{"id":5773,"date":"2017-03-30T07:15:39","date_gmt":"2017-03-29T20:15:39","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/?p=5773"},"modified":"2017-03-30T09:05:31","modified_gmt":"2017-03-29T22:05:31","slug":"moree-ses-50th-anniversary","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/moree-ses-50th-anniversary\/","title":{"rendered":"Moree SES – 50th Anniversary of Opening and 30th Anniversary of Closure"},"content":{"rendered":"

Moree officially opened on 29th<\/sup> March 1968 and officially closed in September 1988.<\/p>\n

\"Moree<\/a>Moree 1 was OTC’s first satellite\u00a0earth station built specifically\u00a0to convey public communications\u00a0traffic; it opened with a two-way\u00a0Australia\/Japan broadcast via the\u00a0Pacific Ocean Intelsat 11 satellite\u00a0on 29 March 1968.<\/p>\n

Since that time, Moree 1 (and more\u00a0recently Moree 2) has been Australia’s\u00a0primary earth station for conveying\u00a0public and private communications\u00a0traffic to Asia, Canada, the Americas and\u00a0Pacific region nations.<\/p>\n

Moree 2 became operational in 1982\u00a0to cater for increased traffic demand. The\u00a0dish and associated equipment was\u00a0dismantled by OTC riggers, engineering\u00a0and technical staff, and re-erected at\u00a0Sydney earth station (to become Sydney\u00a02) earlier this year.<\/p>\n

The last communications traffic to\u00a0pass through Moree did so in August via\u00a0the original earth station, Moree 1. Since\u00a0that time, the complex has been wound\u00a0down – in terms of both equipment and\u00a0staff.<\/p>\n

Much of the equipment is now\u00a0operational at the new Sydney earth\u00a0station complex – with staff transferred\u00a0to Perth, Ceduna, Melbourne and\u00a0Sydney.<\/p>\n

The Moree station is being sold to a\u00a0private developer – possibly to cater for\u00a0the tourist trade as a hotel\/health spa\u00a0complex. A skeleton staff will remain at\u00a0the station until all details are finalised\u00a0and the complex is handed over.<\/p>\n

The transfer of operations from\u00a0Moree to Sydney is a further development\u00a0in OTC’s capital city earth station\u00a0program – made possible through the\u00a0application of modern technology which\u00a0provides for improved frequency interference\u00a0protection.<\/p>\n

Locating earth stations close to major\u00a0customer centres provides improved\u00a0service quality and more cost-effective\u00a0operations. Such is the march of progress.<\/p>\n

Hailed in 1968 as a major breakthrough\u00a0in Australia’s international\u00a0communications network, Moree has\u00a0provided reliable, high-quality service via a succession of Intelsat Pacific Ocean \u00a0Region satellites for more than two\u00a0decades.<\/p>\n

In a series of functions held mid-August,\u00a0Moree staff, families, and the\u00a0local community, bade their farewells.<\/p>\n

Such was the interest shown by other\u00a0staff involved with the station at various\u00a0times over the past 20 years, a coach was\u00a0provided to take them from Sydney to\u00a0Moree for a ‘farewell’ weekend 13\/14\u00a0August. Others arrived under their own\u00a0steam from as far away as Queensland.<\/p>\n

It was a nostalgic weekend tinged\u00a0with sadness for many, but with enthusiastic\u00a0anticipation of future transfers for\u00a0most.<\/p>\n

Executive Manager, Planning, John\u00a0Mattes, was responsible for commissioning\u00a0the original station. ‘I was here at the\u00a0beginning’, he said. ‘So it was good to\u00a0have the opportunity of being here at the\u00a0end – it’s a trip back through time.’<\/p>\n

The last word went to station manager,\u00a0Ed Willingham, after several hours\u00a0of nostalgia and ‘There we were’ yams\u00a0(instigated by Regional Manager Europe,\u00a0Dennis Grant): ‘That’s it folks’, Ed
\nannounced sadly. ‘It’s over.’<\/p>\n

\"Aerial<\/a><\/p>\n

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OTC donates\u00a0Rolls Royce to\u00a0hospital<\/p>\n

\"OTC<\/a>
\nAs a parting gesture to the local\u00a0community, Managing Director\u00a0George Maltby (seen in photo) handed over ownership of a\u00a0Rolls Royce to Ron O’Mullane of\u00a0the Moree District Hospital.\u00a0The Rolls Royce 375 KYA diesel\u00a0alternator will be installed in the hospital\u00a0to provide emergency power. The\u00a0hospital’s present generator can only\u00a0support the operating theatre and some\u00a0emergency services and facilities during\u00a0a power failure.\u00a0With the donation of OTC’s alternator, which has recently undergone a\u00a0major re-build, the hospital should no\u00a0longer face inconvenience to patients and\u00a0staff during blackouts.<\/p>\n

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Extracts of both the Contact article announcing the fanfare around the opening of the Moree SES and the Transit article heralding ‘The End of an Era’.<\/p>\nExtracts-of-1988-Contact-Magazine-OTC-Moree-SES-Opening<\/a>\nTransit-Moree-End-of-an-Era<\/a>\n

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Other photos of Moree:<\/p>\n

\"Moree15\"<\/a> \"Moree14\"<\/a> \"Moree13\"<\/a> \"Moree16\"<\/a> \"Moree12\"<\/a> \"Moree11\"<\/a> \"Moree10\"<\/a> \"Moree07\"<\/a> \"Moree08\"<\/a> \"Moree09\"<\/a> \"Moree06\"<\/a> \"Moree05\"<\/a> \"Moree04\"<\/a> \"Moree03\"<\/a> \"Moree02\"<\/a> \"Moree01\"<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Moree officially opened on 29th March 1968 and officially closed in September 1988. Moree 1 was OTC’s first satellite\u00a0earth station built specifically\u00a0to convey public communications\u00a0traffic; it opened with a two-way\u00a0Australia\/Japan broadcast via the\u00a0Pacific Ocean Intelsat 11 satellite\u00a0on 29 March 1968. Since that time, Moree 1 (and more\u00a0recently Moree 2) has been Australia’s\u00a0primary earth station for […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5773","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-notices"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/paMOfU-1v7","jetpack-related-posts":[],"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5773","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5773"}],"version-history":[{"count":14,"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5773\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":5843,"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5773\/revisions\/5843"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5773"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5773"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.otva.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5773"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}