So I just got to hear one of the funny stories my Godfather has about his days working on GPS surveying, in Papua New Guinea.
First thing to go wrong was at the airport. Someone forgot their passport, being so used to doing domestic surveying.
When they got on the plane, they were on an island. Two teams at this point. They were supposed to stay in contact via radios, but they had been forgotten. So what my godfather was supposed to do was see if he could hire some 4WDs. Turns out they could, so they got the pilot to take back a message to the other team that they could and the price. Pilot left.
Then he asked if there was a road that could get to the other side of the island. Said there was. However, they then learned that the road they were intending to take had been washed out. Pilot had already gone, so the message that the road had been washed out didn't get through.
Then the coworker came with a 4WD he'd hired from the other side of the island. Turned out that there was no diesel at the side my Godfather was at.
They at this point needed to get to the other side of the strait. Now, they'd been told back in Australia that the strait was too dangerous to cross by boat, so they'd hired a helicopter. Turns out the people they'd hired it from didn't actually have a helicopter...but they did have the fuel for one.
Being stuck for ideas, one of the natives suggested they cross the strait in a banana boat. They'd been told that it was too dangerous, and they said that, and the native laughed and said they made the trip three times a day. Turns out the person who said it was too dangerous was a highlander, and didn't know how to swim.
Anyway, they got across, and went to set up their readings, which were taken from a hill. At this point, they had the radios, but they were malfunctioning such that they had three. Two could hear both, one could send to both, and one could only hear one but send to both. So they had to communicate through passing the message along. Last night of testing, they had a problem with the readings. Godfather unplugged it and plugged it back in, worked again. Reported it, due to bad communication got told to check the readings for the last 24 hour period hourly. Up the hill. A total of fourty minutes sleep that night.
Got their stuff packed up, reported to the group leader. Apparently, the readings had deviated by a few millimetres, but this was to be expected due to grass growth. The pair had run the measuring tape across the grass. The group leader says to my godfather in a horrified tone 'You ran the tape across the grass?' then turns to the partner, a surveying student, and repeats 'You ran the tape across the grass?' and adds 'But you're a SURVEYING student!' and from that point on, refuses to let them set up and does it for them.
They get to town, and set up tents around the gear, because they were told at the last town (the one with no diesel) that the people here will steal your stuff as soon as look at it. Schoolmaster there offers the use of the library, they say no, they'd rather stay with their stuff. Schoolmaster says 'You may have needed to do that there (last town), they're all thieves over there, but you don't need to do it here.'
They start to spend the night there. It starts raining. And some of the tents have holes in them. They declare 'Bugger this for a lark' and go into the library. They lie down, about to get to sleep...when tbe rooster starts crowing. Every hour, on the hour. They didn't get much sleep that night.
And that's why he hates roosters.
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Topic: [MILK] There were 12 eggs here what did you do with them? (Happy thread?!) (Read 16176341 times)