For Basil.
Hi, Basil, good to hear from you. I loved diving on The Great Barrier Reef, and did so most days of the first year I was castaway to collect fish and set out the anchoring systems to hold Debut safely in place. Once my wife, Mariana, left I cut this frequency down because of the risks involved of diving alone.
Two weeks before my arrival in Australia, the Rainbow Warrior was sunk by the French in Auckland Harbour, and I wrote to Greenpeace in London, offering the use of my ship to continue their work. At the same time, the British film company, Phillip-Woodhouse Productions of Pinewood Studios, London, were looking for a sister ship for their next film about the sinking. The letter from Greenpeace landed on their office desk in Auckland suggesting using Debut, at the same time as the letter from Tiger Timbs recommending the same. The 'Eye of the Wind' had been used in many of their productions, the last being 'Taipei'. I received a letter from the film company, requesting me to phone their office in Auckland collect. With an air of excitement, I did so and was offered the part for my ship. Of course, when the press got hold of it the news was front page all over Australia.
First, they had to write the script, then look for backers for the ten million dollar production. Two engineers came out to my ship, now anchored in Sandy Bay just outside of Cairns Harbour, from the local shipyard to survey Debut and calculate the cost to convert Debut to look like the 'Rainbow Warrior'. Their quotation of Aus $300,000 was accepted by Phillip-Woodhouse Productions, and preparations went ahead to take Debut up on to the slip in Cairns to start the work.
But first, the backers for the film had to be found! And when they were, the script had to be rewritten to meet their requirements.
That old devil time was running against us... we had been in Australia thirteen months, by this time... one month more than is allowed by Australian customs, when the full import duty has to be paid for any vessel remaining in Australian waters at their own valuation. A writ was stuck on my wheelhouse windows, giving me 30 days to leave Australian waters, or have the vessel impounded. I contacted the Maritime General's Office in Canberra, to find out where I could anchor within The Great Barrier Reef that was in International waters, and was told that any anchorage that is more than five miles from any drying reef was in International waters.
On 13th October, 1986, I anchored Debut in the 40 meters hole, 25 miles east of Bloomfield, to await instructions from Phillip-Woodhouse Productions, to return to Cairns to go up on the slip... but that request never came. Mariana had to return to Cairns to deliver our baby son, and returned three months later. After she had been back on the ship only a week, a tropical line-squall bore down on us from the south-east on a barmy late afternoon to turn our peaceful day into a living hell. As the ship was lying with the current at ninety degrees to the wind, the ship hadn't time to come up into the wind before the inch and a quarter stud-link anchor chain parted with a bang, leaving us adrift. With visibility down to twenty feet and an unknown amount of chain still remaining attached to the ship from the 900 feet let out, I thought it best to let her sort herself out. I didn't want to hit a reef with a spinning twelve foot diameter propeller, because of the damage that could have caused, and both of our radars had long-since died, so she drifted before the screaming storm. She gently grounded on Emily Reef, 25 miles SE of Cooktown, at three in the morning on the 30th March, 1987... and the rest is history.
The main shipping channel is some five to ten miles wide, lying near to the coast. It is deep and well marked, suitable for the largest ships, even though it is 1,200 miles in length. The main problem is the hundreds of prawn trawlers fishing its sandy bottom, turning it into a motorway with their lights. All the best, Basil. Cpt Dick Brooks.
