Buried in last week’s budget was money for rehabilitating the Rum Jungle uranium mine near Darwin. The exact sum was not disclosed.
Rum Jungle used to be a household name. It was Australia’s first large-scale uranium mine and supplied the US and British nuclear weapons programs during the Cold War.
Today, the mine is better known for extensively polluting the Finniss River after it closed in 1971. Despite a major rehabilitation project by the Commonwealth in the 1980s, the damage to the local environment is ongoing.
I first visited Rum Jungle in 2004, and it was a colourful mess, to say the least. Over later years, I saw it worsen. Instead of a river bed, there were salt crusts containing heavy metals and radioactive material. Pools of water were rich reds and aqua greens hallmarks of water pollution. Healthy aquatic species were nowhere to be found, like an ecological desert.
Tracking down unregistered EPIRBs has kept Northern Territory Water Police crews busy this long weekend.
Water Police, Border Force aircraft and Commercial Barge responded to a beacon activation off the coast of Croker Island on Friday night. On arrival the skipper of the fishing vessel in the area advised authorities he had not activated his EPIRB, and coincidently the signal stopped.
Water authorities were alerted to a beacon activation in the same area the following morning, and this time contacted the skipper by phone to confirm his exact location. Further inquiries revealed the skipper was carrying a life raft containing a faulty EPIRB, which he was unaware of. The faulty EPIRB has now been disabled.
Top 10 Wilderness Horror Movies Based On Horrific True Stories
In the wilderness, we have little control over our surroundings, and, whether a provincial park, a rain forest, a crocodile-infested area along a flooded river, or another forbidding location, our environment can be hostile, dangerous, or even deadly.
Trees obscure lines of sight; darkness impedes vision; sounds in the darkness seem ominous. Especially in remote locations, the wilderness isolates us, cutting us off from civilization and the assistance that social institutions and government agencies could otherwise provide. No ambulances, fire trucks, or police cruisers are standing by; no emergency telephone operators await our calls; no infrastructure of highways, hospitals, and other resources is available.