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Speaker 1: The public has had a long held fascination with detectives.

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Speaker 1: Detective see aside of life the average person is never

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Speaker 1: exposed to. I spent thirty four years as a cop.

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Speaker 1: For twenty five of those years, I was catching killers.

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Speaker 1: That's what I did for a living. I was a

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Speaker 1: homicide detective. I'm no longer just interviewing bad guys. Instead,

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Speaker 1: I'm taking the public into the world in which I operated.

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Speaker 1: The guests I talk to each week have amazing stories

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Speaker 1: from all sides of the law. The interviews are raw

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Speaker 1: and honest, just like the people I talk to. Some

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Speaker 1: of the content and language might be confronting. That's because

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Speaker 1: no one who comes into contact with crime is left unchanged.

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Speaker 1: Join me now as I take you into this world.

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Speaker 1: Welcome back to part two of my chat with former

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Speaker 1: tactical police officer John Taylor. In part one, we covered shootings, sieges,

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Speaker 1: and the high risk situations special operations officers confront. Now

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Speaker 1: add bomb to that list, because in part two, John

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Speaker 1: tells me what it's like to put on a forty

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Speaker 1: kilogram bomb suit and walk up to a suspicious package,

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Speaker 1: knowing if you make a mistake, it will literally be

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Speaker 1: the last mistake you ever make. John also talks about

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Speaker 1: what he does to unwind by climbing Mount Everest. He

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Speaker 1: also runs boot camps for elite professional sportsmen. Have a

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Speaker 1: listened to what John has to say. He certainly lived

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Speaker 1: a life of adventure. Well. I thoroughly enjoyed part one

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Speaker 1: hearing stories of tactical policing and all the things that

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Speaker 1: you've done. And that was really just scratching the surface

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Speaker 1: of some of the things you've done. But I think

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Speaker 1: it gave listeners a sense of what that type of

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Speaker 1: work involves. We're going to talk about then you are

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Speaker 1: going into the world of the bomb response unit and

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Speaker 1: how you got into that, but before we do, and

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Speaker 1: I think it'll save us getting into trouble or get

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Speaker 1: you in the good books. Anyway. I think one of

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Speaker 1: the things you're most proud of in what you've done

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Speaker 1: through your life is the fact that you've kept your

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Speaker 1: family together. You've raised some raised the kids, happily married

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Speaker 1: and in the world that you operated that doesn't always

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Speaker 1: play out.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, that's great. I've had a you know, my wife's

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Speaker 2: been very good, probably very patient in a way, considering

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Speaker 2: one year I missed her sixteenth, eighteenth and twenty first birthday.

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Speaker 1: You did the big three.

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Speaker 2: I missed the big three that goes with work. One

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Speaker 2: was a personal challenge too, but that's just the way

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Speaker 2: it happened. But yeah, you know, we missed a lot

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Speaker 2: of functions and things like, Oh, she went to a

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Speaker 2: lot of functions by herself. You know, I wasn't around

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Speaker 2: And that was just part of the cause. In the

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Speaker 2: early days, very hard on the family life. No mobile

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Speaker 2: phones and things like that. Senior sergeant would ring jan

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Speaker 2: and just say he probably went be home for a week.

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Speaker 2: He's got out to do his task and that was it,

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Speaker 2: you know. And she always trusted the guys, the boys,

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Speaker 2: the bosses and stuff like that. Had no qualms with that.

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Speaker 2: But Dad was a vionman for a lot of years

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Speaker 2: sort of understood the ship work, which help.

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Speaker 1: But yeah, you need that to be able to do

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Speaker 1: the things that you've done. You need that type of support.

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Speaker 1: And I'm sure that having that stability and knowing that

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Speaker 1: the home is safe, that your wife is looking after

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Speaker 1: things things there make it easier for you to concentrate

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Speaker 1: on doing what you're doing.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah, yeah, she read the household really when it

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Speaker 2: comes down to it, Yeah, it would have been hard.

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Speaker 2: She's self employed us for dietriss, so basically eating starting off,

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Speaker 2: she'd get home visits, you know, have all the equipment

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Speaker 2: and probably a baby in toe capsule. And yeah, she worked.

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Speaker 1: Hard while you're off flying around in helicopters and.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, we're getting paid to do this stuff and.

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Speaker 1: Living the boy's own adventure. Okay, let's talk about diffusing bombs. Now.

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Speaker 1: It's a very specialist field of policing. There's only a

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Speaker 1: small number of people that do it. And yeah, I

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Speaker 1: suggested there's be any a small number of people that

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Speaker 1: want to do it, and then you've got to have

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Speaker 1: the aptitude for it. What threw you into becoming a

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Speaker 1: member of the Bomb Response Unit?

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Speaker 2: Well, yeah, so you get into the SOG. You're all

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Speaker 2: tactical members. Everybody's a tactical member. It does house raids

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Speaker 2: and what we've discussed before, and then you can start

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Speaker 2: going to a special s fields, like some can be

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Speaker 2: a sniper, some can be a bomb tech, you know,

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Speaker 2: depending what comes up. And it was nineteen ninety so

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Speaker 2: I hadn't been in the group that long, and I

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Speaker 2: had shown an interest, you know, been to a few

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Speaker 2: scenes where I'll help get the equipment out but not

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Speaker 2: involved and a course was coming up and I saw

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Speaker 2: you wanted to become a bomb tech also to that

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Speaker 2: kind of field, so I was going to remain tactical,

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Speaker 2: but it was just an extra skill. And so in

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Speaker 2: ninety ninety I headed off to a place called Bandiana,

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Speaker 2: which is on the quarter of Victoria and New South Wales.

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Speaker 2: It's an army base and basically started my course there,

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Speaker 2: a four week course which was run by police jurisdiction

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Speaker 2: throughout Australia. So they have two police officers from each

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Speaker 2: state and territory there and we're using a military base,

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Speaker 2: so we had some of their instructors. Plus we also

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Speaker 2: had previous bomb texts, experienced bomb texts from various states

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Speaker 2: who would be a director, assistant director and instructors and

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Speaker 2: things like that. So you do your four week course

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Speaker 2: there to start your bomb and like four week course

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Speaker 2: is not long, you know, it's an apprenticeship.

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Speaker 1: It would be a course that I'd be paying particular

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Speaker 1: attention to because.

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Speaker 2: You don't want to miss any lessons, that's for sure,

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Speaker 2: and it's passed failed. You know. In the early days,

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Speaker 2: you know, there's nothing about compe season resetting things as

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Speaker 2: you know, you know it was you know, you either

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Speaker 2: passed or you failed, and you know the pressure. I

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Speaker 2: just got into the group, but you mean the group

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Speaker 2: probably a year and maagine going back to first Victorian

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Speaker 2: to fail a bomb course.

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Speaker 1: You know when it came down to it, Yeah, you

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Speaker 1: don't want to carry that. Well, it might got rid

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Speaker 1: of your name as Calvin, you might have Calvin, Yeah,

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Speaker 1: got rid of that. But want to do that work

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Speaker 1: like that's you know that we talket the pressure of

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Speaker 1: being in the tactical terms, the sag and responding to incidents,

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Speaker 1: but there's I think I'm just looking at there's another

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Speaker 1: level of pressure when you're okay, there's a package over there,

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Speaker 1: and it happens so many times in police and I

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Speaker 1: don't think people fully appreciate how much effort then things

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Speaker 1: have to be done when there's a suspicious package. So

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Speaker 1: you're going to you're putting your hand up to be

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Speaker 1: the person that walks in and determines whether that's going

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Speaker 1: to blow you up. If you make a mistake in

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Speaker 1: this line of work, it's the last mistake you make.

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Speaker 1: Literally it is.

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Speaker 2: And I had a good mate, see sergeant, and basically

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Speaker 2: We used to say every met matters, so if you

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Speaker 2: could be a further meter away, that could be the

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Speaker 2: difference between your life or serious injury. So yeah, you're

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Speaker 2: trained basically to assess the situation, which with the equipment

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Speaker 2: you had in the early days, if you had a

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Speaker 2: suspicious band, you walk up with your X ray equipment,

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Speaker 2: you'd take an X ray of it, and like the

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Speaker 2: xtra equipment those days wasn't great and like, oh geez,

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Speaker 2: it is a bomb, now go and put the bombsuit on.

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Speaker 2: So we've changed now that you know, over the fifteen

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Speaker 2: years ago, we decided like, if we get caught the job,

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Speaker 2: it's a bomb until we determine it's not. So full equipment, equipment,

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Speaker 2: full bomb suit, it's required and use everything before we

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Speaker 2: actually try and put a member over the top of it.

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Speaker 2: And robots have got better these days, so you know,

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Speaker 2: it makes your job a lot easier. It just bends

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Speaker 2: the location where it is.

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Speaker 1: So what sort of appt you do you feel that

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Speaker 1: you need to be a bomb technician.

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Speaker 2: I think stick to the procedures that you've been taught.

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Speaker 2: You know, there's no shortcuts, and I've had people, I've

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Speaker 2: filed people on courses that have done the wrong thing.

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Speaker 2: You know, I've had one guy removed from our unit

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Speaker 2: that made a bad mistake and make it it is lucky.

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Speaker 2: It was lucky. Basically nothing happened, but he made a

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Speaker 2: bad decision. And as the upgraded senior stage in that time,

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Speaker 2: you know, I thought, advice this person. I think it's

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Speaker 2: just time that you move to another location. And he

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Speaker 2: understood the consequences, you know. So you know, I don't

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Speaker 2: want to be going to someone's family and saying you

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Speaker 2: made a mistake. With training now and all the equipment,

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Speaker 2: you don't take a risk, you know, and maybe this

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Speaker 2: will happen. Now you know what's going to happen. If

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Speaker 2: you're going to go up there and cut the red

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Speaker 2: wire or whatever that's going to disarm it, that's not

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Speaker 2: the way to go. But there's other ways of dealing

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Speaker 2: with it that you've been able.

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Speaker 1: We hold this could be great. Are you telling us

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Speaker 1: all those Hollywood films, do we cut the red or

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Speaker 1: the blue wire? Is bullshit?

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Speaker 2: Only on Fridays, right If you.

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Speaker 1: Want to knock off because you've got to get out,

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Speaker 1: let's just.

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Speaker 2: You just hope you're not color blind or something like that.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, yeah, but yeah, the skill sets. So a four

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Speaker 1: week four week course and I take on board each

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Speaker 1: meter matters that that's logical in its process, the way

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Speaker 1: that you've shifted assess of the situation that's a bomb

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Speaker 1: until you can improve otherwise. That all makes sense, But

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Speaker 1: it gets down to the point where you've got to approach.

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Speaker 2: At some stage, no matter what, some stage you have

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Speaker 2: to approach it and declear it's safe, and we run

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Speaker 2: our own course. Now in Victoria, things changed within the

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Speaker 2: government and basically every state turgory was to deal with

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Speaker 2: their own bomb techs and train their own bombics. Our

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Speaker 2: course is now five weeks long and it's only an

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Speaker 2: initial course. Really. The first week is actually getting your

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Speaker 2: explosive license. Originally you didn't have to have a license,

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Speaker 2: so under the work Safe and all that we had permission,

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Speaker 2: really good work safe that we could run our own

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Speaker 2: explosive course and give people their exposes licenses. Even as

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Speaker 2: a bomb tech, if you're driving around exploses, you've got

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Speaker 2: to have a license to do that. So everything's done

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Speaker 2: within the legislation and things like that. It's just important

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Speaker 2: that the first week's a good understanding the effect of

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Speaker 2: an explosive blast. Then you start putting fragmentation and all

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Speaker 2: that kind of stuff that have a good understanding.

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Speaker 1: Well, I think that's probably a good idea because if

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Speaker 1: it's not a fire cracker going off invariably, it can

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Speaker 1: be devastating, and so they give you an appreciation of that,

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Speaker 1: probably wake you up to make sure you're concentrating in

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Speaker 1: what you're being taught.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, well, you know when I did my course where

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Speaker 2: we had jelly knite, basically they don't have jelly knite

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Speaker 2: these days, which is really nitru It's base based, so

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Speaker 2: instink that heat, shock and friction, you know, has like

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Speaker 2: even a residue on it. You know, if you get

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Speaker 2: it on your hands you sort of scrape your forehead,

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Speaker 2: you'll come down with a terrible migraine. So it gets

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Speaker 2: into the poresy your skin. And basically when you get

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Speaker 2: jelly knife for the first time, you got to poke

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Speaker 2: a hole in it, and poke another hole and put

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Speaker 2: a detonator in it, you know, and make sure you

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Speaker 2: don't hit the little steel clip on the top and

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Speaker 2: correct friction and stuff like that. Different kind of level. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: you were nervous doing it, but it was exciting in

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Speaker 2: a way if you like fireworks exposure a lot better.

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Speaker 1: Right, Okay, look it's a bigger bank. Yeah, how like

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Speaker 1: you've got to you've got to be calm, and that

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Speaker 1: is that something you had or something that you trained

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Speaker 1: yourself for, because you really need to be focused, calm,

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Speaker 1: making informed, correct decisions.

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Speaker 2: Now, as a sergeant, you'd come up with a plan

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Speaker 2: how are you going to deal with a situation? And

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Speaker 2: my bomb techs, you know, the bontics I had. When

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Speaker 2: we're dressing them, you know I would have put a

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Speaker 2: plan together. This is what you're going to do, bang

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Speaker 2: bang bang bang bang abc D right through. Unless they

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Speaker 2: can think of themselves, you know, when they get out there,

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Speaker 2: it's changed the environment or whatever. But whilst we're dressing

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Speaker 2: and we're putting their overall pants on and then we're

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Speaker 2: putting their browin protection on them, they're thinking about the

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Speaker 2: tasks they have to do. Then we put the helmet

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Speaker 2: on and then basically then we put the big coat on,

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Speaker 2: we put gloves on so DNA fingerprints we don't contaminate

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Speaker 2: what we're dealing with. And then I'll say to him

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Speaker 2: before I drop that visor, what are you going to do?

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Speaker 2: And you'll go through a whole process of what he's.

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Speaker 1: Going to do.

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Speaker 2: And then he's in lay maybe your forty kilo bomb

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Speaker 2: suit with that big helmet on, and he might have

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Speaker 2: to carry a few sandbags a twenty kilo shambag in

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Speaker 2: each hand. So they had to be extremely fit to

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Speaker 2: actually do that and think of what they have to

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Speaker 2: do when they get up there.

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Speaker 1: How did you feel the first time you put on

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Speaker 1: that bomb suit, Because I know, if you're wearing like

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Speaker 1: a gas maskt you're very You're sort of focus, you're

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Speaker 1: contained and all that. And I watch I've seen blokes

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Speaker 1: putting on the bomb suit and I'm thinking, okay, you're

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Speaker 1: part of a term. Everyone's with you at this stage.

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Speaker 1: But once that vice goes down, you are very.

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Speaker 2: Much You wipe your hands and yeah, that's it.

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Speaker 1: Yeah we're with your John. We're just stand back here.

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Speaker 2: Well, the vis that you start perspiring, basically the breather

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Speaker 2: unit or the blower unit it's not working properly. Your

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Speaker 2: buys will start the fog up, and so you have

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Speaker 2: all these things and when you're walking up to the

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Speaker 2: first time, it may seem silly. You just had a habit.

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Speaker 2: I used to fold the fingers up, you know, into

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Speaker 2: the sleeve as I'm walking up, just pull the fingers in.

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Speaker 2: I don't know what we're just have it, have a look,

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Speaker 2: you know, don't lose the pinkies or whatever, and go

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Speaker 2: from there, never concerned. If it was I thought that

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Speaker 2: it was going to go up, I wouldn't be walking up,

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Speaker 2: simple as that. And if I was going to make

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Speaker 2: a move, I have comms with the other guys back,

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Speaker 2: even though I may be a sergeant and I can

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Speaker 2: see your sergeant at the time. I come up with

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Speaker 2: a plane and say, guys, can we do this better

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Speaker 2: than what I've just come up with? And sometimes they

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Speaker 2: come up with another plan which I hadn't even thought of,

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Speaker 2: and we'd go down that direction. That's the type of

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Speaker 2: person we look for. It doesn't matter what rank. You're

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Speaker 2: a team. You're looking after each other and someone comes up,

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Speaker 2: so could we do it this way? And go why

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Speaker 2: didn't I think of that? Yeah? It makes sense. It

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Speaker 2: goes from.

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Speaker 1: There without giving away any methodology, just for the lame

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Speaker 1: and how do you diffuse a bomb? When there's a

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Speaker 1: bomb there? What's the processes to diffuse it?

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Speaker 2: With the robots? Basically, it just makes common sense these

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Speaker 2: days that when you get to a location, you're not

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Speaker 2: going to walk up and have a look. You can

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Speaker 2: be sure that the police that are on site looks

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Speaker 2: So we did questioning first. Then we'll send a robot up.

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Speaker 2: The robot can go up and have a look, and

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Speaker 2: sometimes with the attachments on a robot, the actual robot

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Speaker 2: can actually open it for ourselves and we can have

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Speaker 2: a good look at what we're dealing with. If not,

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Speaker 2: we can use diagnostics equipment, extra equipment, and we've all

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Speaker 2: fairly experienced in reading what X rays are and what

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Speaker 2: we're looking for. I won't go through the various components,

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Speaker 2: but what we're looking for, and sometimes we can say, no,

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Speaker 2: it's not a device, it's just a mistake someone's done,

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Speaker 2: a delivery of whatever. If we're really concerned about it,

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Speaker 2: we won't get up there to cut it open, or

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Speaker 2: basically we'll use what we call a disruptor, which is

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Speaker 2: like a counter charge. We'll get rid of it that way.

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Speaker 2: Then the detectives can gather all the evidence. Forensic arson squad,

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Speaker 2: we'll gather all the evidence that's remaining.

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Speaker 1: The world of bombs just by the nature of them too,

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Speaker 1: Like you can walk up there, and you're saying you

303
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Speaker 1: wouldn't walk up there if you thought there was concerns.

304
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Speaker 1: But there's so many duvious ways bombs can be activated

305
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Speaker 1: and what bombs are used for. And yeah, we just

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Speaker 1: look at today's day and age. It doesn't surprise when

307
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Speaker 1: bombs go off left, right and center, and it can

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Speaker 1: be such a powerful tool. It's constantly evolving. I would imagine. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: you'd be learning things from something that's happened overseas. You

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Speaker 1: take on board, Okay, this situation happened. We've got to

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Speaker 1: look out for.

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Speaker 2: That now, liaison with groups overseas and certainly in the State.

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Speaker 2: We do case histories and things like that, how they

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Speaker 2: approached a particular device. You know, it's getting always getting

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Speaker 2: that information a lot on the internet. You know, a

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Speaker 2: lot of the stories are on the internet. We read

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Speaker 2: what's happened overseas. You know, there's a lot of mistakes

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Speaker 2: that the made overseas too. I'm sure it's mistakes made

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Speaker 2: in Australia, but yeah, you just can't afford to make

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Speaker 2: that mistake.

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Speaker 1: No, Well, you saw I think you saw the consequences

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Speaker 1: of someone wearing a bombsuit where the bomb went off

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Speaker 1: and it wasn't too pretty.

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Speaker 2: No, it wasn't. It's probably it would be one. Probably

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Speaker 2: one of the largest bombs was not the bomb suit

326
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Speaker 2: side of it, but that severa gone off in Australia

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Speaker 2: that probably no one heard about it. There's a township

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Speaker 2: in Victory called daryn Allam and we had a person

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Speaker 2: called Glen Sanders and he had mental health issues again

330
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Speaker 2: drug effect, had probably been on the marijuana. Now he's

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Speaker 2: on ice, very paranoid for whatever reason, he got things

332
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Speaker 2: rolling and he'd been wearing a suicide vest explosive best

333
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Speaker 2: probably for a year that some people knew about and

334
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Speaker 2: thought it was just a joke. Don't worry about it's

335
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Speaker 2: not real anyway. He had a property at Darren Allam

336
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Speaker 2: and his property was one hundred acres on the Helmston Highway,

337
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Speaker 2: at least another eighty acres on the other side of

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Speaker 2: the highway. He was visiting his mum in Balarat Hospital

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Speaker 2: and prior to that, the day before it had someone

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Speaker 2: come over to his farm and help him in the

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Speaker 2: mechanic shed and he had an inspection pick where you

342
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Speaker 2: get under the vegle and you have look what's going

343
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Speaker 2: on underneath, and he had this plumber friend come over

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Speaker 2: and he said, I had to get out and some tools.

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Speaker 2: So he got out a gate on the inspection pit

346
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Speaker 2: and then got a whole od of gas bottles LPG

347
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Speaker 2: gas wetson opened it up and the guy couldn't get out,

348
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Speaker 2: and he just let him walk away and left him anyway,

349
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Speaker 2: His plumber mate took me about half an hour to

350
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Speaker 2: get out, and he got out and then confronted Glenn

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Speaker 2: what's going on, and Glenn showed him his best he

352
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Speaker 2: was wearing and sort of brushed him down, said sorry

353
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Speaker 2: about all that. So it sort of triggered the game,

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Speaker 2: I think to get the police involved. So then the

355
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Speaker 2: investigators were notified, and then the next day we were

356
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Speaker 2: notified and we're on our way and he had gone

357
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Speaker 2: to ballaratte Hospital where his mum was in the hospital.

358
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Speaker 2: She had cancer at the time, so he is visiting.

359
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Speaker 2: So we had this person now walking around in Ballerrette

360
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Speaker 2: Hospital with a possible explosive suitside vest on. So naturally

361
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Speaker 2: the SOG theyre coming out formulating a plan. I've got

362
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Speaker 2: the bomb side of it. I've got the robots fready,

363
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Speaker 2: they're in the truck. We haven't got him out. We

364
00:17:48,440 --> 00:17:50,680
Speaker 2: haven't been compromised during like that. I've got the suit

365
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Speaker 2: laying out on the floor of one of the trucks

366
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Speaker 2: for to put someone on. What are the sag you're

367
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Speaker 2: going to do? The investigated and this was not unusual

368
00:17:58,200 --> 00:18:00,240
Speaker 2: for his normal habit to visit his mum, so they

369
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Speaker 2: let it run and he would have been notified that

370
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Speaker 2: he had seen his brother he hadn't seen for some

371
00:18:06,359 --> 00:18:09,720
Speaker 2: time the day before also, and he showed him this vest,

372
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Speaker 2: and he had buttons on each shoulder and a button

373
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Speaker 2: on his chest, and that was if the police should

374
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Speaker 2: arrest him, he could just use his head to push

375
00:18:18,040 --> 00:18:19,760
Speaker 2: one of the buttons or push the button on his

376
00:18:19,840 --> 00:18:23,040
Speaker 2: chest and things would go off. This is his interpretation.

377
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Speaker 2: So he ended up backing his property at durren Ellum. Basically,

378
00:18:26,840 --> 00:18:29,720
Speaker 2: the police arrived here, sog Wright in the armored vehicle

379
00:18:29,760 --> 00:18:32,880
Speaker 2: went up. They triggered the warning alarms on his driveway.

380
00:18:32,960 --> 00:18:35,199
Speaker 2: Thatt senses in the trees, so they he knew they

381
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Speaker 2: were coming. And it's about nine o'clock at night, freezing

382
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Speaker 2: cold up there, and he came out and he had

383
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Speaker 2: a sort of shirt on, showed him the vest sort

384
00:18:44,560 --> 00:18:47,639
Speaker 2: of disappeared back inside, came back a minute later, and

385
00:18:47,680 --> 00:18:50,960
Speaker 2: the negotiations went on for three hours and he was

386
00:18:51,000 --> 00:18:53,400
Speaker 2: in and out. He must have been freezing. He didn't

387
00:18:53,400 --> 00:18:55,320
Speaker 2: ask about the time, probably asked how long have it

388
00:18:55,400 --> 00:18:58,119
Speaker 2: been here? Maybe two or three times. I did a

389
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Speaker 2: delivery of meals to all the out accordance. I wasn't

390
00:19:00,600 --> 00:19:03,439
Speaker 2: sog now, but they knew that I could deliver the

391
00:19:03,480 --> 00:19:07,119
Speaker 2: meals and stuff like that through my experience, and I

392
00:19:07,119 --> 00:19:09,040
Speaker 2: could see him standing in the driveway and all that

393
00:19:09,119 --> 00:19:12,320
Speaker 2: kind of stuff talking through the negotiators. In the end,

394
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Speaker 2: I closed our guys down and said, we'll go find

395
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Speaker 2: some accommodation. We're not going to search a house for

396
00:19:18,400 --> 00:19:22,600
Speaker 2: exposers at night just doesn't make sense, dangerous dark. You

397
00:19:22,640 --> 00:19:26,320
Speaker 2: want to use daylight. So basically we found a local

398
00:19:26,359 --> 00:19:30,320
Speaker 2: motel some I think Morton Lake, some distance away. About

399
00:19:30,800 --> 00:19:32,679
Speaker 2: caught the five five o'clock in the morning. I'll get

400
00:19:32,680 --> 00:19:35,680
Speaker 2: a phone. My phone goes and senior sergeant says, I

401
00:19:35,800 --> 00:19:38,720
Speaker 2: hope you wake The place is just blowing up and

402
00:19:39,520 --> 00:19:42,440
Speaker 2: Sanders is dead. And I thought it was just typically sog.

403
00:19:42,720 --> 00:19:45,960
Speaker 2: You know, I'm sleeping. He's not wake me up, And

404
00:19:46,240 --> 00:19:48,320
Speaker 2: he says, no, I'm serious and three of us have

405
00:19:48,359 --> 00:19:50,959
Speaker 2: been hurt. So you're getting me to get here, get

406
00:19:51,000 --> 00:19:53,639
Speaker 2: the boys here and take over because we all have

407
00:19:53,720 --> 00:19:57,360
Speaker 2: to be interviewed by the homicide quite death in police custody.

408
00:19:58,080 --> 00:20:00,280
Speaker 2: So we get there and it's just getting things sort

409
00:20:00,280 --> 00:20:02,880
Speaker 2: of blocked the handles in the highway completely, this fragmentation

410
00:20:03,000 --> 00:20:05,800
Speaker 2: all over the highway and things like that. And to

411
00:20:05,800 --> 00:20:09,440
Speaker 2: cut a long story short, I suppose during the negotiation

412
00:20:09,680 --> 00:20:12,920
Speaker 2: period one of the guys had his head outside the

413
00:20:13,040 --> 00:20:16,600
Speaker 2: armored beagle just talking to him, negotiating, and there was

414
00:20:16,680 --> 00:20:18,960
Speaker 2: just a loud explosion. If you're closer, it was just

415
00:20:19,040 --> 00:20:22,879
Speaker 2: one explosion. His interpretation, he got a fright when this

416
00:20:23,119 --> 00:20:26,359
Speaker 2: explosure off, and he hit his shoulder and banged right.

417
00:20:26,720 --> 00:20:30,680
Speaker 2: He went off. Yeah. So he had debt cord detonating

418
00:20:30,720 --> 00:20:33,359
Speaker 2: cord which wrapped around his body, and detonating cords are

419
00:20:33,400 --> 00:20:36,880
Speaker 2: high explosive for those people that know, travels eighty four

420
00:20:36,920 --> 00:20:39,240
Speaker 2: hundred meters per second. That's over eight and a half

421
00:20:39,560 --> 00:20:41,280
Speaker 2: nearly eight and a half plombs per second. That's how

422
00:20:41,320 --> 00:20:45,440
Speaker 2: fast his cord will travel. So that basically cutting him half.

423
00:20:45,720 --> 00:20:50,320
Speaker 2: Upper torso was from the lower torso was seven meters separated. Basically,

424
00:20:50,520 --> 00:20:52,719
Speaker 2: the guy in the arm of beagle had over pressure

425
00:20:52,760 --> 00:20:56,240
Speaker 2: damage from the blast, and if you were some distance away,

426
00:20:56,400 --> 00:20:59,000
Speaker 2: they said they heard something like six or seven explosions

427
00:20:59,040 --> 00:21:03,840
Speaker 2: going off. So who basically had seven devices planted around

428
00:21:03,840 --> 00:21:06,960
Speaker 2: the property, all interconnected to each other, and they all

429
00:21:07,000 --> 00:21:10,640
Speaker 2: went off at the same time, but distance a way

430
00:21:10,720 --> 00:21:12,400
Speaker 2: you could hear the bang, bang, bing bang, but close

431
00:21:12,520 --> 00:21:15,960
Speaker 2: up just hand like one large explosion. So his house

432
00:21:16,040 --> 00:21:19,760
Speaker 2: was totally destroyed. His engineering shed had plasma colors and

433
00:21:19,760 --> 00:21:23,000
Speaker 2: stuff like that, totally destroyed. Mum's house was on the

434
00:21:23,040 --> 00:21:26,720
Speaker 2: same property. Her house wasn't destroyed. The ceiling dropped from

435
00:21:26,720 --> 00:21:30,600
Speaker 2: the overpression the fragmentation through it. And he had a

436
00:21:30,960 --> 00:21:33,919
Speaker 2: device basically a bomb near the front door, one near

437
00:21:34,000 --> 00:21:36,480
Speaker 2: the back door. He had two in the engineering shed

438
00:21:36,520 --> 00:21:39,480
Speaker 2: and one had one in a hidden shipping container. Were

439
00:21:39,520 --> 00:21:42,760
Speaker 2: there for the next three weeks making the property safe.

440
00:21:46,080 --> 00:21:48,560
Speaker 1: Just a couple of things to unpack that. And I

441
00:21:48,720 --> 00:21:52,919
Speaker 1: saw the photo of the damage. It's unbelievable. I saw

442
00:21:53,680 --> 00:21:57,359
Speaker 1: foto in your book, But just unpacking that, the consequences

443
00:21:57,359 --> 00:22:01,520
Speaker 1: could have been devastating, like three members injured. The person

444
00:22:01,560 --> 00:22:05,119
Speaker 1: that created the bomb, blowing him blowing himself up. Yeah,

445
00:22:05,280 --> 00:22:08,160
Speaker 1: if people went in there the wrong way or didn't

446
00:22:08,240 --> 00:22:10,120
Speaker 1: cold and off the era and going there, it could

447
00:22:10,160 --> 00:22:11,840
Speaker 1: be mass casualties.

448
00:22:12,320 --> 00:22:15,280
Speaker 2: If if the police had done a raid or something

449
00:22:15,320 --> 00:22:17,560
Speaker 2: like that at night. You know, once we're dealing the bomb,

450
00:22:17,560 --> 00:22:22,800
Speaker 2: were trying to to come up with planets to our advantage. Yeah.

451
00:22:23,000 --> 00:22:26,080
Speaker 2: One SG member received trapped onto his head, went through

452
00:22:26,119 --> 00:22:29,159
Speaker 2: his falistic helmet. He has recovered from his injuries. And

453
00:22:29,200 --> 00:22:32,159
Speaker 2: the other one, fortunately, they were behind a chimney of

454
00:22:32,240 --> 00:22:35,560
Speaker 2: the house, the main house of brick chimney, so the

455
00:22:35,600 --> 00:22:37,479
Speaker 2: overpressure in the blast bay sort of win a ran

456
00:22:37,640 --> 00:22:40,560
Speaker 2: but it collapsed it. Yeah, the fortunate they weren't killed.

457
00:22:40,640 --> 00:22:42,080
Speaker 2: Lucky they won't killed.

458
00:22:42,359 --> 00:22:45,040
Speaker 1: Now to attend the scene like that, which clearly I

459
00:22:45,400 --> 00:22:47,800
Speaker 1: call him a nutter, It's not probably the technical term,

460
00:22:47,840 --> 00:22:52,160
Speaker 1: but yeah, an intelligent nher that can cause some damage

461
00:22:52,160 --> 00:22:55,280
Speaker 1: and set bombs up like that. You'd be going through

462
00:22:55,280 --> 00:22:57,080
Speaker 1: a scene like that that could be booby trapped. You

463
00:22:57,080 --> 00:23:00,119
Speaker 1: wouldn't know what you're going to uncover there. How how

464
00:23:00,119 --> 00:23:02,520
Speaker 1: long did it take before you could clear that scene?

465
00:23:02,800 --> 00:23:07,000
Speaker 2: We were there for three weeks and even arriving there,

466
00:23:07,320 --> 00:23:10,360
Speaker 2: putting the cords in place blocking the Hamilton Highway, which

467
00:23:10,359 --> 00:23:12,400
Speaker 2: is the main highway. I was getting a bit of grief.

468
00:23:12,440 --> 00:23:14,800
Speaker 2: Will that be for a day? I said, no, it'll

469
00:23:14,880 --> 00:23:16,840
Speaker 2: open when it opened, simple to that. So it was

470
00:23:16,880 --> 00:23:20,520
Speaker 2: three weeks that was closed for sort of the command structure.

471
00:23:20,560 --> 00:23:22,320
Speaker 2: Some of them work. Sorrying to put pressure on. It

472
00:23:22,320 --> 00:23:24,760
Speaker 2: doesn't work with me for pressure. Don't care. This is

473
00:23:24,760 --> 00:23:26,679
Speaker 2: what's going to happen. Take as long as it's going

474
00:23:26,720 --> 00:23:30,480
Speaker 2: to take. Protect my members and protect other people. So

475
00:23:30,920 --> 00:23:33,639
Speaker 2: we had to start basically from the front door. He

476
00:23:33,920 --> 00:23:40,159
Speaker 2: had explosives in milk churns and large LPG tanks. You

477
00:23:40,200 --> 00:23:43,400
Speaker 2: know everybody knows about strapnel like nails and things like that.

478
00:23:43,920 --> 00:23:47,920
Speaker 2: He had welded railway iron onto the side of these churns,

479
00:23:48,440 --> 00:23:53,560
Speaker 2: chunks of railway iron, and it gales the Hamilton Highway

480
00:23:53,560 --> 00:23:56,240
Speaker 2: over four hundred meters away. One of those chunks had

481
00:23:56,240 --> 00:23:59,280
Speaker 2: gone right, Yeah, I've got a fart of it. I

482
00:23:59,320 --> 00:24:01,840
Speaker 2: saw when I was setting up everything, got this gouge

483
00:24:01,880 --> 00:24:04,560
Speaker 2: in the highway and I could see the indentations in

484
00:24:04,600 --> 00:24:07,760
Speaker 2: the plowed field. So I found the railway on. You know,

485
00:24:08,080 --> 00:24:11,000
Speaker 2: they didn't know what was whizzing pass that night. So

486
00:24:11,080 --> 00:24:13,920
Speaker 2: we basically started at the front. His letterbox was actually

487
00:24:14,840 --> 00:24:17,639
Speaker 2: looked like a bomb. It was a large aerial bomb.

488
00:24:17,680 --> 00:24:20,119
Speaker 2: That was his letterbox, and like I had like a

489
00:24:20,160 --> 00:24:24,120
Speaker 2: shotgune cartage in the front of it, and basically all

490
00:24:24,119 --> 00:24:26,320
Speaker 2: the neighbors were coming out. He said, oh, you always

491
00:24:26,400 --> 00:24:28,199
Speaker 2: used to say if anyone touch his letterbox, that'd be

492
00:24:28,280 --> 00:24:30,560
Speaker 2: last thing they'll do. So you know, we had to

493
00:24:30,600 --> 00:24:33,560
Speaker 2: take that has been a possible bomb. And I had

494
00:24:33,560 --> 00:24:35,760
Speaker 2: a haystack in the front yard. We had to empty

495
00:24:35,800 --> 00:24:38,719
Speaker 2: every bale of hay because they rumors coming he had

496
00:24:38,760 --> 00:24:40,120
Speaker 2: exposes hidden in the hay.

497
00:24:40,240 --> 00:24:43,280
Speaker 1: And what the painstaking task. How many of you were

498
00:24:43,359 --> 00:24:43,879
Speaker 1: working on that.

499
00:24:44,200 --> 00:24:47,040
Speaker 2: We had at least eight on site. And then we

500
00:24:47,119 --> 00:24:49,399
Speaker 2: had the rest of Victoria to respond to too, so

501
00:24:49,480 --> 00:24:53,000
Speaker 2: we had our limbits were really stretched for Victoria. We

502
00:24:53,040 --> 00:24:55,840
Speaker 2: had teams, a team in the city. I sort of

503
00:24:55,840 --> 00:24:58,320
Speaker 2: stayed there once I sort of started. My senior sergeant

504
00:24:58,320 --> 00:25:01,280
Speaker 2: came back three days later after being interviewed and all

505
00:25:01,280 --> 00:25:03,560
Speaker 2: that kind of stuff. It was just a long process,

506
00:25:03,680 --> 00:25:06,919
Speaker 2: very slow. His body was in the driveway, you know,

507
00:25:07,480 --> 00:25:10,439
Speaker 2: he separbarated by seven meters up and lower. That had

508
00:25:10,480 --> 00:25:12,240
Speaker 2: to be covered. On the first day we had rumors

509
00:25:12,240 --> 00:25:14,000
Speaker 2: that he was wearing a bra that had a number

510
00:25:14,080 --> 00:25:16,800
Speaker 2: of detonators in it. People don't know what a detonated.

511
00:25:16,880 --> 00:25:18,880
Speaker 2: You stand on a detonator, good chance to lose half

512
00:25:18,880 --> 00:25:20,840
Speaker 2: a foot, that's what they're like. They look very small,

513
00:25:20,840 --> 00:25:24,240
Speaker 2: but very dangerous. So I had clean path there. I

514
00:25:24,240 --> 00:25:26,920
Speaker 2: had to cover the body, so you hadn't been cleared

515
00:25:27,000 --> 00:25:30,920
Speaker 2: deceased by the pathologists till two and a half days later,

516
00:25:31,400 --> 00:25:34,359
Speaker 2: when again I had to go back uncover the body.

517
00:25:34,880 --> 00:25:37,719
Speaker 2: They came into photos they moved out and then had

518
00:25:37,760 --> 00:25:41,480
Speaker 2: to roll those parts over, checked the pockets and his clothing,

519
00:25:41,520 --> 00:25:44,040
Speaker 2: make sure nothing was in them. They came in toil

520
00:25:44,080 --> 00:25:45,680
Speaker 2: more photus and cleared and deceased.

521
00:25:46,160 --> 00:25:48,520
Speaker 1: What a painstaking task that would have been, and that

522
00:25:48,520 --> 00:25:51,840
Speaker 1: would have been high alert the whole time, like any

523
00:25:51,920 --> 00:25:55,600
Speaker 1: step could have been your last one on that literally.

524
00:25:55,280 --> 00:25:57,560
Speaker 2: Yeah, watching where you put your feet. And that's why

525
00:25:57,600 --> 00:26:00,000
Speaker 2: we stopped the other investigators coming on. They wanted to

526
00:26:00,040 --> 00:26:02,840
Speaker 2: come on, but we just couldn't guarantee the safety. So

527
00:26:02,880 --> 00:26:05,480
Speaker 2: we cleared a path down the driveway, which driveways would

528
00:26:05,480 --> 00:26:07,480
Speaker 2: have been about two and a half two point five

529
00:26:07,640 --> 00:26:10,480
Speaker 2: two hundred and fifty meters long. It was a long driveway. Yeah,

530
00:26:10,520 --> 00:26:13,879
Speaker 2: it was painstaking. And then you've got a biological hazard,

531
00:26:14,119 --> 00:26:16,720
Speaker 2: know you're bomb techer and like we call a knuckle

532
00:26:16,760 --> 00:26:18,800
Speaker 2: drag or whatever. You've got all these things running through

533
00:26:18,800 --> 00:26:22,040
Speaker 2: your mind. That's when your mind you're going to work mode,

534
00:26:22,160 --> 00:26:25,360
Speaker 2: you know, and health and well being of the members.

535
00:26:25,359 --> 00:26:27,840
Speaker 2: His house was made out of asbestos, so we had

536
00:26:27,880 --> 00:26:31,720
Speaker 2: to have basically appropriate ASBESTO suits. We had to get swabbed,

537
00:26:31,880 --> 00:26:36,240
Speaker 2: swabbed every day for fibers again, breathing apparatus and working

538
00:26:36,280 --> 00:26:39,320
Speaker 2: some days in boiling heat the other days in the range.

539
00:26:39,320 --> 00:26:41,760
Speaker 2: The guys are really really professional. The guys I work

540
00:26:41,840 --> 00:26:45,439
Speaker 2: with big worry though as a sergeant giving a task

541
00:26:45,520 --> 00:26:47,720
Speaker 2: and sending them in, you want to do it yourself

542
00:26:47,720 --> 00:26:50,960
Speaker 2: because you don't want them getting hurt. It's just human nature.

543
00:26:51,359 --> 00:26:54,359
Speaker 2: But you trust them. And we did twenty two counter

544
00:26:54,480 --> 00:26:58,160
Speaker 2: chargers in the end for things that we found IEDs.

545
00:26:58,480 --> 00:27:02,800
Speaker 2: We found the time device that made everything go off.

546
00:27:03,000 --> 00:27:05,760
Speaker 2: And yeah, so busy, perod, very busy.

547
00:27:06,280 --> 00:27:09,520
Speaker 1: I could imagine, and I imagine I understand what you're

548
00:27:09,520 --> 00:27:12,400
Speaker 1: saying too, Like sending people in that you know you're

549
00:27:12,400 --> 00:27:14,560
Speaker 1: putting them at risk, but that is the job. That's

550
00:27:14,880 --> 00:27:17,040
Speaker 1: the way that plays out, isn't it. People have got

551
00:27:17,040 --> 00:27:19,800
Speaker 1: to get Yeah, it is got their experience. And I'm

552
00:27:19,840 --> 00:27:22,720
Speaker 1: glad you stood up to the detectives. I know you.

553
00:27:23,960 --> 00:27:26,480
Speaker 1: I know you've done a couple of things. I just

554
00:27:26,600 --> 00:27:29,080
Speaker 1: reference you know when you're back in your s O

555
00:27:29,240 --> 00:27:32,359
Speaker 1: G days when you had an operation on your knee

556
00:27:32,359 --> 00:27:34,679
Speaker 1: and you were told directly by your boss not to

557
00:27:34,680 --> 00:27:36,439
Speaker 1: get out of the car no matter what, when you

558
00:27:36,520 --> 00:27:38,080
Speaker 1: had to fill in for a raid and you got

559
00:27:38,119 --> 00:27:40,960
Speaker 1: out not once, but you did it again, and so

560
00:27:41,040 --> 00:27:43,840
Speaker 1: you disobeyed that. I'll tell you a funny story and

561
00:27:43,880 --> 00:27:46,320
Speaker 1: you probably won't laugh at me. You'll say what the

562
00:27:46,600 --> 00:27:49,800
Speaker 1: bomb guys from New South Wales said about me I

563
00:27:49,840 --> 00:27:54,520
Speaker 1: was doing. It was a high profile cot high profile

564
00:27:54,600 --> 00:27:57,600
Speaker 1: in the magnitude of the job. We had an informant

565
00:27:57,760 --> 00:28:01,119
Speaker 1: that I've been dealing with covertly for a very long time.

566
00:28:01,600 --> 00:28:04,440
Speaker 1: And this informant was paranoid and he was a bit

567
00:28:04,480 --> 00:28:07,399
Speaker 1: of a tech that liked to make bombs and into

568
00:28:07,440 --> 00:28:09,920
Speaker 1: his firearms and all that, and he handed me We've

569
00:28:09,920 --> 00:28:12,439
Speaker 1: gone to see the informant and he's handed me what

570
00:28:12,560 --> 00:28:15,720
Speaker 1: I described as a pipe bomb. It was a fair

571
00:28:15,800 --> 00:28:19,120
Speaker 1: sized pipe bomb, probably you know, thirty centimeters or more

572
00:28:19,440 --> 00:28:22,480
Speaker 1: length wires coming out of screwed at both both ends,

573
00:28:22,720 --> 00:28:25,240
Speaker 1: thick pipe. Handed it to me when I went to

574
00:28:25,280 --> 00:28:27,400
Speaker 1: his place, and he's put it in my hands before

575
00:28:27,400 --> 00:28:29,159
Speaker 1: I move, and thinking I've got it in my hands

576
00:28:29,680 --> 00:28:32,000
Speaker 1: and he's gone, I've said, mate, what's that? He's gone.

577
00:28:32,119 --> 00:28:34,560
Speaker 1: It's a bomb. I set it up that if anyone

578
00:28:34,600 --> 00:28:36,320
Speaker 1: tried to break in here, they were going to that

579
00:28:36,359 --> 00:28:38,720
Speaker 1: would be the last thing they do. Blah blah blah.

580
00:28:38,760 --> 00:28:41,760
Speaker 1: But it's all right, mate, because I've diffused it. It's disconnected.

581
00:28:42,360 --> 00:28:46,360
Speaker 1: I've got it in my hands and covert. It is

582
00:28:46,640 --> 00:28:50,040
Speaker 1: year years, years long operation. I couldn't blow it. And

583
00:28:50,080 --> 00:28:52,480
Speaker 1: I know if I called the bomb squad guys, the

584
00:28:52,520 --> 00:28:54,440
Speaker 1: whole place would be cordered off and it would be

585
00:28:54,480 --> 00:28:57,840
Speaker 1: no be no covert anymore. So I said to the

586
00:28:57,840 --> 00:29:01,560
Speaker 1: bloke I was working with, Luke, if you're stupid, I'm stupid.

587
00:29:01,720 --> 00:29:03,840
Speaker 1: How about we just carry this to the car, We'll

588
00:29:03,920 --> 00:29:05,680
Speaker 1: drive it to an oval and then we'll call the

589
00:29:05,720 --> 00:29:09,560
Speaker 1: bomb squad. So where we're walking out, I've got my

590
00:29:09,640 --> 00:29:11,680
Speaker 1: head tilt of the way. I don't know how that

591
00:29:11,760 --> 00:29:13,880
Speaker 1: was going to save me. It was just Oh, that

592
00:29:14,400 --> 00:29:18,880
Speaker 1: make a difference. It was a inner city, like a

593
00:29:18,960 --> 00:29:21,920
Speaker 1: Friday afternoon that would have been shut down city type thing.

594
00:29:22,360 --> 00:29:24,640
Speaker 1: I've put it in the put in the boot of

595
00:29:24,680 --> 00:29:28,440
Speaker 1: the car. Luke press the bonnet because I've watched Hollywood.

596
00:29:28,480 --> 00:29:31,240
Speaker 1: I see every time the buttons pressed, the bomb goes off.

597
00:29:31,440 --> 00:29:34,200
Speaker 1: I'm looking away. We put it in the boot and

598
00:29:34,240 --> 00:29:35,920
Speaker 1: we drove and parked the car in the middle of

599
00:29:35,960 --> 00:29:39,320
Speaker 1: the oval, and I called the bomb squad and basically

600
00:29:40,200 --> 00:29:44,160
Speaker 1: relay what they were saying. Your fucking what you They

601
00:29:44,320 --> 00:29:47,040
Speaker 1: abused me for about ten or fifteen minutes, and every

602
00:29:47,080 --> 00:29:50,120
Speaker 1: single thing they said was one hundred percent right. And

603
00:29:50,160 --> 00:29:54,000
Speaker 1: I've said, I get it, I'm stupid. I promise I'll

604
00:29:54,040 --> 00:29:55,920
Speaker 1: never do it again, but can you come and help

605
00:29:55,920 --> 00:29:58,360
Speaker 1: me and get this bomb? And they came and took

606
00:29:58,400 --> 00:30:00,800
Speaker 1: the bomb away, dedonated and did what they should have

607
00:30:00,840 --> 00:30:03,800
Speaker 1: done at the place. So that was my one experience

608
00:30:03,840 --> 00:30:07,240
Speaker 1: with handling handling bombs, and I don't think I did

609
00:30:07,360 --> 00:30:07,960
Speaker 1: very well on that.

610
00:30:08,440 --> 00:30:12,480
Speaker 2: But sometimes you put in a position that that's what

611
00:30:12,520 --> 00:30:13,000
Speaker 2: you've got.

612
00:30:12,880 --> 00:30:15,360
Speaker 1: To do, you know. Yeah, Well, I only told you

613
00:30:15,400 --> 00:30:17,760
Speaker 1: that story because I've picked up enough in speaking to

614
00:30:17,800 --> 00:30:20,560
Speaker 1: you and reading reading through the book. Sometimes things have

615
00:30:20,720 --> 00:30:22,240
Speaker 1: just got to be done, and we did it. We

616
00:30:22,320 --> 00:30:26,000
Speaker 1: got got away of it. But yeah, they abused me,

617
00:30:26,080 --> 00:30:28,120
Speaker 1: and then I got dragged in the boss's office the

618
00:30:28,160 --> 00:30:30,680
Speaker 1: next day. He abused me. Everyone abused me. They had

619
00:30:30,720 --> 00:30:33,600
Speaker 1: nothing to come back with. The only thing after a

620
00:30:33,960 --> 00:30:36,560
Speaker 1: length of time, I said, yeah, but look I'm still here.

621
00:30:36,880 --> 00:30:42,920
Speaker 1: Didn't blow up anyway. That was a funny side story overseas.

622
00:30:42,960 --> 00:30:46,080
Speaker 1: You've done a lot of study overseas in the bomb

623
00:30:46,160 --> 00:30:48,360
Speaker 1: technician side of the things. Tell us some of the

624
00:30:48,440 --> 00:30:50,320
Speaker 1: things and things that you did there.

625
00:30:50,600 --> 00:30:52,960
Speaker 2: Well, fortunate enough, I've got a scholarship. You know when

626
00:30:53,040 --> 00:30:55,280
Speaker 2: we talk about the bomb course and stuff like that.

627
00:30:55,720 --> 00:30:59,480
Speaker 2: You become a director basically once you've done an overseas

628
00:30:59,520 --> 00:31:03,240
Speaker 2: trip that's being sponsored. So that's what I was loing

629
00:31:03,360 --> 00:31:07,720
Speaker 2: up to do. So I went to basically the America. First,

630
00:31:07,760 --> 00:31:09,840
Speaker 2: I went to a conference over there in Sacramento for

631
00:31:09,880 --> 00:31:13,320
Speaker 2: a week. Visited the FBI and Washington and all that

632
00:31:13,400 --> 00:31:16,480
Speaker 2: kind of stuff. Spoke to all their bomb techs, look

633
00:31:16,520 --> 00:31:19,000
Speaker 2: at the techniques that that using, shown a lot of

634
00:31:19,040 --> 00:31:21,320
Speaker 2: case histories and stuff like that. Did a number of

635
00:31:21,360 --> 00:31:24,320
Speaker 2: training days from there. Then I went to South Africa.

636
00:31:24,360 --> 00:31:27,320
Speaker 2: In the same trip, I spent a month in South Africa.

637
00:31:27,360 --> 00:31:29,720
Speaker 2: It was just after a partay and things were still

638
00:31:29,720 --> 00:31:32,440
Speaker 2: pretty yeah, pretty wide over there. You're sitting at the

639
00:31:32,440 --> 00:31:34,880
Speaker 2: motel and I just listening to gunshots going off, you know,

640
00:31:35,360 --> 00:31:39,600
Speaker 2: just unbelievable. But worked with their bomb techs and you know,

641
00:31:39,600 --> 00:31:41,800
Speaker 2: I went out with their tactic guys. One night was

642
00:31:41,800 --> 00:31:44,320
Speaker 2: a secure location and that night one of the guys

643
00:31:44,320 --> 00:31:46,240
Speaker 2: got shot. On the way I am bushed and shot,

644
00:31:46,280 --> 00:31:47,680
Speaker 2: you know, And that's what it was like over there.

645
00:31:47,840 --> 00:31:49,880
Speaker 2: Was I don't know if they had known that, they

646
00:31:49,920 --> 00:31:52,320
Speaker 2: would have sent me over there. And on the way back,

647
00:31:52,400 --> 00:31:55,800
Speaker 2: I went to the UK England, saw their bomb went

648
00:31:55,800 --> 00:31:57,600
Speaker 2: to Scotland Yard and did a bit of training with

649
00:31:57,720 --> 00:32:00,160
Speaker 2: some of their bomb people. And what you do is

650
00:32:01,160 --> 00:32:04,280
Speaker 2: generating a lot of information that you can bring back

651
00:32:04,320 --> 00:32:07,440
Speaker 2: to the next course as the director. I'd already been

652
00:32:07,440 --> 00:32:09,600
Speaker 2: an assistant director. Now I was going to be a director.

653
00:32:09,960 --> 00:32:12,200
Speaker 2: And we ran two courses that year, so I was

654
00:32:12,280 --> 00:32:15,320
Speaker 2: directed twice, so I was getting a lot of experience.

655
00:32:15,360 --> 00:32:17,000
Speaker 2: I had a lot of knowledge, I supposed by then,

656
00:32:17,440 --> 00:32:20,280
Speaker 2: and you just convey that information onto everybody else. You know,

657
00:32:20,320 --> 00:32:22,920
Speaker 2: you've just taken in I've been fortunate that I was

658
00:32:22,960 --> 00:32:27,360
Speaker 2: sponsored by the CESG Community Security Group. It's a Jewish

659
00:32:27,560 --> 00:32:29,800
Speaker 2: community group down in Melbourne. They have a lot of

660
00:32:29,840 --> 00:32:32,840
Speaker 2: functions and do searches before they have big function We

661
00:32:32,920 --> 00:32:35,120
Speaker 2: would help them with those searcheres, but we'd train them

662
00:32:35,120 --> 00:32:37,920
Speaker 2: to help us also, And they sponsored me to go

663
00:32:38,200 --> 00:32:40,520
Speaker 2: to Israel for a conference over there, and I spent

664
00:32:40,560 --> 00:32:42,840
Speaker 2: a couple of weeks over in Israel. It was a

665
00:32:42,880 --> 00:32:46,040
Speaker 2: suicide bombers conference, so you're learning all the time and

666
00:32:46,040 --> 00:32:50,120
Speaker 2: you bring that information back to Australia. That was open

667
00:32:50,160 --> 00:32:53,000
Speaker 2: to all. And then I went to Spain and trained

668
00:32:53,000 --> 00:32:56,200
Speaker 2: with Europol, and that was open to all bomb techs

669
00:32:56,240 --> 00:32:58,440
Speaker 2: in Australia. And I heard about it and I heard

670
00:32:58,440 --> 00:33:01,360
Speaker 2: someone was going. I thought, I think I should go

671
00:33:01,520 --> 00:33:04,040
Speaker 2: and do that. And there was no hesitation for me

672
00:33:04,120 --> 00:33:07,239
Speaker 2: going straight away. They said you can go, and I

673
00:33:07,280 --> 00:33:10,200
Speaker 2: did a week's training with Europol, which is actually we're

674
00:33:10,240 --> 00:33:13,120
Speaker 2: not part of Europol, but were. It was a guest

675
00:33:13,200 --> 00:33:15,320
Speaker 2: and it's good to train with deponteics of all the

676
00:33:15,400 --> 00:33:18,600
Speaker 2: various countries. It just shows that our language. They speak

677
00:33:18,600 --> 00:33:21,120
Speaker 2: three or four different languages and I speak Australia.

678
00:33:21,120 --> 00:33:22,240
Speaker 1: It's embarrassing, isn't it?

679
00:33:22,280 --> 00:33:24,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, and I had to do I did a presentation

680
00:33:24,360 --> 00:33:28,000
Speaker 2: on the Durhan Allum at the conference and the guy

681
00:33:28,080 --> 00:33:30,760
Speaker 2: stands up and introduces me, and he apologizes for me

682
00:33:30,840 --> 00:33:33,560
Speaker 2: before I ever starts speaking, how strains speak too fast.

683
00:33:34,120 --> 00:33:37,280
Speaker 2: And I think that's a great start. Thanks for that confidence.

684
00:33:37,280 --> 00:33:39,479
Speaker 2: So I had to do it through an interpret on

685
00:33:39,520 --> 00:33:42,800
Speaker 2: the all of the various languages. It was interesting experience. Yeah,

686
00:33:43,120 --> 00:33:45,440
Speaker 2: we did. They set up the scenarios, a couple of

687
00:33:45,440 --> 00:33:48,080
Speaker 2: scenarios and yeah, once dage, no one stood forward and

688
00:33:48,080 --> 00:33:50,600
Speaker 2: I put my hand up, and I'm happy in our

689
00:33:50,680 --> 00:33:53,080
Speaker 2: skill level and what we have is very good. I

690
00:33:53,080 --> 00:33:56,240
Speaker 2: was really pressed, not by myself, but when I came back,

691
00:33:56,720 --> 00:33:57,320
Speaker 2: we're pretty good.

692
00:33:57,400 --> 00:33:59,800
Speaker 1: That's not the type of thing you want to lag behind.

693
00:34:00,400 --> 00:34:01,240
Speaker 2: No, definitely not.

694
00:34:02,200 --> 00:34:05,440
Speaker 1: And sadly, I think in today's day and age, it's

695
00:34:05,480 --> 00:34:08,560
Speaker 1: a skill set that will probably be needed more and more.

696
00:34:08,840 --> 00:34:10,920
Speaker 2: It is like, on average, we're probably doing one and

697
00:34:10,960 --> 00:34:12,759
Speaker 2: a half to two jobs a week now. People don't

698
00:34:12,760 --> 00:34:14,520
Speaker 2: hear about them. We're very much. We get in there,

699
00:34:14,719 --> 00:34:16,799
Speaker 2: do the job and we're out and we're gone, you know,

700
00:34:16,880 --> 00:34:20,120
Speaker 2: and the media pick it up and they're good basically

701
00:34:20,320 --> 00:34:21,600
Speaker 2: with the information they give.

702
00:34:22,040 --> 00:34:25,200
Speaker 1: Out of the callouts, how many are legitimate call Well,

703
00:34:25,200 --> 00:34:27,960
Speaker 1: they're all legitimate callouts because there's a concern there, but

704
00:34:28,280 --> 00:34:30,640
Speaker 1: how many are actually turn out to be bombs?

705
00:34:31,200 --> 00:34:35,880
Speaker 2: I would say maybe fifteen percent either bombs through it

706
00:34:35,960 --> 00:34:39,200
Speaker 2: could be misadventured kids mucking around making something and it's

707
00:34:39,239 --> 00:34:43,160
Speaker 2: been left behind. They've improvised something. It might not have

708
00:34:43,280 --> 00:34:47,120
Speaker 2: an explosive compound involved, but it's made to look like

709
00:34:47,160 --> 00:34:50,680
Speaker 2: a bomb. Not a bomb, but it looks like a bomb.

710
00:34:50,719 --> 00:34:54,960
Speaker 2: So you've got to take that on board criminal activity. Certainly,

711
00:34:55,480 --> 00:34:58,239
Speaker 2: they're still finding pipe bombs as far as I know.

712
00:34:58,320 --> 00:35:00,600
Speaker 2: It was on the news this week actually in Victoria

713
00:35:00,600 --> 00:35:02,360
Speaker 2: they found a number of pipe bombs and that was

714
00:35:03,040 --> 00:35:07,080
Speaker 2: on Channel seven telecasts. A number of counter charges were

715
00:35:07,120 --> 00:35:11,000
Speaker 2: done and where they were rendered safe. Where it rendered

716
00:35:11,040 --> 00:35:14,800
Speaker 2: safe basically means that disarmed made safe. So it happens

717
00:35:14,840 --> 00:35:18,000
Speaker 2: quite regularly and been on call. You know, in my career,

718
00:35:18,280 --> 00:35:23,000
Speaker 2: I had my own personal phone, I'd have my sergeant's phone,

719
00:35:23,040 --> 00:35:25,120
Speaker 2: and then i'd had the senior sergeant's phone at times.

720
00:35:25,360 --> 00:35:27,120
Speaker 2: So if I went to the pictures with jan I'd

721
00:35:27,120 --> 00:35:29,640
Speaker 2: be sitting there in the picture theater with three mobile

722
00:35:29,640 --> 00:35:31,319
Speaker 2: phanes and you probably done it yourself. You had turn

723
00:35:31,400 --> 00:35:33,600
Speaker 2: them over so the screen doesn't come on. But you're

724
00:35:33,640 --> 00:35:36,560
Speaker 2: sitting there watching me, waiting for the glow which phone's

725
00:35:36,600 --> 00:35:38,960
Speaker 2: going to go off? So you know it's a it's

726
00:35:38,960 --> 00:35:41,640
Speaker 2: a life and a half as you've experienced yourself.

727
00:35:41,760 --> 00:35:43,920
Speaker 1: Don't you feel like the dickhead that's so important that

728
00:35:43,960 --> 00:35:46,080
Speaker 1: he's got to keep the phone on wherever you are

729
00:35:46,200 --> 00:35:52,120
Speaker 1: and everyone's just looking at you know the feeling. There's

730
00:35:52,200 --> 00:35:56,719
Speaker 1: an image of you looking very lonely walking down down

731
00:35:56,760 --> 00:36:00,319
Speaker 1: the street in your book, in your bomb suit. Tell

732
00:36:00,360 --> 00:36:03,720
Speaker 1: us what's going through your mind as you're walking walking

733
00:36:03,760 --> 00:36:08,120
Speaker 1: towards it. Are you in communications with someone about what

734
00:36:08,600 --> 00:36:09,680
Speaker 1: you're seeing and what you're doing.

735
00:36:09,880 --> 00:36:12,680
Speaker 2: Yeah, we have communications through the bomb suits and stuff

736
00:36:12,680 --> 00:36:15,560
Speaker 2: like that, so we had comms, but it's a secure

737
00:36:15,600 --> 00:36:18,680
Speaker 2: comms channel. They say don't use a radio over a bomb,

738
00:36:18,680 --> 00:36:21,600
Speaker 2: but we're basically our radio, so right the way we

739
00:36:21,640 --> 00:36:24,160
Speaker 2: do it, And I know exactly what that job was.

740
00:36:24,320 --> 00:36:27,320
Speaker 2: It's a hot summer's day walking down and you're thinking

741
00:36:27,360 --> 00:36:29,520
Speaker 2: of what you're required to do. We had the robot

742
00:36:29,560 --> 00:36:32,040
Speaker 2: app that had done observations. I think that's in the picture,

743
00:36:32,600 --> 00:36:35,600
Speaker 2: but it was a difficult location where it was, so

744
00:36:35,640 --> 00:36:38,200
Speaker 2: it's going to have to be hands on. And I

745
00:36:38,280 --> 00:36:40,800
Speaker 2: know it's silly, but after so many years as a

746
00:36:40,840 --> 00:36:43,480
Speaker 2: bomb tick sometimes I can pretty well pick what we're

747
00:36:43,520 --> 00:36:45,280
Speaker 2: going to deal with and what it actually is before

748
00:36:45,280 --> 00:36:49,040
Speaker 2: I even see it. And it was I know that

749
00:36:49,120 --> 00:36:53,160
Speaker 2: job was a geotag. So people was a container and

750
00:36:53,320 --> 00:36:56,960
Speaker 2: inside the container has a piece of paper and it

751
00:36:57,000 --> 00:36:59,839
Speaker 2: has a pin in it, and people have got there

752
00:37:00,160 --> 00:37:02,480
Speaker 2: a website. You're going to find these where these things

753
00:37:02,520 --> 00:37:05,360
Speaker 2: are hidden throughout the city, and we've done a number

754
00:37:05,360 --> 00:37:07,920
Speaker 2: of them, so we don't take them for granted. But

755
00:37:09,160 --> 00:37:11,560
Speaker 2: I think this will be a goo tag or something

756
00:37:11,640 --> 00:37:14,839
Speaker 2: like that, and have a look. Yeah, yeah, I might

757
00:37:15,000 --> 00:37:18,320
Speaker 2: use a manual means of removing it, but every meter matters.

758
00:37:18,520 --> 00:37:20,560
Speaker 2: I won't be pulling it out with my hands. I'll

759
00:37:20,560 --> 00:37:22,960
Speaker 2: attach something to it and pull it out from the distance.

760
00:37:23,000 --> 00:37:25,239
Speaker 2: So it's going through your minds. You know, there's no

761
00:37:25,320 --> 00:37:27,239
Speaker 2: time to think about fun or aing like that. You're

762
00:37:27,280 --> 00:37:30,120
Speaker 2: focusing on what you're doing, and surely I'm focusing that

763
00:37:30,160 --> 00:37:32,040
Speaker 2: the media. You're a filming this too. Now it's not

764
00:37:32,040 --> 00:37:33,839
Speaker 2: a good time to trip over my feet and land

765
00:37:33,920 --> 00:37:37,520
Speaker 2: like a turtle on the back, because that's the shot.

766
00:37:38,440 --> 00:37:42,440
Speaker 1: Like you're laughing, but in I could only imagine how

767
00:37:42,560 --> 00:37:45,640
Speaker 1: uncomfortable that suit would be. And what forty kilos were.

768
00:37:45,600 --> 00:37:48,319
Speaker 2: Yeah, forty kilos were sweats dripping down the back of

769
00:37:48,360 --> 00:37:52,239
Speaker 2: your you just your T shirt and your uniform. It's

770
00:37:52,320 --> 00:37:54,600
Speaker 2: just ringing wet and normally carry a spare one and

771
00:37:54,719 --> 00:37:57,319
Speaker 2: just get changed after a job because you drop on

772
00:37:57,360 --> 00:37:59,200
Speaker 2: the grounds, just like a wet pile on the ground,

773
00:37:59,280 --> 00:38:02,280
Speaker 2: se you lose a few kilos, probably just a fluid.

774
00:38:02,440 --> 00:38:04,400
Speaker 2: You know, it's very hot in those days.

775
00:38:04,840 --> 00:38:08,320
Speaker 1: What's is there a job that you've got to that

776
00:38:08,600 --> 00:38:12,120
Speaker 1: really schedule what you're at the you're thinking, okay, this

777
00:38:12,200 --> 00:38:14,600
Speaker 1: is this is where all the training everything needs to

778
00:38:14,680 --> 00:38:19,680
Speaker 1: kick in. You have to be your sharpest that okay,

779
00:38:19,719 --> 00:38:21,240
Speaker 1: this is a difficult one.

780
00:38:21,320 --> 00:38:23,920
Speaker 2: Probably I think Gary Allen more than anything that was

781
00:38:23,960 --> 00:38:26,720
Speaker 2: a thing more scared for other people. The boys would

782
00:38:27,719 --> 00:38:30,040
Speaker 2: to a particular zone area clear it and then they

783
00:38:30,040 --> 00:38:31,960
Speaker 2: come back and say they come back with a photo

784
00:38:32,239 --> 00:38:33,640
Speaker 2: and say this is what we found. And it was

785
00:38:33,680 --> 00:38:37,120
Speaker 2: an ied had an arming switch and everything attached to it.

786
00:38:37,600 --> 00:38:40,520
Speaker 2: And I said, we have defenders deceased. We not looked

787
00:38:40,520 --> 00:38:42,799
Speaker 2: for any other offenders. We don't need that evidence. Just

788
00:38:43,160 --> 00:38:46,239
Speaker 2: don't touch it, just destroy it where it is. You know,

789
00:38:47,000 --> 00:38:49,720
Speaker 2: it was probably that kind of operation that they're turning

790
00:38:49,760 --> 00:38:52,480
Speaker 2: over at the end. After three weeks. We had a

791
00:38:52,480 --> 00:38:54,560
Speaker 2: pile of timber, we had a pile of metal, we

792
00:38:54,600 --> 00:38:57,080
Speaker 2: had a pile of clothing. We're going through clothing and

793
00:38:57,120 --> 00:39:01,200
Speaker 2: find sticks of powergell like explosies in coats and pockets

794
00:39:01,200 --> 00:39:04,400
Speaker 2: and things like that. It's not just rummaging through. Everything

795
00:39:04,520 --> 00:39:05,440
Speaker 2: had to be checked.

796
00:39:06,280 --> 00:39:09,319
Speaker 1: The threat. The threat was everywhere everywhere you look.

797
00:39:09,480 --> 00:39:12,520
Speaker 2: Everywhere you looked out. Once he parked his car in

798
00:39:12,600 --> 00:39:15,400
Speaker 2: the drive in the garage and he actually parked the

799
00:39:15,400 --> 00:39:18,799
Speaker 2: front passenger wheel on one of the devices and like

800
00:39:18,840 --> 00:39:21,000
Speaker 2: that blew the car onto its roof. So he had

801
00:39:21,040 --> 00:39:24,359
Speaker 2: everything planned out. And when we rolled that car back over,

802
00:39:24,440 --> 00:39:26,719
Speaker 2: we found another twenty detonators just laying on the ground

803
00:39:26,760 --> 00:39:28,520
Speaker 2: that come out of the car. You know, and like

804
00:39:28,719 --> 00:39:30,680
Speaker 2: as I said, you stand on a detonator, you will

805
00:39:30,680 --> 00:39:32,560
Speaker 2: lose half foot, simple as that.

806
00:39:32,920 --> 00:39:36,799
Speaker 1: With the bomb suit, what saw the protection does that

807
00:39:36,920 --> 00:39:40,400
Speaker 1: give you? Like I've seen guys put them on, and

808
00:39:40,800 --> 00:39:43,520
Speaker 1: you know, you say you pull your hands in, I'm looking, Okay,

809
00:39:43,560 --> 00:39:46,319
Speaker 1: that's covered, that's covered. They lose their feet, they lose

810
00:39:46,360 --> 00:39:50,440
Speaker 1: their hands, Like, what sort of protection is it that

811
00:39:50,600 --> 00:39:51,080
Speaker 1: provides you.

812
00:39:51,440 --> 00:39:54,480
Speaker 2: The heat, shock and basically fragmentation when you look at

813
00:39:54,520 --> 00:39:58,200
Speaker 2: the heat from the blast, the shock wave and basically

814
00:39:58,360 --> 00:40:01,400
Speaker 2: fragmentation that comes with it. But when we said before,

815
00:40:01,440 --> 00:40:04,000
Speaker 2: every meter matters. If I'm going to be another met

816
00:40:04,160 --> 00:40:08,040
Speaker 2: back back, back back, the risk becomes less, But it

817
00:40:08,160 --> 00:40:10,960
Speaker 2: depends on the size of the device. I think. Now

818
00:40:10,960 --> 00:40:12,960
Speaker 2: I've got photos of a guy in the Philippines that

819
00:40:13,080 --> 00:40:16,120
Speaker 2: was wearing a bomb suit and all it basically did

820
00:40:16,280 --> 00:40:20,080
Speaker 2: is keep body parts together a tour pieces. Basically, when we.

821
00:40:20,120 --> 00:40:22,920
Speaker 1: Come down to it, you've explained why you applied. Do

822
00:40:22,960 --> 00:40:26,239
Speaker 1: you have an abundance of applicants for this type of

823
00:40:26,320 --> 00:40:26,879
Speaker 1: type of work.

824
00:40:26,960 --> 00:40:28,719
Speaker 2: Yeah, we have quite a few that apply for it.

825
00:40:28,760 --> 00:40:32,360
Speaker 2: Normally you get about twenty five might advertise every three years.

826
00:40:32,440 --> 00:40:36,680
Speaker 2: You know, our staff stayed for some time to become

827
00:40:36,800 --> 00:40:39,279
Speaker 2: proficient and takes you two or three years. You know,

828
00:40:39,800 --> 00:40:42,120
Speaker 2: we had some new bomb techs on the duran Ellum

829
00:40:42,120 --> 00:40:44,840
Speaker 2: and that was like two years of work for that

830
00:40:44,960 --> 00:40:47,160
Speaker 2: three weeks. You know, they learn a lot they just

831
00:40:48,239 --> 00:40:50,920
Speaker 2: which is great experience. So we get a lot of applicants,

832
00:40:51,400 --> 00:40:56,560
Speaker 2: some old SG mentality. You know, I hear reputations and

833
00:40:56,560 --> 00:40:58,319
Speaker 2: stuff like that. Are they in for the right reason

834
00:40:58,440 --> 00:41:01,760
Speaker 2: or reason? They do a big evaluation.

835
00:41:02,400 --> 00:41:04,080
Speaker 1: Like a psychometric test.

836
00:41:04,160 --> 00:41:08,160
Speaker 2: Yeah, and basically spoken to and we look at that

837
00:41:08,280 --> 00:41:11,840
Speaker 2: very carefully. The group is getting bigger than the AU,

838
00:41:12,040 --> 00:41:13,640
Speaker 2: but you want to make sure you've got people that

839
00:41:13,719 --> 00:41:16,880
Speaker 2: are going to working with the family, with your family

840
00:41:16,920 --> 00:41:19,040
Speaker 2: that you don't want someone that's going to upset everybody.

841
00:41:19,200 --> 00:41:22,800
Speaker 2: You know, you can't have a square peg in a

842
00:41:22,880 --> 00:41:25,400
Speaker 2: round a hole or something like that. So personalities are

843
00:41:25,440 --> 00:41:26,080
Speaker 2: really important.

844
00:41:26,280 --> 00:41:29,960
Speaker 1: There's always workplace conflict in any group that operates in

845
00:41:30,000 --> 00:41:32,719
Speaker 1: pressure situations, but I would imagine that's the last thing

846
00:41:32,760 --> 00:41:36,040
Speaker 1: you need in the bomb response group. But internal dramas

847
00:41:36,080 --> 00:41:37,200
Speaker 1: and different.

848
00:41:36,880 --> 00:41:39,479
Speaker 2: Things, well, we do three days of assessments. It goes

849
00:41:39,480 --> 00:41:42,920
Speaker 2: for three days, and you know, we'd like to do

850
00:41:42,960 --> 00:41:45,840
Speaker 2: it into overtime period, but that's a problem with budget.

851
00:41:45,960 --> 00:41:48,719
Speaker 2: Wouldn't be allowed when people get tight. You know, when

852
00:41:48,760 --> 00:41:51,680
Speaker 2: I did the Frankston shooting, two bomb jobs and one

853
00:41:51,680 --> 00:41:54,399
Speaker 2: shooting in one night. That's what it's all about. But

854
00:41:54,960 --> 00:41:58,840
Speaker 2: at the end of those three days, whoever's remaining there, Okay,

855
00:41:59,160 --> 00:42:01,960
Speaker 2: I'd ask them who you would like to work with

856
00:42:02,320 --> 00:42:05,080
Speaker 2: from one to twenty. I'll put people in a list,

857
00:42:05,600 --> 00:42:09,200
Speaker 2: and at times we're being happy with someone and we

858
00:42:09,360 --> 00:42:11,640
Speaker 2: suddenly look at all these lists and their names down

859
00:42:11,680 --> 00:42:15,520
Speaker 2: the bottom, and they're playing the game and they've been

860
00:42:15,520 --> 00:42:18,120
Speaker 2: doing things that we haven't seen. And that's where I

861
00:42:18,160 --> 00:42:20,960
Speaker 2: might decide to do another evaluation and find out what's

862
00:42:20,960 --> 00:42:24,120
Speaker 2: going on here because other people aren't happy with this person.

863
00:42:24,480 --> 00:42:27,239
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's interesting, isn't it. Like they can put on

864
00:42:27,280 --> 00:42:30,359
Speaker 1: the facade in that they know what you guys are

865
00:42:30,360 --> 00:42:32,960
Speaker 1: looking for or assume, but they get caught out when

866
00:42:33,040 --> 00:42:38,120
Speaker 1: the other members identified because I would imagine you said

867
00:42:38,160 --> 00:42:40,719
Speaker 1: with over time and you can't put them through that.

868
00:42:41,560 --> 00:42:43,960
Speaker 1: You want to see how they react when they're tired

869
00:42:44,000 --> 00:42:46,719
Speaker 1: and under pressure, because I know in policing sometimes you

870
00:42:46,800 --> 00:42:50,520
Speaker 1: go in twenty four hours straight or longer, and it

871
00:42:50,640 --> 00:42:53,800
Speaker 1: amazes me. Some people that are the good operators literally

872
00:42:53,840 --> 00:42:57,360
Speaker 1: fall apart where they go past bedtime and they can't function.

873
00:42:57,880 --> 00:43:01,960
Speaker 2: Well. We had one guy couldn't function without too you know,

874
00:43:02,160 --> 00:43:04,160
Speaker 2: like I can go about to for twenty four hours,

875
00:43:04,200 --> 00:43:06,919
Speaker 2: I don't care, but yeah, he's going to be fed

876
00:43:06,960 --> 00:43:07,920
Speaker 2: every hour or so.

877
00:43:08,280 --> 00:43:10,839
Speaker 1: John, You've just sit on a bugbear of mine doing

878
00:43:10,880 --> 00:43:13,400
Speaker 1: an early morning raid or an operation or something that

879
00:43:13,480 --> 00:43:16,640
Speaker 1: is based on time, and someone I need my coffee

880
00:43:17,080 --> 00:43:21,880
Speaker 1: and fuck your coffee. Why are we waiting? I just

881
00:43:21,920 --> 00:43:24,359
Speaker 1: had to get a coffee or something like that. But

882
00:43:25,640 --> 00:43:28,440
Speaker 1: it's interesting and interesting field. No, I would imagine what

883
00:43:28,840 --> 00:43:32,360
Speaker 1: sort of satisfaction do you get from it, like going

884
00:43:32,400 --> 00:43:34,640
Speaker 1: in and doing the job. Is there a satisfaction you

885
00:43:34,680 --> 00:43:35,160
Speaker 1: get or.

886
00:43:35,680 --> 00:43:37,200
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think it's a reward at the end if

887
00:43:37,239 --> 00:43:40,160
Speaker 2: everything goes well, the equipment all works, you know where

888
00:43:40,160 --> 00:43:43,200
Speaker 2: you have so much electronic equipment now and you sometimes

889
00:43:43,239 --> 00:43:45,759
Speaker 2: can get interference and things like that. Very much with

890
00:43:45,920 --> 00:43:47,759
Speaker 2: bomb side of it, you do have to have a

891
00:43:47,800 --> 00:43:52,319
Speaker 2: plan A, B and C, you know, and A doesn't work,

892
00:43:52,360 --> 00:43:54,560
Speaker 2: do you go to B. But you do get a

893
00:43:54,600 --> 00:43:57,400
Speaker 2: satisfaction if you've done a good job. Everything's worked, everybody's

894
00:43:57,440 --> 00:44:00,920
Speaker 2: gone on well, and yeah, no issues. You know, equipment

895
00:44:01,000 --> 00:44:02,719
Speaker 2: was always a bit of an issue. There's always some

896
00:44:02,840 --> 00:44:07,160
Speaker 2: kind of technical problem that and we improvise. We've become

897
00:44:07,239 --> 00:44:08,440
Speaker 2: quite good at it. Actually.

898
00:44:08,840 --> 00:44:11,000
Speaker 1: Is there a lot of liaison with all the other

899
00:44:11,040 --> 00:44:14,239
Speaker 1: police forces in the country and military that you'll keep

900
00:44:14,560 --> 00:44:16,560
Speaker 1: in contact so you're all on the same page.

901
00:44:16,760 --> 00:44:19,479
Speaker 2: Yeah, if there's military ordinance, we basically get the army

902
00:44:19,520 --> 00:44:21,640
Speaker 2: to deal with it. So if we come across something

903
00:44:21,719 --> 00:44:24,480
Speaker 2: and there was a job last week, I know the

904
00:44:24,560 --> 00:44:28,000
Speaker 2: boys the army surned up. They've had military ordinance and

905
00:44:28,040 --> 00:44:29,560
Speaker 2: then they saw a couple of pipe bombs, so they

906
00:44:29,560 --> 00:44:32,160
Speaker 2: said that's for the bomb response unit to deal with.

907
00:44:32,280 --> 00:44:35,360
Speaker 2: So it sort of it goes from there. So we

908
00:44:35,440 --> 00:44:37,440
Speaker 2: have a lot of the liaison. We work well together,

909
00:44:37,600 --> 00:44:40,960
Speaker 2: always have good Yeah, it's always good. You always want

910
00:44:40,960 --> 00:44:43,640
Speaker 2: that expertise. I've done jobs where grenades have been involved

911
00:44:44,000 --> 00:44:46,799
Speaker 2: and that's military ordinance. We might be searching them for

912
00:44:46,840 --> 00:44:49,400
Speaker 2: a warrant, but I'll have the military there with us

913
00:44:49,440 --> 00:44:51,320
Speaker 2: to say this is the way you should handle it,

914
00:44:51,400 --> 00:44:52,799
Speaker 2: and I'm quite happy to listen to that.

915
00:44:55,120 --> 00:44:58,240
Speaker 1: You're downtime, like what thirty four years in the police

916
00:44:58,840 --> 00:45:02,400
Speaker 1: pretty much? Yeah, thirty two of those years in the

917
00:45:02,520 --> 00:45:05,480
Speaker 1: s og or bomb response. You know, what do you

918
00:45:05,480 --> 00:45:07,640
Speaker 1: do for your downtime? And this is a loaded question

919
00:45:07,680 --> 00:45:09,759
Speaker 1: because I know what you do, and I think people

920
00:45:09,800 --> 00:45:10,080
Speaker 1: are just.

921
00:45:10,040 --> 00:45:13,040
Speaker 2: Going to go, what the hell, Well, basic things. I

922
00:45:13,120 --> 00:45:15,120
Speaker 2: like exercising and do a lot of cycling. Used to

923
00:45:15,160 --> 00:45:16,520
Speaker 2: do a lot of running before I had two new

924
00:45:16,600 --> 00:45:20,560
Speaker 2: needs put in. Then I like other challenges. I've climbed

925
00:45:20,680 --> 00:45:24,560
Speaker 2: quite a few mounts with Greg Lincell and a guy

926
00:45:24,640 --> 00:45:29,040
Speaker 2: called Paul Carr, who were both in the sog Okay

927
00:45:29,120 --> 00:45:33,160
Speaker 2: good friends because I had this passion that they basically

928
00:45:33,280 --> 00:45:35,360
Speaker 2: took me along and taught me how to climb, and

929
00:45:35,400 --> 00:45:38,759
Speaker 2: then we got into mountaineering. So and I like a

930
00:45:38,840 --> 00:45:42,120
Speaker 2: challenge basically in Greg Keith, Greg Linz, I keeps on

931
00:45:42,160 --> 00:45:44,360
Speaker 2: coming up with stupid ideas. I'll blame it on In,

932
00:45:44,480 --> 00:45:45,919
Speaker 2: but we're as bad as each other.

933
00:45:46,000 --> 00:45:50,520
Speaker 1: So we've like you climbed Everest. Now people, yeah, it's

934
00:45:50,520 --> 00:45:53,560
Speaker 1: a true crime podcast, but I'm just fascinated by the

935
00:45:53,640 --> 00:45:57,239
Speaker 1: mentality and the drive to achieve that, like very few

936
00:45:57,280 --> 00:46:00,439
Speaker 1: people do it, and there's a home mortality, the rate

937
00:46:00,480 --> 00:46:03,080
Speaker 1: of people that try talk us through that experience of

938
00:46:03,120 --> 00:46:06,680
Speaker 1: what drove you before I do. I should just clarify

939
00:46:06,719 --> 00:46:09,799
Speaker 1: it's just another aspect of your police And we haven't

940
00:46:09,880 --> 00:46:15,200
Speaker 1: talked about a lot of repelling. You were very efficient

941
00:46:15,239 --> 00:46:16,880
Speaker 1: in that and we're training a lot of people in

942
00:46:17,320 --> 00:46:19,320
Speaker 1: repelling down the side of the building.

943
00:46:19,440 --> 00:46:23,040
Speaker 2: Yeah, with Paul Greg. Paul Greg were very much into

944
00:46:23,080 --> 00:46:25,120
Speaker 2: climbing all that. When I did the SOG course that

945
00:46:25,200 --> 00:46:27,319
Speaker 2: week at a mount of Rapilis, I just loved the

946
00:46:27,320 --> 00:46:29,440
Speaker 2: best week of the course. Can get the smile off

947
00:46:29,480 --> 00:46:32,759
Speaker 2: my face. Then when I got into the unit, into

948
00:46:32,800 --> 00:46:34,799
Speaker 2: the group, we go away for weekends up to Aunt

949
00:46:34,800 --> 00:46:36,920
Speaker 2: of Rapilids, even with our families and things like that,

950
00:46:37,000 --> 00:46:40,760
Speaker 2: do rock climbing. And then we started improvising you ways

951
00:46:40,760 --> 00:46:43,880
Speaker 2: to do urban climbing, climb buildings, you know. I became

952
00:46:44,000 --> 00:46:48,080
Speaker 2: a senior instructor in the end for rock and urban climbing,

953
00:46:48,280 --> 00:46:51,960
Speaker 2: AB sailing fast raping, which is from a helicopter you

954
00:46:52,280 --> 00:46:55,120
Speaker 2: drop a rope out thirty meters long about forty millimeters

955
00:46:55,120 --> 00:46:58,360
Speaker 2: into light diameter and just slide down it. And we

956
00:46:58,440 --> 00:47:01,520
Speaker 2: came up with that procedure and sort of went from there.

957
00:47:02,160 --> 00:47:06,040
Speaker 2: And then basically he's sort of ever a bit SOG motivated.

958
00:47:06,239 --> 00:47:09,799
Speaker 2: Is that Paul Carr was training for it. I won't

959
00:47:09,800 --> 00:47:12,640
Speaker 2: go into full story, but on the fourteenth of May

960
00:47:13,280 --> 00:47:16,839
Speaker 2: he suffered a coronary inclusion on a mountain called Chao Yu,

961
00:47:16,920 --> 00:47:19,200
Speaker 2: which is basically in China, to bet so he had

962
00:47:19,239 --> 00:47:21,560
Speaker 2: a massive heart attack as a result of that. That

963
00:47:21,719 --> 00:47:24,319
Speaker 2: was in the plan to do Everest. Greg and I

964
00:47:24,400 --> 00:47:27,720
Speaker 2: were ready to do Everest with this at that particular period,

965
00:47:28,040 --> 00:47:29,680
Speaker 2: so we didn't go to Chao Yu. He went with

966
00:47:29,760 --> 00:47:32,799
Speaker 2: three other people as a result of that. Probably as

967
00:47:32,800 --> 00:47:34,880
Speaker 2: a police officer, the worst thing you've have to do,

968
00:47:35,000 --> 00:47:37,960
Speaker 2: as you know, would be a death notification knocking on

969
00:47:38,000 --> 00:47:40,680
Speaker 2: someone's store. And I've been in the police force a

970
00:47:40,760 --> 00:47:44,400
Speaker 2: number of years now and known Paul for probably fourteen

971
00:47:44,480 --> 00:47:47,480
Speaker 2: fifteen years. We've been away with his first wife and

972
00:47:47,600 --> 00:47:50,920
Speaker 2: kids Misco absently, and we're really good friends with the

973
00:47:51,200 --> 00:47:54,960
Speaker 2: second wife, and basically both ex and current wife were

974
00:47:54,960 --> 00:47:59,240
Speaker 2: good because they had children involved. Was quite a happy family.

975
00:47:59,760 --> 00:48:02,799
Speaker 2: So my first death message was knocking on Julie, his

976
00:48:02,840 --> 00:48:06,279
Speaker 2: current wife's door, and informing her with another guy of

977
00:48:06,360 --> 00:48:09,719
Speaker 2: his death, and then having to go to his ex

978
00:48:09,760 --> 00:48:12,960
Speaker 2: wife and go and tell her, and then go to

979
00:48:13,000 --> 00:48:15,920
Speaker 2: the school with Julie with Liz to tell the kids

980
00:48:15,960 --> 00:48:18,000
Speaker 2: that what had happened. And we had to do this

981
00:48:18,040 --> 00:48:20,640
Speaker 2: because Paul was in charge of the Special Operations Group

982
00:48:20,640 --> 00:48:22,600
Speaker 2: at the time and we had to get it out

983
00:48:22,600 --> 00:48:25,080
Speaker 2: there before the media got it. Out before it was known,

984
00:48:25,640 --> 00:48:29,319
Speaker 2: and so yeah, terrible period. And he was sort of

985
00:48:29,680 --> 00:48:32,960
Speaker 2: planning to raise the money for the Makerwish Foundation, and

986
00:48:33,719 --> 00:48:35,239
Speaker 2: he was sharing a tent with a guy called Nick

987
00:48:35,280 --> 00:48:38,799
Speaker 2: Farr who was a police officer. So once we Greg

988
00:48:38,840 --> 00:48:40,920
Speaker 2: and I went over to Paul, we helped the logistics

989
00:48:40,920 --> 00:48:45,080
Speaker 2: of bringing Paul back and the other climbers. So basically

990
00:48:45,160 --> 00:48:48,719
Speaker 2: a guy called Kaye C. Mcdan, he did the highest

991
00:48:49,080 --> 00:48:52,440
Speaker 2: helicopter rescue on Everes a number of years inter Thinney

992
00:48:52,600 --> 00:48:55,319
Speaker 2: John Cracker if you ever read that book. Anyway, he

993
00:48:55,400 --> 00:48:58,440
Speaker 2: flew with the mission a China, gave permission for Nepoli's

994
00:48:58,440 --> 00:49:00,640
Speaker 2: helicopter to go in, brought the timber is out the

995
00:49:00,640 --> 00:49:03,520
Speaker 2: next day that went back Paul's body being brought down

996
00:49:03,600 --> 00:49:06,600
Speaker 2: to a reasonable altitude and his body was walked back

997
00:49:06,640 --> 00:49:09,239
Speaker 2: to Nepal. We arrived the same day and we did

998
00:49:09,280 --> 00:49:12,200
Speaker 2: a week of logistics of everything having to be done

999
00:49:12,320 --> 00:49:14,719
Speaker 2: to keep bringing back to his family. And so we

1000
00:49:14,800 --> 00:49:16,840
Speaker 2: let it sit for about a year. But it was

1001
00:49:16,840 --> 00:49:19,960
Speaker 2: like a bit of an sog thing. Sog sort of

1002
00:49:19,960 --> 00:49:22,080
Speaker 2: started it. Greg and I wanted to climb every don't

1003
00:49:22,080 --> 00:49:24,919
Speaker 2: get us wrong there, So we continued the journey and

1004
00:49:25,080 --> 00:49:28,680
Speaker 2: basically a documentary is done Unfinished Business by a person

1005
00:49:28,719 --> 00:49:31,759
Speaker 2: called Jennifer Adams who came with us. It was a

1006
00:49:31,800 --> 00:49:35,000
Speaker 2: great experience to go and do it. Thoroughly enjoyed it.

1007
00:49:35,120 --> 00:49:37,960
Speaker 2: We're doing for a number of reasons, for ourselves, for

1008
00:49:38,560 --> 00:49:42,600
Speaker 2: Paul's family, for the group definitely, we just wanted to finish,

1009
00:49:42,680 --> 00:49:45,120
Speaker 2: and for the Makers Foundation. We raised I think something

1010
00:49:45,120 --> 00:49:47,320
Speaker 2: like nearly two hundred thousand dollars in the end.

1011
00:49:47,960 --> 00:49:52,279
Speaker 1: Amazing what drives you, But it's not something that you

1012
00:49:52,400 --> 00:49:54,880
Speaker 1: wake up and say, this is what I've got to do.

1013
00:49:54,960 --> 00:49:58,319
Speaker 1: The training, the preparation, the risk assessment, the whole thing,

1014
00:49:58,400 --> 00:50:02,200
Speaker 1: the time in, costs, every think come into play. Like

1015
00:50:02,600 --> 00:50:05,719
Speaker 1: I'm just fascinated. I'm just curious about it. Where you

1016
00:50:05,800 --> 00:50:08,719
Speaker 1: hear people, you know, we're four hundred meters from but

1017
00:50:08,800 --> 00:50:11,759
Speaker 1: we had to turn around and couldn't make that four

1018
00:50:11,840 --> 00:50:14,560
Speaker 1: hundred movers that type of thing. It's life on the

1019
00:50:14,680 --> 00:50:19,080
Speaker 1: edge because you're in that zone they call the death zone.

1020
00:50:19,520 --> 00:50:21,680
Speaker 1: What does it feel like when you actually stood on

1021
00:50:21,960 --> 00:50:23,440
Speaker 1: the top of Everest.

1022
00:50:23,200 --> 00:50:26,040
Speaker 2: Just released that I'd made it, But I haven't really

1023
00:50:26,080 --> 00:50:28,120
Speaker 2: made it till you actually get back down. But I

1024
00:50:28,200 --> 00:50:29,799
Speaker 2: always want to look at the curvature of the earth.

1025
00:50:29,800 --> 00:50:32,160
Speaker 2: I always heard that you could actually see the curvature

1026
00:50:32,160 --> 00:50:34,480
Speaker 2: of the earth standing up there, you can. Yeah, it

1027
00:50:34,640 --> 00:50:38,400
Speaker 2: was blowing a gale and like I've got footage in

1028
00:50:38,400 --> 00:50:42,080
Speaker 2: the documentary that Jen made, the shows the camera icing up.

1029
00:50:42,480 --> 00:50:45,160
Speaker 2: You know, that's how cold it is, but surreal to

1030
00:50:45,239 --> 00:50:49,080
Speaker 2: be looking at it. And I had my Shirka with me, Pemma,

1031
00:50:49,280 --> 00:50:52,239
Speaker 2: and we just shared that moment together. Nepalese people just

1032
00:50:52,280 --> 00:50:55,120
Speaker 2: love them. It just fantastic, hard working and you know

1033
00:50:55,160 --> 00:50:58,719
Speaker 2: what they had, they just appreciate. Just beautiful people. To

1034
00:50:58,800 --> 00:51:01,800
Speaker 2: share that moment, and then for Greg Nick and myself

1035
00:51:01,800 --> 00:51:03,520
Speaker 2: to be on the mountain at the same time as

1036
00:51:03,520 --> 00:51:06,040
Speaker 2: a team, it was fantastic. Although we didn't get a

1037
00:51:06,040 --> 00:51:07,799
Speaker 2: photo of all three of us together because someone had

1038
00:51:07,800 --> 00:51:11,279
Speaker 2: to take the photo, but you know, it was it

1039
00:51:11,320 --> 00:51:15,720
Speaker 2: was good and we Greg had been given a book

1040
00:51:16,440 --> 00:51:19,560
Speaker 2: by Paul's daughters to lead up on the top of Everest,

1041
00:51:19,640 --> 00:51:22,120
Speaker 2: little book with poems and stuff like that, and he'd

1042
00:51:22,160 --> 00:51:26,720
Speaker 2: been given also a ribbon that Paul's parents had given

1043
00:51:26,760 --> 00:51:28,440
Speaker 2: to us to leave on the top of the mountain,

1044
00:51:28,440 --> 00:51:30,400
Speaker 2: which we did, you know, and we took photos of

1045
00:51:30,440 --> 00:51:32,919
Speaker 2: that and all that kind of stuff. And the hard

1046
00:51:32,960 --> 00:51:35,200
Speaker 2: part now was getting down. Most people die going down

1047
00:51:35,239 --> 00:51:38,680
Speaker 2: the coming up. Heard that, Yeah, it's like walking up

1048
00:51:38,680 --> 00:51:40,520
Speaker 2: a flight of stairs. If you're walking up flight of

1049
00:51:40,560 --> 00:51:42,439
Speaker 2: stairs and you fall, you can put your hands out

1050
00:51:42,440 --> 00:51:44,560
Speaker 2: and just arrest. But if you're walking down a flight

1051
00:51:44,680 --> 00:51:47,200
Speaker 2: of stairs, you know, not connected to the safety line.

1052
00:51:47,280 --> 00:51:52,080
Speaker 1: Yeah, when you're downtime between diffusing bombs, arresting high risk

1053
00:51:52,120 --> 00:51:55,200
Speaker 1: of fenders, climbing Mount Everest, you also paddle a kayak

1054
00:51:55,239 --> 00:51:58,120
Speaker 1: across the bast strait. Yeah.

1055
00:51:58,160 --> 00:52:03,200
Speaker 2: It was two thousand fourteen, Greg, and I was saying, Oh,

1056
00:52:03,200 --> 00:52:05,160
Speaker 2: we need to do something, and I'll play.

1057
00:52:05,239 --> 00:52:07,239
Speaker 1: I agree. You guys have got to live and up

1058
00:52:07,239 --> 00:52:08,839
Speaker 1: a little bit, do something with your lives.

1059
00:52:09,239 --> 00:52:11,000
Speaker 2: And I'm telling him about this girl down the road

1060
00:52:11,040 --> 00:52:14,000
Speaker 2: that actually paddled from Tasmania to Victoria with her brother

1061
00:52:14,080 --> 00:52:16,200
Speaker 2: and another group of people. And I said, you know,

1062
00:52:16,719 --> 00:52:20,760
Speaker 2: I'd done a bit of kayaking called Mark Weather Challenges.

1063
00:52:20,800 --> 00:52:23,279
Speaker 2: I know Mark Webber, the f one guy, and he

1064
00:52:23,360 --> 00:52:25,239
Speaker 2: did a couple of charity things. I was fortunate enough

1065
00:52:25,280 --> 00:52:27,240
Speaker 2: to be involved in those and did a bit of kayaking,

1066
00:52:28,040 --> 00:52:30,480
Speaker 2: and so I thought, yeah, we can do this one

1067
00:52:30,520 --> 00:52:34,319
Speaker 2: and need four months training, look fine, and first thing

1068
00:52:34,480 --> 00:52:36,160
Speaker 2: is going to find a kayak and all that kind

1069
00:52:36,200 --> 00:52:38,880
Speaker 2: of stuff. And I sort of went from there. So Greg,

1070
00:52:38,920 --> 00:52:41,759
Speaker 2: myself and three other police officers. You know, we had

1071
00:52:41,760 --> 00:52:44,399
Speaker 2: a few personalities on that trip. We didn't kill each

1072
00:52:44,400 --> 00:52:46,800
Speaker 2: other any like that, but it was it was interesting,

1073
00:52:46,840 --> 00:52:50,600
Speaker 2: and I'll tell the story a week about a month beforehand,

1074
00:52:50,680 --> 00:52:52,640
Speaker 2: I wanted to do the first League, you know, just

1075
00:52:52,680 --> 00:52:55,560
Speaker 2: by myself as a copper, prepared and all that. I

1076
00:52:55,600 --> 00:52:58,040
Speaker 2: had all the water, all the fuel, all the food

1077
00:52:58,040 --> 00:53:00,120
Speaker 2: as if I was going to go to Tasy. So

1078
00:53:00,160 --> 00:53:02,200
Speaker 2: I left from a place called Port welsh Ball to

1079
00:53:02,360 --> 00:53:05,880
Speaker 2: refuge Cove, which is Wilson's Prime, so still the mainland.

1080
00:53:06,480 --> 00:53:08,920
Speaker 2: Forty two k's did that. I was coming back the

1081
00:53:08,920 --> 00:53:10,880
Speaker 2: next day, told Jan only way for a couple of

1082
00:53:10,920 --> 00:53:14,080
Speaker 2: days anyway coming back, and I was leaving, thought, oh Jesus,

1083
00:53:14,120 --> 00:53:16,799
Speaker 2: waves are up a bit today in Bastraight soon enough,

1084
00:53:16,840 --> 00:53:19,040
Speaker 2: about twenty k's into it, hit by a rogue wave

1085
00:53:19,680 --> 00:53:21,600
Speaker 2: and ended up in the I had to detach from

1086
00:53:21,600 --> 00:53:24,440
Speaker 2: the kayak. I had a leg rape on and detached

1087
00:53:24,480 --> 00:53:26,400
Speaker 2: and ended up on a beach, on a bit of

1088
00:53:26,400 --> 00:53:29,040
Speaker 2: a sandy beach, and I was stuck there for five days.

1089
00:53:30,800 --> 00:53:32,480
Speaker 2: I managed to get to manage the message to Jan

1090
00:53:32,600 --> 00:53:33,759
Speaker 2: and I might be a few days later.

1091
00:53:33,840 --> 00:53:38,200
Speaker 1: Life full of Adventure. There's another aspect of your life

1092
00:53:38,239 --> 00:53:41,640
Speaker 1: and it was in the in the ford of your book.

1093
00:53:41,719 --> 00:53:44,560
Speaker 1: That's running boot camp for one of a better word

1094
00:53:44,640 --> 00:53:50,000
Speaker 1: with elite athletes. And Craig Bellamy did the ford in

1095
00:53:50,040 --> 00:53:52,560
Speaker 1: your book because that's with the Melbourne Storm. Like this

1096
00:53:52,640 --> 00:53:55,840
Speaker 1: is where I'm Sydney base. We all understand Melbourne Storm

1097
00:53:55,840 --> 00:53:58,000
Speaker 1: and they have a reputation of being the go to

1098
00:53:58,200 --> 00:54:00,760
Speaker 1: club in the way of the culture that they creating

1099
00:54:00,800 --> 00:54:04,759
Speaker 1: the club. And you were heavily involved in the sort

1100
00:54:04,760 --> 00:54:07,360
Speaker 1: of preseason training camps and that what was that all about.

1101
00:54:07,560 --> 00:54:10,000
Speaker 2: We've been doing Melbourn Stone for about twenty three years, myself,

1102
00:54:10,640 --> 00:54:14,320
Speaker 2: Craig Walsh, Andrew mctrustee and another person who's still working

1103
00:54:14,320 --> 00:54:18,480
Speaker 2: son his day. Originally we did the Western Bulldogs. It's

1104
00:54:18,480 --> 00:54:22,560
Speaker 2: an AFL side under Christine Nixon, our chief commissioner. Basically,

1105
00:54:22,600 --> 00:54:24,760
Speaker 2: if we could help the Western Bulldogs do a boot camp,

1106
00:54:25,160 --> 00:54:28,080
Speaker 2: Bulldogs would help the local community use troubles and things

1107
00:54:28,120 --> 00:54:30,200
Speaker 2: like that. We met a guy called Andrew mctrusty. He

1108
00:54:30,200 --> 00:54:31,760
Speaker 2: said Oh, she said that was a really good program.

1109
00:54:31,800 --> 00:54:34,720
Speaker 2: We should do it privately. We started a company called IDQ.

1110
00:54:34,920 --> 00:54:38,080
Speaker 2: It's referred to as I Don't Quit. We started with

1111
00:54:38,200 --> 00:54:40,680
Speaker 2: a number of AFL sides and the Melbourne Storm in

1112
00:54:40,719 --> 00:54:44,160
Speaker 2: the very early days and it's just great. It's just professional.

1113
00:54:44,200 --> 00:54:47,520
Speaker 2: The players are there to basically it's like a writer

1114
00:54:47,680 --> 00:54:51,120
Speaker 2: passage now to do this camp. We're not there to

1115
00:54:51,160 --> 00:54:53,600
Speaker 2: make them fit. We're probably there to make them discover

1116
00:54:53,680 --> 00:54:57,200
Speaker 2: about themselves, whether they're an individual where they can act

1117
00:54:57,200 --> 00:55:00,440
Speaker 2: as a team, who can make decisions. We look at

1118
00:55:00,480 --> 00:55:03,080
Speaker 2: fatigue and things like that. You get tired playing a game,

1119
00:55:03,239 --> 00:55:05,319
Speaker 2: so we can sort of replicate that a bit with

1120
00:55:05,400 --> 00:55:08,279
Speaker 2: the camp that we give. It is physical. We're not

1121
00:55:08,320 --> 00:55:11,200
Speaker 2: there to break anybody. The idea is those players that

1122
00:55:11,239 --> 00:55:14,919
Speaker 2: are coming to get the opportunity to discover each other

1123
00:55:15,640 --> 00:55:19,239
Speaker 2: and they can basically form a more bonding friendship. If

1124
00:55:19,280 --> 00:55:21,720
Speaker 2: they've got issues, they've got someone to discuss those issues

1125
00:55:21,760 --> 00:55:24,840
Speaker 2: with now. So a lot of these stuff's done very private.

1126
00:55:24,880 --> 00:55:28,480
Speaker 2: We don't talk about it. It's done professionally and melm Storm,

1127
00:55:28,719 --> 00:55:32,319
Speaker 2: Craig and Frank they're just so professional and I find

1128
00:55:32,320 --> 00:55:34,880
Speaker 2: it great to work with professional athletes. You know, I

1129
00:55:34,920 --> 00:55:36,560
Speaker 2: feel privileged to be able to do that.

1130
00:55:36,680 --> 00:55:39,520
Speaker 1: There's in the ford I just I'll read it out

1131
00:55:39,520 --> 00:55:42,480
Speaker 1: because it's pretty impressive coming from Craig Bellamy, but this

1132
00:55:42,560 --> 00:55:45,560
Speaker 1: is how he talks about those camps that you run.

1133
00:55:46,000 --> 00:55:48,360
Speaker 1: For me, those camps are about more than just building

1134
00:55:48,400 --> 00:55:52,080
Speaker 1: a successful team. They're about helping the players grow as individuals,

1135
00:55:52,239 --> 00:55:55,359
Speaker 1: about preparing them for challenges they'd face both on and

1136
00:55:55,400 --> 00:55:57,880
Speaker 1: off the field. And for that, I will always be

1137
00:55:57,960 --> 00:56:02,040
Speaker 1: grateful to JT and mister Wolsh. Their contributions went far

1138
00:56:02,120 --> 00:56:04,520
Speaker 1: beyond what I would have imagined and their legacy will

1139
00:56:04,560 --> 00:56:08,160
Speaker 1: always be part of what makes Melbourne Storm special. That's

1140
00:56:08,160 --> 00:56:08,759
Speaker 1: pretty cool.

1141
00:56:09,400 --> 00:56:13,400
Speaker 2: I feel stated, you know, I just don't sort of

1142
00:56:14,040 --> 00:56:17,200
Speaker 2: I feel embarrassed in that kind of praise. But you

1143
00:56:17,239 --> 00:56:19,680
Speaker 2: see how well they've done and the structure they have

1144
00:56:19,840 --> 00:56:23,120
Speaker 2: there just shows that they've got a great culture, you know,

1145
00:56:23,239 --> 00:56:25,360
Speaker 2: and we've done with a lot of sides over the

1146
00:56:25,440 --> 00:56:28,319
Speaker 2: years and we've seen various cultures and stuff like that,

1147
00:56:28,360 --> 00:56:31,279
Speaker 2: but they're just impressive. You know, the Storm. They look

1148
00:56:31,280 --> 00:56:32,480
Speaker 2: after the place too. You know.

1149
00:56:32,560 --> 00:56:36,960
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's abundantly clear. You hear that. That's the narrative

1150
00:56:37,000 --> 00:56:40,120
Speaker 1: that comes out of the club. But it makes me

1151
00:56:40,239 --> 00:56:44,080
Speaker 1: reflect like you seem so calm and zen like and peaceful,

1152
00:56:44,120 --> 00:56:47,120
Speaker 1: and you know, just you've got your shit together basically,

1153
00:56:47,600 --> 00:56:50,719
Speaker 1: and it's interesting that people have put themselves been You've

1154
00:56:50,760 --> 00:56:54,440
Speaker 1: been testing yourself basically your whole career and even on

1155
00:56:54,480 --> 00:56:58,120
Speaker 1: your downtime, testing yourself, and it seems to you've got

1156
00:56:58,160 --> 00:56:59,879
Speaker 1: a good outlook on life, on what's in.

1157
00:57:00,680 --> 00:57:03,480
Speaker 2: Yep, very much live life every day like this. Your

1158
00:57:03,520 --> 00:57:07,040
Speaker 2: last life goes too fast, you know, there's so many

1159
00:57:07,080 --> 00:57:09,759
Speaker 2: exciting things and challenges out there. You know, I'm probably

1160
00:57:09,800 --> 00:57:11,640
Speaker 2: slowing down a little bit, but you know, I'm really

1161
00:57:11,680 --> 00:57:15,360
Speaker 2: in the cycling now with Greg is a bad influence again.

1162
00:57:15,480 --> 00:57:18,480
Speaker 1: I'm laughing that. Yeah, you live like your life it

1163
00:57:18,560 --> 00:57:20,320
Speaker 1: could be the last day. Well, the way you have

1164
00:57:20,440 --> 00:57:22,600
Speaker 1: lived your life every day could have been the last

1165
00:57:22,880 --> 00:57:26,760
Speaker 1: last night. Reflections on policing. We're having to chat the

1166
00:57:26,760 --> 00:57:29,600
Speaker 1: other day, and that saddens both of us that police

1167
00:57:29,640 --> 00:57:32,880
Speaker 1: forces across the country are struggling to get people to

1168
00:57:33,120 --> 00:57:36,160
Speaker 1: sign up and too old fools like us look back

1169
00:57:36,160 --> 00:57:38,960
Speaker 1: and go, jeez, they paid us for that time in

1170
00:57:39,000 --> 00:57:41,439
Speaker 1: the cops. What would you say the people that were

1171
00:57:42,040 --> 00:57:44,400
Speaker 1: might have an inkling to join the police are in

1172
00:57:44,400 --> 00:57:46,960
Speaker 1: two minds whether they join the police. What opportunities are

1173
00:57:46,960 --> 00:57:47,680
Speaker 1: there for people?

1174
00:57:48,400 --> 00:57:50,360
Speaker 2: Look, you know, I was there for thirty four years.

1175
00:57:50,400 --> 00:57:52,640
Speaker 2: I thoroughly enjoyed it. I found my niche, I found

1176
00:57:52,680 --> 00:57:54,840
Speaker 2: my spot, and there's lots of areas in the police

1177
00:57:54,880 --> 00:57:56,200
Speaker 2: force that you can go to. You're going to have

1178
00:57:56,200 --> 00:58:00,160
Speaker 2: to do your probationary period, no matter what need go

1179
00:58:00,400 --> 00:58:02,600
Speaker 2: mount of branch, go traffic or whatever. You want to

1180
00:58:02,720 --> 00:58:04,960
Speaker 2: come and detective. You're the one that's got to make

1181
00:58:05,000 --> 00:58:06,680
Speaker 2: the most. You know, no one's going to give it

1182
00:58:06,680 --> 00:58:09,400
Speaker 2: to you. It's a great career, you know, and it

1183
00:58:09,480 --> 00:58:13,000
Speaker 2: has rules and regulations and police are needed. When you

1184
00:58:13,000 --> 00:58:15,520
Speaker 2: look at what's having to society these days, I think

1185
00:58:15,560 --> 00:58:17,640
Speaker 2: the public that when they mentioned the word cop up

1186
00:58:17,680 --> 00:58:20,000
Speaker 2: on that sometimes a bit derogratyve and stuff like that.

1187
00:58:20,000 --> 00:58:22,120
Speaker 2: They're the person that's the person going to call when

1188
00:58:22,120 --> 00:58:24,120
Speaker 2: you need help. I don't think they sometimes get the

1189
00:58:24,120 --> 00:58:27,720
Speaker 2: support or the respect. They're not all angels. I'm not

1190
00:58:27,720 --> 00:58:30,200
Speaker 2: saying they are, but you know, I think there's a

1191
00:58:30,200 --> 00:58:33,240
Speaker 2: lot of respect that's been lost. It's not a great

1192
00:58:33,280 --> 00:58:36,880
Speaker 2: way that society is heaving. But you know, you'll meet

1193
00:58:36,880 --> 00:58:39,760
Speaker 2: some great friends and be able to share some experiences together.

1194
00:58:39,880 --> 00:58:43,760
Speaker 2: And yeah, I'd certainly go as the police force. You know,

1195
00:58:44,480 --> 00:58:46,120
Speaker 2: I tried as an eighteen year old and I was

1196
00:58:46,160 --> 00:58:48,200
Speaker 2: too short. So I tried ten years later and I

1197
00:58:48,240 --> 00:58:50,800
Speaker 2: got in, and then one year later, eighteen months later,

1198
00:58:50,840 --> 00:58:53,240
Speaker 2: I'm in the Special Operations Group where I spent something

1199
00:58:53,240 --> 00:58:54,200
Speaker 2: like thirty two years.

1200
00:58:54,240 --> 00:58:57,440
Speaker 1: Now I like stories like that, John, because I agree

1201
00:58:57,480 --> 00:59:00,440
Speaker 1: with policing that just opens up doors and expect spearances

1202
00:59:00,480 --> 00:59:03,120
Speaker 1: that you don't get in normal life. And now it

1203
00:59:03,240 --> 00:59:05,480
Speaker 1: comes to the price. You pay a price in different

1204
00:59:05,560 --> 00:59:08,640
Speaker 1: different ways. But I certainly think the good overways the

1205
00:59:09,600 --> 00:59:10,560
Speaker 1: negatives of it.

1206
00:59:10,840 --> 00:59:14,240
Speaker 2: Yeah, definitely. Yeah, Well i've become police officers. Yeah, i'd

1207
00:59:14,240 --> 00:59:17,040
Speaker 2: come again. I've done my time. I had no regrets leaving.

1208
00:59:17,560 --> 00:59:19,800
Speaker 2: I haven't missed it at all because I feel like Geez,

1209
00:59:19,840 --> 00:59:24,120
Speaker 2: I hit an exciting period when everything was happening. You know,

1210
00:59:24,160 --> 00:59:27,040
Speaker 2: I went through a number of generations when we got

1211
00:59:27,040 --> 00:59:30,120
Speaker 2: that pages to mobile phones now and technology with robots

1212
00:59:30,160 --> 00:59:32,320
Speaker 2: and stuff like that. You know, I've been to me,

1213
00:59:32,360 --> 00:59:34,520
Speaker 2: I've been fortunate and I appreciate that.

1214
00:59:34,560 --> 00:59:36,840
Speaker 1: Well, I might wrap it up here before I do

1215
00:59:36,920 --> 00:59:39,960
Speaker 1: I'd just like to think not just you, but also

1216
00:59:40,520 --> 00:59:43,760
Speaker 1: Jan and the rest of your family for lending you

1217
00:59:43,840 --> 00:59:47,120
Speaker 1: to the Victorian Police for so long, for the services

1218
00:59:47,360 --> 00:59:50,240
Speaker 1: you're done to the community. And this is I hope

1219
00:59:50,240 --> 00:59:52,880
Speaker 1: people listening to that when they see the news clips

1220
00:59:52,880 --> 00:59:56,240
Speaker 1: of the guys in their black overalls and balaclavas on

1221
00:59:56,800 --> 00:59:59,520
Speaker 1: just doing what they do and then then taking off

1222
00:59:59,520 --> 01:00:01,720
Speaker 1: their human it's behind it, and you get a sense

1223
01:00:01,760 --> 01:00:04,600
Speaker 1: of someone that's lived at that sharp edge for a

1224
01:00:04,640 --> 01:00:08,200
Speaker 1: long time. And I know, in speaking to you say

1225
01:00:08,440 --> 01:00:10,480
Speaker 1: it's part of a team and it's not just about you,

1226
01:00:10,840 --> 01:00:13,520
Speaker 1: it's everyone that you work with. But full credit to

1227
01:00:14,040 --> 01:00:15,360
Speaker 1: doing what you do or did.

1228
01:00:15,720 --> 01:00:20,200
Speaker 2: Thanks very much, Garry. Bye.