Features

Colonial boys no slouches

Explosive Ordnance Technicians catch up with news from back home.

Known as the Wild Colonial Boys by their Coalition partners, Air Force Explosive Ordnance Technicians have been working in some harsh conditions around the clock.

CAF Air Marshal Angus Houston acknowledged their outstanding work in difficult conditions when he visited them in the MEAO.

“Not even northern Australia is as bad as this, but we need to be able to operate in these conditions because I think the immediate future will be one of contributing to coalitions in the way we have contributed to this one,” he said.

Corporal Dom Rossetto said he was pleased to see CAF visit the technicians in their remote work place.

“I’m glad someone from Canberra has come up and taken the time to see us in these hot and dusty conditions, there’s not much here,” CPL Rossetto said. “We wear the goggles near on every day because of the sand storms.”

He said the hardest part of the job was not climatic but domestic.

“The toughest part is being away from my wife and kids and not being able to walk on grass. One of the first things I’m going to do when I get home is rub my feet through the grass,” he said. “When the air war commenced we were working full on from 6am until 7pm when the night shift would start, so it was just like Ground Hog Day – work, go home have dinner have a shower, go to bed get up and go to work day in day out.”

He said since things had slowed down, they had found time for some souvenir swapping with the Americans. The hot item for trading is the slouch hat which he sold for $US170. “They love them, they are always after anything with Aussie flags, kangaroos or Australia on it.”