His leg painfully broken, a man lies on the ground not far from his motorbike in the WA desert. The earth is cooking after a week-long heatwave.
There’s little charge left on his phone. He’s dragged himself nearly 200 metres, agonisingly, up to the highest point there is in this flat, open country. Of all the places he could come off his bike…
He’s been bush prospecting, but no one knows he’s out here, somewhere near Siberia Cemetery. He tries not to think about why Siberia is now a ghost town.
Back in the 1890s there was a pub and a small settlement here. Back then, an ill-fated gold rush ended with countless prospectors dying here in the heat without adequate water.
He’s parched. He has no water.
He finally gets a bar of reception—for brief moments. He calls triple zero (000). The line connects, then drops out. He reaches into the sky to get signal. Then, finally: a voice.
It’s 7.20 pm. Tari is relaxing after her day at the Kalgoorlie mine site where she works as an environmental scientist when the phone rings. The ambulance is needed somewhere near Siberia.
She and her paramedic partner head off, assuming someone will be at a nearby town—a police officer, or a friend of the casualty—to meet them and take them to him. They have no idea who the patient is, nor how to locate him. In fact, Tari’s wondering if this is a hoax; she’s experienced her fair share of those as a volunteer ambulance officer.
They pull up outside the pub. It’s not often this town sees an ambulance at this time of night. Someone comes out and Tari recognises him as a driller she’s worked with.
“KEEP TRYING, EVEN IF IT SEEMS IMPOSSIBLE”
The pub manager also comes out, but neither of them knows anything about an injured man.
Hoax. Gotta be.
They hop in his 4WD and escort the ambulance out to Siberia Cemetery, in the Goldfields. They meet two police officers also searching. An update comes in—the patient is located 4 kms from his car, which was used to transport his gear, including his motorbike.
Finally, a major breakthrough—they find the man’s car. They are now 4 kms away from him. The desert is huge around them.
By torchlight, the driller examines the dirt around the car and spots motorbike tracks. Everyone gets in his truck and expertly follows the tracks. And in his headlights, finally, they see the man on the ground.
He’s in severe pain. In the dirt, by torchlight, they administer intravenous pain relief and check his vital signs. His temperature is high because he’s been on the hot ground so long. The heatwave has brought day after day of over 40 degrees. He is literally frying.
‘What would you have done,’ Tari asks quietly, ‘if we hadn’t found you?’
She will never forget his answer. ‘I’d have perished,’ he says.
Tari feels every bump in the road on the way to hospital—the patient moans in discomfort and she works hard to keep his pain under control. They chat and he shows her the first gold nugget he ever found. It is huge.
After handing over to the hospital staff, Tari shakes the man’s hand and realises how much her work has made a genuine difference to his life. This is one story she’ll never forget, and it’s exactly why she volunteers with St John.
Illustration –Sofia Varano
