Smartcarby- Stories of the outback

September 1991
On the last weekend of the school holidays I went with Olga (the secondary teacher who lived next door) to pick up some of her friends from the bus at Marla. I went with her for a swim in the pool at Marla and some a pub meal at Mintibie (a opal mining town not far from Marla). It was a beautiful morning, crisp but with the promise of being a beautiful day.
We got onto the main highway and were about 20km out from Marla when we came across what we thought to be a road blockage but it was a road accident, as there was carnage all over the road. A shoe, a teddy a handbag and glass. A Targo carrying 3 adults and 5 children had rolled off the highway. A Telstra truck already stopped and he had used short-wave radio to call for help.

The father in the vehicle had a broken neck and was dead (he had been in the front passenger side) the mother who had been driving had multiple fractures to her right arm and a bad cut to her leg, a boy had a head wound, a girl had a broken wrist, another had a broken arm, the littlest girl had 2 years old had a cut to the back of here head and grazing on her legs, one of the boys had nothing physically wrong but he was suffering from shock, he kept wandering off to look for his shoe on the road. The auntie was in a serious condition in the center of the car with bad concussion, broken arm, various cuts and internal injuries.

We had only a basic first aid kit in the car but soon other vehicle had stopped and a very good first aid kit and the women who was driving was an excellent organiser and first-aider. She was a National Parks ranger from Ayres Rock and on her way home from holidays. She made slings out of newspaper and gauze to stabilise the broken arms and organiser everyone to be looked after. I was surprised at my happiness to be told what to do, I always thought that I would be the one to get things done in such an emergency, but I felt numb by the situation. I nursed the 2 year old and gave comfort to the mother who was telling the children that Daddy was at peace and had gone to heaven.

The truck driver had set up tarpaulins for shade as by now it was getting about 25 degrees and we moved the injured underneath it. The mother had started to tell us that the car had rolled because the children were arguing in the back of the car. As she was driving, she turned around to tell them off and veered off the road. This part of the highway was subjected to flooding so the road had been built-up with steep embankments. The car had gone down the left-hand side but traveling straight. Her husband had woken from his sleep and grabbed the wheel pulling it with a jerk, this had caused the car to flip upwards and roll two times. The car had impacted at the front of the vehicle directly about the head of the father where he was sitting. The Targo's only have a few inches about the roof lining and he would have taken the full impact on his head. He looked so peaceful, no blood, just sleeping. I was so surprised at the mothers peace at such a situation, it may have been shock but it was also her strong religions belief that he was in a better place and the children accepted this.

An hour later the police arrived from Indulkna with a nurse to say that the ambulence had a blown-out tyre and it would be a while so the nurse will stabalise the seriously injured auntie and wait the ambulance. So we decided to use the schools troop carrier to drive the mother and her children into Marla. I drove at 10km per hour as the children were worried that we too would have an accident. We passed the ambulence and finially found the clinic at Marla, but there was no-one there. We found out that the trained voluntere was on holidays and we again had to wait until they drove the nurse from Mintibie. Finially the ambulence ariived and Olga and I left. All the family was to be flown to Alice Springs by Flying Doctor.

After 2 hours of stress and strong emotions we sat at the front bar at the pub drinking coffee and feeling very nausious but thinking how fragile life is. That anytime events can happen which can take away life so quickly.

When Olga's friends arrived on the bus they had asked if I had cut myself. I looked down to see dried blood all over my legs and face - we hadnt even noticed.

I have often wondered what happened to the family- if the mother and children are going OK. A wreath of flowers appeared at the crash sit a couple of weeks later and I wonder if they put it there or if someone from Marla had driven out to the site to mark the day and the loss of life of one so young.

Top of page