October 9, 2024 • 15 mins
In today's episode ... a grim outlook for natural disasters.
The Royal Flying Doctor Service's new pilot training academy opens.
Volunteers working to reduce fatalities.
And an iconic Gympie event returns.
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Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
I have White Bay Burnett, HI, and welcome to iHeart
White Bay Burnette. I'm Taylor Larson, joined by Bruce Atkinson.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
On today's episode, a world class pilot training facility opens
and an iconic Gimpy event makes a return.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
First though it's get ready weak. Encouraging Queensland is to
prepare for natural disasters, but as Bruce has found out,
we could be hit with more unpredictable weather.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Queensland is set to face increasingly severe fires, heat waves,
storms and floods as climate change produces a different and
dangerous mix of extreme weather. That's according to a report
titled the State of Queensland Disaster ground Zero, produced by
the Emergency Leaders for Climate Action. When no strangest natural
disasters in the wide Bay Burnette, memories of the twenty
(00:45):
thirteen Bunderberg floods are still raw. Gimby also has a
history of flooding, but it reached new heights in twenty
twenty one twenty two. Bushfires are also increasingly common. Last season,
communities around Kinkuna were evacuated, and earlier this week several
or five cruise battle to blaze at Bucker. Former Queensland
Fire Commissioner and founding member of the group, Lee Johnson
(01:05):
says extreme natural disasters are becoming more common.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
So we'd like to now call them unnatural disasters because
of how often we're seeing huge impacts on Queensland and
the impacts to not just people but our environment as well.
So an increase to things like flooding. Of course, heat
waves are becoming more prominent, and something that's changing very
(01:31):
dramatically in the last six years the amount of bushfires
and the severity that we're experiencing with those bushfires.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Severe weather events are also becoming less predictable.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
It's going to become more frequent simply because our global
temperature is rising, and the temperature for Queensland has gone
up one and a half degree since nineteen ten, and
that's come about from the burning of coal, oil and
gas polluting our atmosphere and creating increases in things like
ocean temperature, and ocean temperature controls very much the climate
(02:04):
of the world, so all of those factors mixed up
into one are creating very very severe, localized weather outcomes
for us here in Queensland.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Lee Johnson says climate change is also disrupting the pattern
of cyclones.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
Well scientists do believe that we're likely to get fewer cyclones,
but they're likely to be more intense, and with continuing
warning days and nights, the impact of heat waves, which
is one of the greatest killers of people. It's just
keep rolling our at us and I guess we're just
going to have to work out how to live with
(02:39):
it all. But we believe also in very much the
need to slash climate pollution. Well.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Queensland is known as a cyclone state. It's increasingly being
hit by severe bushfires as climate pollution fuels more extreme
and erratic weather conditions.
Speaker 3 (02:55):
Our most recent bad fire season was twenty twenty three,
and one of the fact that there was that temperatures
overnight were remaining very very high, which makes for very
active fire behavior but also makes it very difficult for
firefighters to control them. And in fact, in the last
six years Queensland has experienced its worst three bush fire
(03:18):
seasons ever twenty and eighteen nineteen into twenty and twenty
twenty three, with the most property loss that has ever
been experienced.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
And while Gimpi is flood prone, it's likely to get
even worse.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
Flooding, which is no stranger to places like Gimpi and
the coast. That's all going to increase and we really
need to be prepared for what's coming. I don't think
many of us, probably people who haven't experienced a flood
or a major cyclone in quite a while. It's very
easy to forget and our memory lets us down on
(03:55):
many occasions. But much of Queensland very much at high risk,
but still areas particularly I think will suffer the most.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
Lee Johnson wants the state government to stop approving new
and expanded coal and gas projects with the heightened threat.
There's also a need to increase the state's fire fighting
capacity and help communities better prepare for future climate risks.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
The most important thing any government in Queensland can do
is to continue their work on the change of our
economy to a carbon low carbon one. That means increasing
renewable energy, reducing our independence on coal, oil and gas
for sure, and whilst that's a big challenge, it needs
(04:37):
to be done because as global temperatures continue to rise,
the situation that's before us just keeps getting worse.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Bunderberg has been put on the map as a leading
healthcare and training hub, a world class pilot training facility,
has officially opened around two years after construction began. The
Royal Flying Doctor Services Aeromedical Training Academy has the only
Beechcraft King airflight simulator of its kind in the country.
Here's CEO Meritith state.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
It's a full motion simulator, so it's as close to
flying an aircraft as possible. So a lot of time
spent getting the quality of data and the simulation that
it provides to our pilots so they can obviously then
practice a lot of those emergency procedures, those things that
you wouldn't want them to be doing in an aircraft,
so it's as close as possible to fly without actually
being in an aircraft.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
The facility is next to the existing RFDS BAX in Bunderberg.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
It's close to the airport.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
We've built the facility.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
Facility, which is great with pilots coming in for training.
We've got a base you already, so it's already one
of our locations, so it's a great location for us
to be training pilots.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
Queensland Senator Anthony Chisholm was in town for the opening.
Speaker 5 (05:46):
I know that Bunderberg is such a great place to
live and work, but we want to ensure that it
continues to be the case, and a facility like this
will ensure that a young person growing up in Bunderberg
we'll be able to have the opportunity to come here
see what's possible in local community, and let's hope that
one of them will go on to be one of
the next pilots for the RFTS.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
It comes at a time when the aviation sector is
calling out for pilots. It's hope the academy will attract
staff and keep medical services in the year able to
train hundreds of people every year. The Royal Flying Doctor
Service is out about eighty percent capacity for its pilot
numbers and ten more people are in the training process.
They will obviously use this new facility, but it'll also
(06:26):
be open to other organizations which use beachcraft.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
We will train all our pilots here in Bunderberg, so
they'll come from across all our bases and obviously if
we're supporting other organizations with training and really hoping people
will be coming from all around Australia and maybe even
in the Asia Pacific as well.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Merited stay ads. Demand for the service isn't slowing down.
Speaker 4 (06:45):
We do about two hundred and nineteen occasions of service
a day. So that's across all our programs, so aero medical,
the dental, programming around mental health and primary healthcare. So
that's really the number that we help each day across
the state. So it's a significant amount. We probably from
an air medical point of view, do about thirty five
to forty patient transfers a day.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
The academy cost just under twenty nine million dollars. Nineteen
point four million of that was from the federal government,
three million from q Cole while the land was donated
by council.
Speaker 5 (07:15):
It was obviously a work that was done as part
of the Hinkler Regional Deal which started under the previous government.
But we were really pleased to honor that commitment as well,
and I wanted to acknowledge the support of the Bunderberg
Regional Council in ensuring that they had this land available
for the RFDS as well. So it really is a
good contribution federal government council. But obviously the RFDS are
(07:38):
integral with something like this.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Happening coming up after the break the program keeping young
people Safe on our roads.
Speaker 5 (07:47):
I Herb wh.
Speaker 4 (07:52):
I, Herb White.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
You're listening to Iheartwired Bay Bernier. I'm Taylor Larson, joined
by Bruce Akins and Drivers College has been running in
Bunderberg for twelve years. The dedicated complex we're set up
in response to rising crashes, especially among young people. A
group of volunteers regularly helps inexperienced drivers as well as
those wanting a refresher or who are new to our country.
(08:16):
I spoke with one of the directors, Robert Andrews, about
how things have evolved since opening in twenty twelve.
Speaker 6 (08:21):
Programs are similar to they were when we first started,
but there are some advancements to the complex. We now
have emergency breaking areas of bitumen roads, we have gravel roads.
We have actually gravel roads with bumps in them that
you find out on the outback Australian around the areas
and things like that, where we teach students how to
go through those bumps and ruts correctly, you know. So
(08:42):
that's all on the complex as well. We have roundabout
stop signs, stop lights, give way signs, round about signs,
all those things as well. As we were here.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
How does it benefit young drivers or even inexperienced drivers
to be learning within the complex rather than out on
the roads or you know sometimes with mum and dad,
those ten can run pretty high.
Speaker 6 (09:02):
Yeah, learning on drivers College is very very good because
it's a safe, controlled environment. So in other words, if
they make a mistake, we just turn then and say okay,
let's go around and do that again till we get
it right, and then we just move onto something else.
We also teach things that's not taught on the road
by driving instructors, emergency breaking, hazard avoidance. You know, when
they go for the learners permit, they're told about avoiding
(09:23):
hazards and had the book, but don't actually shown how
to actually physically do that, and we actually show them
how to avoid the hazards. We also show them if
the car starts to move slightly on the gravel road,
how to correct that. That's not shown to them by
other instructors or driving structures, and a lot of other
things we can actually teach them in a controlled environment
(09:44):
they can't be taught on road.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
How do you believe the college has contributed to boosting
road safety and reducing those fatalities, especially among young people.
Speaker 6 (09:52):
We find it's done very very well. You know, example,
we have one young lace to come through your one
time and in between a one and two day program
which would run a each apart. She was going around
the ring road and coming around round the corners and
suddenly found two cars coming towards it. One of the
things we turn around and teaches that if a decision
needs to be made, you make the decision, don't rely
on the other person. And she avoided having a bach
(10:13):
a head on crash with that person. So you know,
things like that they pick up very quickly from us
here on the complex.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
Yeah, and I suppose as well it helps them to
remain calm in those stressful situations.
Speaker 6 (10:23):
Well, it does, because the thing is that we bring
them up from very basic level up to a standard
from say fifteen cage twenty k twenty five k's, thirty
k's and so on. So we actually bring them up
in stages, so each stage they learning in separately, so
their confidence is growing bit by bit by bit, but
they don't get the stage of over confidence because we
(10:43):
don't have big skid pads and things like that. We
actually have normal road with roads. So what they're doing
with and learning on is the same things that they'll
be learning on when they're driving on the highway on
a normal street because that's the size of the streets
they taught on. And when they're doing the agency breaking
for example, that's done on the same with as well,
so we don't use good pats.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
How many lessons do the students need.
Speaker 6 (11:07):
We used to do them in blocks of five hours.
We have what we call Pathway to Your L's which
is a five hour program. School students are only cost
one hundred and twenty five dollars for five hours of training,
which is very very good. And then we have a
two day program which goes for ten hours and that
takes them into parallel parking as of a goids, reverse parking,
roundabouts and all the other things they need to know,
(11:28):
traffic lights and things like that. That program's only two
hundred and twenty five dollars for school students. So the
price is all good to pay for disadvantaged parents as well,
you know, because there's not a lot of money, you
don't pay it. You're sixty seventy dollars an hour or
whatever you can do a block. So you have ten
hour program and that's done for the two hundred twenty
(11:49):
five dollars.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
And I understand you're searching for more volunteers. So if
people can give up their time, what's involved also need to.
Speaker 6 (11:56):
Do is have a clean license for the last twelve
months or so and be able to go through a
normal police set because we are dealing with students, so
we'll have to do that and also get a blue card.
We help them get the blue card if they're eligible
to get it, work flowing get that for them. There's
not a lot of time they need to give up,
maybe an hour five hours a week at the maximum.
(12:18):
Use this only fortnightly. Because now we try not to
put too much burden on our students. We on our educators.
We actually train the educator theirself so they know how
to train the students on our complex, which is a
very safe complex. We actually run under what they called
controlled environment driver training through Tayama Department made a Transport
to Stay program that they have which we run under
(12:40):
and help develop. In twenty twenty.
Speaker 2 (12:45):
An iconic event in Gimpi is being resurrected, but with
a different format. Race the Rattler was an annual event
with people running against the famous Heritage steam train trying
to beat it on the journey from Memomoir to Gimbee.
It was canceled in twenty thirteen due to flooding and
hasn't been held since. It returns on Sunday as the
rush to the Rattler. Loads of people have.
Speaker 7 (13:05):
Entered a little bit of a surprise, really, I don't
know how many we're going to get. Entries are open.
You go on to the Rattler page and you can
enter through that. It's all sort of suck at and see,
if you know what I mean, to see how it
goes this year. But hopefully it could be a big
part of gold Rush Festival when we get that going
(13:26):
again in a year or two.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
That's Charlie Horn, the president of Gibbe Lyons Club. A
fun run and walk starts at the gold Mining Museum
and finishes at the Mary Valley Heritage Railway Station. Charlie
is hoping the event sparks the return of the former
gold Rush Festival.
Speaker 7 (13:41):
We used to have procession through the streets and a
party or a ball. We had a ball on Friday
night usually and procession through the streets on Saturday afternoon
and a big turnout in Nelson Reserve. Lots of other
We used to have a soapbox. We used to have
lots of the things going on through the whole virtual
(14:03):
week of Celebration to celebrate our heritages. But it died
off or years ago it started dying. Shame of Commerce
picked it up at one stage and kept it going.
Other groups have picked it up and kept it going.
But now we lines, you know, like I've come in
and we've got a sort of a half new committee
(14:25):
together and we're sort of taken hold of it a
little bit and see if we can get some things
going to reinvigorate it and get it going. Got to
get the community.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Behind it, he says. When the Bruce Highway bypass opens
later this month, people need big events to get people
to stop in the city.
Speaker 7 (14:41):
Well, hopefully we'll bring some people from out of town
and get people thinking the same as we're thinking that
we need community based events to keep the town alive.
We do need things to pull people into town. These
fun run type events seem to bring peace from far away.
I've got a bo talking about coming down from.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
The general manager of the Rattler, Sherry Low says, it's
important to give people reasons to stop.
Speaker 8 (15:09):
Gimp is alive and well and open to business. And
as I said, there's so much to see and do
in and around the Greater Gimpy Region. The bypass will
be absolutely beneficial to get those heavy haulage trucks off
the road away from the CBD, but it is so
important to remind everyone that there's so much to see
and do in and around the Gimpy Region and yes,
(15:30):
the Rush to the Rattler will be one of many
events happening right across the region.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
Thanks for tuning in. If you want to hear this
episode again or find previous ones, look up iHeart White
Bay Burnett on the iHeartRadio app or your favorite podcast app.
Speaker 1 (15:46):
We're back again next week with more local, trusted and
free news
I have White Bay Burnett, HI, and welcome to iHeart
White Bay Burnette. I'm Taylor Larson, joined by Bruce Atkinson.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
On today's episode, a world class pilot training facility opens
and an iconic Gimpy event makes a return.
Speaker 1 (00:14):
First though it's get ready weak. Encouraging Queensland is to
prepare for natural disasters, but as Bruce has found out,
we could be hit with more unpredictable weather.
Speaker 2 (00:24):
Queensland is set to face increasingly severe fires, heat waves,
storms and floods as climate change produces a different and
dangerous mix of extreme weather. That's according to a report
titled the State of Queensland Disaster ground Zero, produced by
the Emergency Leaders for Climate Action. When no strangest natural
disasters in the wide Bay Burnette, memories of the twenty
(00:45):
thirteen Bunderberg floods are still raw. Gimby also has a
history of flooding, but it reached new heights in twenty
twenty one twenty two. Bushfires are also increasingly common. Last season,
communities around Kinkuna were evacuated, and earlier this week several
or five cruise battle to blaze at Bucker. Former Queensland
Fire Commissioner and founding member of the group, Lee Johnson
(01:05):
says extreme natural disasters are becoming more common.
Speaker 3 (01:09):
So we'd like to now call them unnatural disasters because
of how often we're seeing huge impacts on Queensland and
the impacts to not just people but our environment as well.
So an increase to things like flooding. Of course, heat
waves are becoming more prominent, and something that's changing very
(01:31):
dramatically in the last six years the amount of bushfires
and the severity that we're experiencing with those bushfires.
Speaker 2 (01:38):
Severe weather events are also becoming less predictable.
Speaker 3 (01:41):
It's going to become more frequent simply because our global
temperature is rising, and the temperature for Queensland has gone
up one and a half degree since nineteen ten, and
that's come about from the burning of coal, oil and
gas polluting our atmosphere and creating increases in things like
ocean temperature, and ocean temperature controls very much the climate
(02:04):
of the world, so all of those factors mixed up
into one are creating very very severe, localized weather outcomes
for us here in Queensland.
Speaker 2 (02:14):
Lee Johnson says climate change is also disrupting the pattern
of cyclones.
Speaker 3 (02:18):
Well scientists do believe that we're likely to get fewer cyclones,
but they're likely to be more intense, and with continuing
warning days and nights, the impact of heat waves, which
is one of the greatest killers of people. It's just
keep rolling our at us and I guess we're just
going to have to work out how to live with
(02:39):
it all. But we believe also in very much the
need to slash climate pollution. Well.
Speaker 2 (02:45):
Queensland is known as a cyclone state. It's increasingly being
hit by severe bushfires as climate pollution fuels more extreme
and erratic weather conditions.
Speaker 3 (02:55):
Our most recent bad fire season was twenty twenty three,
and one of the fact that there was that temperatures
overnight were remaining very very high, which makes for very
active fire behavior but also makes it very difficult for
firefighters to control them. And in fact, in the last
six years Queensland has experienced its worst three bush fire
(03:18):
seasons ever twenty and eighteen nineteen into twenty and twenty
twenty three, with the most property loss that has ever
been experienced.
Speaker 2 (03:28):
And while Gimpi is flood prone, it's likely to get
even worse.
Speaker 3 (03:32):
Flooding, which is no stranger to places like Gimpi and
the coast. That's all going to increase and we really
need to be prepared for what's coming. I don't think
many of us, probably people who haven't experienced a flood
or a major cyclone in quite a while. It's very
easy to forget and our memory lets us down on
(03:55):
many occasions. But much of Queensland very much at high risk,
but still areas particularly I think will suffer the most.
Speaker 2 (04:03):
Lee Johnson wants the state government to stop approving new
and expanded coal and gas projects with the heightened threat.
There's also a need to increase the state's fire fighting
capacity and help communities better prepare for future climate risks.
Speaker 3 (04:16):
The most important thing any government in Queensland can do
is to continue their work on the change of our
economy to a carbon low carbon one. That means increasing
renewable energy, reducing our independence on coal, oil and gas
for sure, and whilst that's a big challenge, it needs
(04:37):
to be done because as global temperatures continue to rise,
the situation that's before us just keeps getting worse.
Speaker 1 (04:48):
Bunderberg has been put on the map as a leading
healthcare and training hub, a world class pilot training facility,
has officially opened around two years after construction began. The
Royal Flying Doctor Services Aeromedical Training Academy has the only
Beechcraft King airflight simulator of its kind in the country.
Here's CEO Meritith state.
Speaker 4 (05:08):
It's a full motion simulator, so it's as close to
flying an aircraft as possible. So a lot of time
spent getting the quality of data and the simulation that
it provides to our pilots so they can obviously then
practice a lot of those emergency procedures, those things that
you wouldn't want them to be doing in an aircraft,
so it's as close as possible to fly without actually
being in an aircraft.
Speaker 1 (05:28):
The facility is next to the existing RFDS BAX in Bunderberg.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
It's close to the airport.
Speaker 2 (05:33):
We've built the facility.
Speaker 4 (05:34):
Facility, which is great with pilots coming in for training.
We've got a base you already, so it's already one
of our locations, so it's a great location for us
to be training pilots.
Speaker 1 (05:43):
Queensland Senator Anthony Chisholm was in town for the opening.
Speaker 5 (05:46):
I know that Bunderberg is such a great place to
live and work, but we want to ensure that it
continues to be the case, and a facility like this
will ensure that a young person growing up in Bunderberg
we'll be able to have the opportunity to come here
see what's possible in local community, and let's hope that
one of them will go on to be one of
the next pilots for the RFTS.
Speaker 1 (06:05):
It comes at a time when the aviation sector is
calling out for pilots. It's hope the academy will attract
staff and keep medical services in the year able to
train hundreds of people every year. The Royal Flying Doctor
Service is out about eighty percent capacity for its pilot
numbers and ten more people are in the training process.
They will obviously use this new facility, but it'll also
(06:26):
be open to other organizations which use beachcraft.
Speaker 4 (06:29):
We will train all our pilots here in Bunderberg, so
they'll come from across all our bases and obviously if
we're supporting other organizations with training and really hoping people
will be coming from all around Australia and maybe even
in the Asia Pacific as well.
Speaker 1 (06:42):
Merited stay ads. Demand for the service isn't slowing down.
Speaker 4 (06:45):
We do about two hundred and nineteen occasions of service
a day. So that's across all our programs, so aero medical,
the dental, programming around mental health and primary healthcare. So
that's really the number that we help each day across
the state. So it's a significant amount. We probably from
an air medical point of view, do about thirty five
to forty patient transfers a day.
Speaker 1 (07:04):
The academy cost just under twenty nine million dollars. Nineteen
point four million of that was from the federal government,
three million from q Cole while the land was donated
by council.
Speaker 5 (07:15):
It was obviously a work that was done as part
of the Hinkler Regional Deal which started under the previous government.
But we were really pleased to honor that commitment as well,
and I wanted to acknowledge the support of the Bunderberg
Regional Council in ensuring that they had this land available
for the RFDS as well. So it really is a
good contribution federal government council. But obviously the RFDS are
(07:38):
integral with something like this.
Speaker 2 (07:39):
Happening coming up after the break the program keeping young
people Safe on our roads.
Speaker 5 (07:47):
I Herb wh.
Speaker 4 (07:52):
I, Herb White.
Speaker 1 (07:55):
You're listening to Iheartwired Bay Bernier. I'm Taylor Larson, joined
by Bruce Akins and Drivers College has been running in
Bunderberg for twelve years. The dedicated complex we're set up
in response to rising crashes, especially among young people. A
group of volunteers regularly helps inexperienced drivers as well as
those wanting a refresher or who are new to our country.
(08:16):
I spoke with one of the directors, Robert Andrews, about
how things have evolved since opening in twenty twelve.
Speaker 6 (08:21):
Programs are similar to they were when we first started,
but there are some advancements to the complex. We now
have emergency breaking areas of bitumen roads, we have gravel roads.
We have actually gravel roads with bumps in them that
you find out on the outback Australian around the areas
and things like that, where we teach students how to
go through those bumps and ruts correctly, you know. So
(08:42):
that's all on the complex as well. We have roundabout
stop signs, stop lights, give way signs, round about signs,
all those things as well. As we were here.
Speaker 1 (08:50):
How does it benefit young drivers or even inexperienced drivers
to be learning within the complex rather than out on
the roads or you know sometimes with mum and dad,
those ten can run pretty high.
Speaker 6 (09:02):
Yeah, learning on drivers College is very very good because
it's a safe, controlled environment. So in other words, if
they make a mistake, we just turn then and say okay,
let's go around and do that again till we get
it right, and then we just move onto something else.
We also teach things that's not taught on the road
by driving instructors, emergency breaking, hazard avoidance. You know, when
they go for the learners permit, they're told about avoiding
(09:23):
hazards and had the book, but don't actually shown how
to actually physically do that, and we actually show them
how to avoid the hazards. We also show them if
the car starts to move slightly on the gravel road,
how to correct that. That's not shown to them by
other instructors or driving structures, and a lot of other
things we can actually teach them in a controlled environment
(09:44):
they can't be taught on road.
Speaker 1 (09:45):
How do you believe the college has contributed to boosting
road safety and reducing those fatalities, especially among young people.
Speaker 6 (09:52):
We find it's done very very well. You know, example,
we have one young lace to come through your one
time and in between a one and two day program
which would run a each apart. She was going around
the ring road and coming around round the corners and
suddenly found two cars coming towards it. One of the
things we turn around and teaches that if a decision
needs to be made, you make the decision, don't rely
on the other person. And she avoided having a bach
(10:13):
a head on crash with that person. So you know,
things like that they pick up very quickly from us
here on the complex.
Speaker 1 (10:18):
Yeah, and I suppose as well it helps them to
remain calm in those stressful situations.
Speaker 6 (10:23):
Well, it does, because the thing is that we bring
them up from very basic level up to a standard
from say fifteen cage twenty k twenty five k's, thirty
k's and so on. So we actually bring them up
in stages, so each stage they learning in separately, so
their confidence is growing bit by bit by bit, but
they don't get the stage of over confidence because we
(10:43):
don't have big skid pads and things like that. We
actually have normal road with roads. So what they're doing
with and learning on is the same things that they'll
be learning on when they're driving on the highway on
a normal street because that's the size of the streets
they taught on. And when they're doing the agency breaking
for example, that's done on the same with as well,
so we don't use good pats.
Speaker 1 (11:04):
How many lessons do the students need.
Speaker 6 (11:07):
We used to do them in blocks of five hours.
We have what we call Pathway to Your L's which
is a five hour program. School students are only cost
one hundred and twenty five dollars for five hours of training,
which is very very good. And then we have a
two day program which goes for ten hours and that
takes them into parallel parking as of a goids, reverse parking,
roundabouts and all the other things they need to know,
(11:28):
traffic lights and things like that. That program's only two
hundred and twenty five dollars for school students. So the
price is all good to pay for disadvantaged parents as well,
you know, because there's not a lot of money, you
don't pay it. You're sixty seventy dollars an hour or
whatever you can do a block. So you have ten
hour program and that's done for the two hundred twenty
(11:49):
five dollars.
Speaker 1 (11:49):
And I understand you're searching for more volunteers. So if
people can give up their time, what's involved also need to.
Speaker 6 (11:56):
Do is have a clean license for the last twelve
months or so and be able to go through a
normal police set because we are dealing with students, so
we'll have to do that and also get a blue card.
We help them get the blue card if they're eligible
to get it, work flowing get that for them. There's
not a lot of time they need to give up,
maybe an hour five hours a week at the maximum.
(12:18):
Use this only fortnightly. Because now we try not to
put too much burden on our students. We on our educators.
We actually train the educator theirself so they know how
to train the students on our complex, which is a
very safe complex. We actually run under what they called
controlled environment driver training through Tayama Department made a Transport
to Stay program that they have which we run under
(12:40):
and help develop. In twenty twenty.
Speaker 2 (12:45):
An iconic event in Gimpi is being resurrected, but with
a different format. Race the Rattler was an annual event
with people running against the famous Heritage steam train trying
to beat it on the journey from Memomoir to Gimbee.
It was canceled in twenty thirteen due to flooding and
hasn't been held since. It returns on Sunday as the
rush to the Rattler. Loads of people have.
Speaker 7 (13:05):
Entered a little bit of a surprise, really, I don't
know how many we're going to get. Entries are open.
You go on to the Rattler page and you can
enter through that. It's all sort of suck at and see,
if you know what I mean, to see how it
goes this year. But hopefully it could be a big
part of gold Rush Festival when we get that going
(13:26):
again in a year or two.
Speaker 2 (13:28):
That's Charlie Horn, the president of Gibbe Lyons Club. A
fun run and walk starts at the gold Mining Museum
and finishes at the Mary Valley Heritage Railway Station. Charlie
is hoping the event sparks the return of the former
gold Rush Festival.
Speaker 7 (13:41):
We used to have procession through the streets and a
party or a ball. We had a ball on Friday
night usually and procession through the streets on Saturday afternoon
and a big turnout in Nelson Reserve. Lots of other
We used to have a soapbox. We used to have
lots of the things going on through the whole virtual
(14:03):
week of Celebration to celebrate our heritages. But it died
off or years ago it started dying. Shame of Commerce
picked it up at one stage and kept it going.
Other groups have picked it up and kept it going.
But now we lines, you know, like I've come in
and we've got a sort of a half new committee
(14:25):
together and we're sort of taken hold of it a
little bit and see if we can get some things
going to reinvigorate it and get it going. Got to
get the community.
Speaker 2 (14:34):
Behind it, he says. When the Bruce Highway bypass opens
later this month, people need big events to get people
to stop in the city.
Speaker 7 (14:41):
Well, hopefully we'll bring some people from out of town
and get people thinking the same as we're thinking that
we need community based events to keep the town alive.
We do need things to pull people into town. These
fun run type events seem to bring peace from far away.
I've got a bo talking about coming down from.
Speaker 2 (15:03):
The general manager of the Rattler, Sherry Low says, it's
important to give people reasons to stop.
Speaker 8 (15:09):
Gimp is alive and well and open to business. And
as I said, there's so much to see and do
in and around the Greater Gimpy Region. The bypass will
be absolutely beneficial to get those heavy haulage trucks off
the road away from the CBD, but it is so
important to remind everyone that there's so much to see
and do in and around the Gimpy Region and yes,
(15:30):
the Rush to the Rattler will be one of many
events happening right across the region.
Speaker 2 (15:37):
Thanks for tuning in. If you want to hear this
episode again or find previous ones, look up iHeart White
Bay Burnett on the iHeartRadio app or your favorite podcast app.
Speaker 1 (15:46):
We're back again next week with more local, trusted and
free news
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