I’m Lieutenant Wendy Ross, I’m currently serving in the Navy, 30 years this year. I have a medical background, as in a medic, not a nurse or a doctor. I have come up through the ranks and I commissioned in 2006 to become an officer, so a slight different role now but predominately medical background for 27 years.
I’ve had the opportunity to deploy twice, 2001 I went for six months to East Timor, part of a hospital contingent, predominantly Army, five Navy and five Air Force. We were based in Dili to provide healthcare predominantly for the serving members there, which was approximately 8,000 and also about 4,000 United Nations civilian employers as well. We did provide care for the East Timorese, more as an emergency sort of factor, which we did, and we also worked together with the local Dili hospital. I had the opportunity to go on HMAS Kanimbla in 2005 for the tsunami disaster. So, deployed mainly on the ship but I went to Bandar Aceh to provide assistance there.
You could see where the tsunami actually hit in the hospital, we were in the hospital area so you could see where the tidal marks were on the wall you could see what had happened to the people that were injured, killed, whatever… but if you can imagine a big wave going through the hospital, all the equipment was in disarray, you had needles and all that sticking up out of mud, everything was just turned upside down, it’s just incredible to see it and think people survived. Driving through the town, I still remember, I think they actually called it Ground Zero, the ship was originally out at sea was in the middle of the town. It was just amazing. And of course everybody had lost somebody, it was a very sad time.
We get up and do you’re normal daily routine, breakfast, washing all that sort of stuff, you worked so I was in the hospital area of the ship, so you had patients, general patient care, you did practice for emergencies in case you had to have a resus if they did bring people on the ship. When we went ashore we went ashore on boats and sometimes on helicopters, that day was much more hard, you slept in a sleeping bag, your toilet was very basic, in the ground sort of thing. Snakes were a big thing over there, you had to make sure you checked your boots and your sleeping bag and all that sort of stuff, I was petrified… I hate snakes, I was petrified about these snakes that get into your sleeping bag at night. So that was a big day, and you would… you ate out of ration packs and then you basically, wherever they wanted you to nurse that day. So whether it would be the general ward or… I got the opportunity to go into theatre, assist in the theatre, and some went into intensive care where things that you would never normally probably see in Australia or very rare like severe tetanus, we all get injections for tetanus but one of the guys got to nurse a full-on guy with tetanus and it wasn’t very nice. And you’ve got your malaria, severe injuries so… big days and then you basically go and have a shower, a cold shower portable shower, and ten you get into your sleeping bag and go to sleep.
Leaving family, I like deploying because you’re over there doing a job, I um… it’s harder for the family back home, they’re the ones doing the day-to-day routine running the household. And you’re over there basically living, sleeping… you’re there to do a task. So you get very much involved with that. We’re very mindful, depending on what country, there cultures for example Bandar Aceh , you weren’t allowed to show much flesh, so if you were exercising in the end, females, they weren’t allowed to exercise in shorts. So we’re always very mindful of that, East Timor I worked very closely with Singaporeans and Egyptians, so Egyptians, with their own culture, again, dress standards things, you had to be very mindful. I think we work very well with the United Nations, I think we do do it well… big organizations, I don’t think we always get it right and you will often see it in the papers that maybe food’s not distributing on time or this and that but… I couldn’t imagine us not doing that, I couldn’t imagine us not going to a country and helping I don’t know how you wouldn’t do it, yeah. I think if you didn’t go and assist anyone you wouldn’t be a good citizen, I don’t know how you couldn’t not do it. I think that, following our allies, I think that it’s just part of the parcel. Not just in defence, but civilians go over there and assist as well. You build… you become a team and you got… you’re working towards a task and it’s basically helping, helping the poor, the less fortunate in a situation that a lot of these, especially the civilians… they haven’t asked for this, they were born in that country. You know potentially I look at it like ‘That could be me’ if I was born in that country I would like to think that someone’s come to help me when I really need it, but then also to leave and let us get back on to being our country.
Just helping people, especially children, when you do something for children. East Timor, we often did daily activities with them just to help put a smile on their face, they were very poor, not many toys or anything like that. So, yeah I just think, if you can put a smile on someone’s face in the hour that they need it, I think that’s something you just can’t take away.