadcasts, 25 November 1966, there was a general air of expectancy and excitement, both at the earth station and in Carnarvon itself.  There were ABC and Channel 7 vehicles and staff on the earth station and the ABC had set up a temporary microwave link for relaying signals between the earth station and the town.   Although initially arrangements for the broadcasts had been only with the ABC, at some stage Channel 7 indicated that they wished to be involved.  The station staff had equipped one of the station’s rooms with TV monitors for viewing the broadcasts by VIPs, station staff and wives.

For the transmissions we had agreed that Don Kennedy would man the control panel and primarily ensure correct pointing of the antenna, whilst I was in the rear of the Operations van, together with a number of other OTC(A), Page and ABC staff observing the TV quality on the monitor and liasing with Goonhilly over the coordination circuit.  The received signal was continually being monitored in the Carnarvon station, so that even whilst transmitting towards Goonhilly, we were receiving and monitoring the video signal as looped through the satellite and we could see when there was a deterioration in the quality, principally due to the antenna not tracking the satellite precisely.

At the UK end, the broadcasts to and from the ABC were passed from Goonhilly

to the BBC studios, whilst the broadcasts to and from Channel 7 to the ITV studios.  There were a total of four broadcasts, i.e. each pair of organisations (ABC – BBC and Channel 7 – ITV) sent and received broadcasts from the other.

The ABC broadcast consisted of interviews of a group of British staff who worked at the NASA Tracking Station in Carnarvon. They spoke to their relatives in a BBC studio in London and described their lives and some showed their children to the great delight of their relatives in London. The interviews took place on the main street in Carnarvon and the ABC also showed scenes of Carnarvon and people describing life in the town.  The broadcast was in real-time, spontaneous and interesting, and is described in detail in a recently published book.[3]   In the return broadcast towards Australia, the BBC showed the eminent scientist Sir Bernard Lovell, who talked about the future uses of space for various purposes, essentially a „talking heads” broadcast.  Compared to the lively ABC broadcast, I felt the BBC could have prepared something more interesting for this important occasion.

I believe that following the ABC broadcast to the BBC, Channel 7 sent a broadcast to the ITV in the UK, but I have no information or recollection of the content.  Similarly, following the BBC broadcast to Australia, the ITV broadcast to Channel 7 and there is a photograph of a British newspaper headline, which is probably one of the items they showed, and an ITV presenter.

According to my diary Goonhilly initially received test pictures from Carnarvon at 0400 UTC (12.00 local), however, I could not reconstitute the exact sequence of the actual broadcasts.  The agreed schedule (according to my diary) had the BBC transmitting for 15 minutes towards Australia at 0545 UTC (followed by the ITV) and the ABC subsequently transmitting towards the UK for 15 minutes starting 0630 UTC (14.30 local), followed by Channel 7.  Newspaper reports indicate that the ABC broadcast indeed started at about 0630 UTC (14.30 local), but according to a private letter of mine describing the day, the transmission towards Australia followed that to the UK, rather than preceded it.

According to my diary the first programme was at 0515 UTC (13.15 local), although it is not clear which programme this was.  However, the diary also illustrates just how fortunate we were regarding satisfactory operation of the station.  I have recorded that at 0455 UTC (i.e. 20 minutes before the first broadcast) „paramp requires readjustment and antenna lowered for this purpose”.  A subsequent entry states: „At about 0600 UTC autotracking starts to give error as indicated by picture variations and switched to programme track with 1 minute data.  After that switched a number of times from one type to the other”.  Don Kennedy recalls: „I remember that we
did have trouble with the autotracking system, and did switch to program
track, even manual at times”.[4]

However, the end result, as I have recorded, was that „Goonhilly reports very good pictures”,  resulting in a highly satisfactory and interesting broadcast in the Australia – UK direction.   As predicted by calculations, due to the relatively smaller size of the Carnarvon earth station antenna, the video signal received in Carnarvon was such that the picture could be made out but in reality was quite marginal and noisy and was not used by the ABC or Channel 7.

I have recorded that „after the satisfactory both way transmissions between Carnarvon and Goonhilly, there was great elation in Carnarvon town and the mayor Wilson Tuckey, shouted free beer to all the people involved in one of the four hotels which he owns”.   There were quite a few beers downed that evening.

Completion of the Earth Station

During December 1966 work continued to make the earth station operational and Page Communications engineers gradually demonstrated satisfactory operation of various pieces of equipment, although we continued to have problems. Don Kennedy recalls: „I also remember that we had an azimuth gearbox fail fairly close to
going operational, and the servo system really didn’t like operating on
one gearbox without the antibacklash system of two gearboxes. Much
oscillation, and impossible for the antenna to track a satellite.”.[5]

A particular difficulty was to demonstrate that the receive sensitivity of the station (i.e. antenna gain/system noise temperature or G/T) met the specified figure of 31.7 dB.   It had been intended to measure the antenna gain using the calibrated signal transmitted from the boresight tower, but this proved unsatisfactory, as the boresight tower was not nearly high enough and the earth station received not only the direct signals from the boresight, but also interfering signals reflected from the ground.  At overseas earth stations there were mountains nearby on which to place boresites, but this was not the case at Carnarvon and in the flat countryside it was just not feasible to build a tower high enough to avoid ground reflections.  The accepted method of measuring earth station G/T at the time was to use the radio noise produced by the star Cassiopeia A, which is the strongest radio star in the sky.  However, this method was only suitable for earth stations with large antennas, such as Goonhilly, but the radio noise from the star was too weak to give an accurate result for a smaller antenna such as Carnarvon.  This question was not settled until much later. Don Kennedy recalls: „As far as measuring the G/T of the antenna, that was difficult. Greg Nichols (an OTC(A) engineer) and the CSIRO did a lot to fix the feed frequency response, which was very bad in the low end of the frequency band, and measure the G/T”.[6]

As the next Intelsat II satellite for the Pacific was due for launch 11 January,1967,  just before Christmas 1966 Head Office indicated that OTC(A) wished to take occupancy of the earth station provided Page Communications demonstrated satisfactory 24 hour operation.  Page attempted to demonstrate this on 22 and 23 December, but there was a dispute about the result as at one stage the tracking system became unstable.   After a break for Christmas there was further remedial work on the equipment and after consultations with Head Office on 5 January 1967 I handed Page engineer Dave Williams an inspection certificate stating that the earth station was ready for beneficial occupancy by OTC(A).

Intelsat II-F2 was indeed launched on 11 January 1967 and the apogee motor was fired two days later to place it into geostationary orbit, this time successfully.   However, the satellite still had to be drifted to its final position in the orbit, and it only became visible to Carnarvon and we started to use it on 1 February.  Nevertheless, apparently using the errant Intelsat II-F1, in January we started to work with our corresponding earth station in the USA, Brewster Flat, to test and line-up the circuits as part of the overall communications system required by NASA.

Cyclone „Elsie”

An interesting interlude during January was provided by cyclone „Elsie”.  As happens during this time of year, a cyclone, christened „Elsie”, developed off the NW coast of WA and moved slowly south offshore along the coastline and as usual, the main question was when and where would it suddenly turn inland and make landfall.  The meteorological bureau in Perth kept us up to date with forecasts and after some days it was apparent that „Elsie” may come as far south as Carnarvon.  Consequently on 19 January Leo Mahoney and I decided to close the earth station and batten it down in preparation for the cyclone.  This involved removing all loose building material, which might fly in the wind, tying down three huts near the station and finally tying down the antenna.  This was an interesting process and involved securing the antenna with heavy steel hawsers to 12 concrete blocks set in the ground around the antenna.  Once secured, the brakes were released to avoid straining them, and the antenna swung slightly, held only by the hawsers.  The antenna structure was designed to withstand cyclonic winds.

It was two more days before the effect of the cyclone was felt and it passed some 80 miles north of Carnarvon, nevertheless wind speeds reached about 60 – 70 mph at the station and there was torrential rain.  In 24 hours the Gascoyne river rose from a dry river bed to a wide river full to the banks with brown water.  There was no significant damage to the earth station and the antenna cyclone tie-down arrangement had been proven, but in some of the newly painted parts of the antenna the paint had peeled off.  Obviously, shoddy workmanship.

Although the earth station survived virtually unscathed, there was considerable cyclone damage to the banana plantations around Carnarvon, and significant flood damage.  The road south of Carnarvon was cut off at the Wooramel River, where the bridge was washed out and after some days a flying fox was set up to ferry material across.  Some of the American engineers from Page Communications drove out there one Sunday and reported back that „those Australians are certainly interesting people: they transported one sack of potatoes across on the flying fox, and the rest were cases and cases of beer”.

Commencement of operation

Everything was coming together fast. Around 1 February we started 24 hour manning of the earth station. Finally, I have recorded in my diary: „Carnarvon in service 1200G (20.00 local) 4th February (1967)”.

For about the next week there was a period of intense testing and lining up with the USA and when that concluded, my responsibility at the earth station was finished.  On 10 February, together with my wife Laima we drove the 1000 km back to Perth to return one of the leased cars we had during the commisioning, and subsequently returned to OTC(A) Head Office in Sydney.   Don Kennedy returned to Sydney by air about the same time. The station was left in the capable hands of Station Manager Leo Mahoney, Deputy Manager Jack Gray and the station staff.  It had been a 3 ½ month period in my professional career that was interesting, challenging and unforgetable.

Some personal reflections

My wife Laima and I were „city folk” and life in a small isolated town such a Carnarvon was a new experience for us, particularly as we were not even living in Carnarvon itself but on an isolated sandy ridge some kilometers from town.  After work we usually had dinner in one of the pubs with the Station Manager Leo Mahoney and then had a few beers.  It felt rather isolated and lonely. Some evenings, for entertainment, at sunset we would get into the car and drive some distance along the road to Geraldton seeing only saltbush, herds of kangaroos or the occasional emu.  At that time Carnarvon did not even have TV, just an indoor and an outdoor cinema, and, as I wrote in a letter: „some of the films are so old, that I was probably not even allowed to go to the pictures when they were produced.”

Laima was a professional librarian, so to pass the time, she occasionally went to the local library and helped the librarian Mrs. Dupress with some tasks.  Mrs. Dupress was an interesting personality who sometimes reminisced how she had „gone East” to Sydney in 1928, describing it before the building of the Harbour Bridge.

I had a friend living in Perth at the time and with Christmas 1966 aproaching, in a telephone conversation I half jokingly suggested to him that he visit us for a few days. To my surprise, he took up my suggestion and some days after Christmas he drove the 1000 km from Perth together with a friend and his girlfriend. They stayed with us for some days and we spent the time fishing or on the beach and drinking beer.   It was nice to see a personal friend.

Not far from the earth station, at the junction of the roads to Geraldton and Carnarvon, there was a „Neptune” petrol station, with a restaurant that was regarded by the station staff to be the best in Carnarvon.  My wife and I had only been married in January 1966, so as we were in Carnarvon for our first wedding anniversary, naturally, the choice for this important occasion was the „Neptune” pertrol station restaurant.    The restaurant had a juke box offering mostly country and western music, but there were two records of melodies popular at the time –  “Edelweiss” and “Laras theme” from the film „ Dr. Zhivago”. Hearing these melodies still brings back memories of Carnarvon and the „Neptune” service station.

This was certainly a period in our lives that left a lifelong impression!

Photographs

Photographs can be found at the following OTVA link: Establishing Carnarvon ES gallery

Guntis Berzins – biography

Born in Riga, Latvia in 1938.  Family fled to Germany during World War 2 in 1944 to avoid Soviet occupation of Latvia and, after living in refugee camps in Germany, family emigrated to Australia in 1949.   Attended schools in refugee camps and subsequently in Australia in Bathurst, Parkes and Sydney. Studied at the University of NSW in Sydney, receiving B.Eng. degree in 1960 and M.Eng.Sc degree in 1967, both with specialisation in telecommunications.  1960 to 1979 with OTC(A) in various posts concerned with planning and operation of submarine cables, satellite earth stations and maritime radio stations. With Dept. of Posts and Telecommunications, as Deputy Director, in 1980 preparing specifications for Australian national satellite system (Aussat).  Moved to London, UK in 1980 and worked until 1993 with the International Maritime Satellite Organisation (Inmarsat) in various positions, in the latter years as General Manager responsible for developing satellite communications for aviation.  Moved to Latvia in 1993, initially as Director, Department of Communications in the Ministry of Transport and from 1994 to 2002 as Board member and State representative for telecommunications organisation “Lattelekom”. Elected to the Latvian Saeima (parliament) from the “New Era” party in 2002 and served as deputy until 2006, and again from 2009 to 2010, during the latter period as Chairman of the Budget and Finance Committee.

Married, wife Laima, and four grown up sons.  Now living in Riga, Latvia

 

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From Julia Brooksbank

Peter

Sadly, I have to inform you John passed peacefully away on 15th May, 2013.

Regards ,

From Robert Hall, President of the Victorian Branch of the OTVA

MERVYN THOMAS COOPER PASSED AWAY ON 8^TH NOVEMBER 2012 AGED 77 IN THE IC UNIT MONASH MEDICAL CENTRE CLAYTON VICTORIA.

HE IS SURVIVED BY HIS WIFE ISABELL AND DAUGHTER JENNY AND SON-IN-LAW STUART AND MUCH LOVED PAPA OF MEGAN AND TWINS WILLIAM AND JACOB

WHO WERE BORN ONLY SEVERAL DAYS AGO.

MERVYN REQUESTED A PRIVATE CREMATION, HELD BY THE FAMILY ON TUESDAY NOVEMBER 13TH 2012.

AT AGE 14 MERVYN COMMENCED WORK AT AUSTRALIA POST TOWNSVILLE QLD IN 1949 AS A POSTAL OFFICER/POSTAL CLERK UNTIL 1949.

1954 TO 1956 MERVYN SERVED IN THE RAAF AS RADIO/TELEGRAPHIST IN SOUTH MELBOURNE BARRACKS

MERVYN JOINED OTC (A) ON THE 17/10/1956  AS TRAFFIC/ASSISTANT GR.1 MOR APPOINTED TELEGRAPHIST 13/8/1959 – ITO – SITO  etc. UNTIL HIS RETIREMENT 1987/88