WORLD’S STRANGEST S.O. S.

Dominion, Volume 32, Issue 72, 17 December 1938, Page 3 (Supplement)

WORLD’S STRANGEST S.O. S.

Cutting A Wire

Stretching more than 2000 miles across Australia is a telegraph wire which is used in a strange way to send messages. For 900 miles, between Alice Springs and Birdum, it rung through country which is practically barren. In this area, cutting the wire is the recognized way of seeking help in illness or emergency. The only men who travel this area regularly are the telegraph linesmen. If’the line is cut, they hasten from their depot to repair the break, and never forget their first-aid equipment and additional food supplies. The person who cuts the line is usually in grave danger. The lives of lonely settlers have been saved on many occasions by the prompt arrival of the linesmen, but death beats them to it sometimes. On one occasion they arrived to repair a

break, and found an old tin with the one word “Water” scratched on it. Later, a skeleton was found in the sand some miles away. There are heavy penalties for cutting the line without good cause. Two motorists recently discovered this to their cost. They had set out without making proper provision for their trip, and frantically cut tiie wire when only a few miles away from the water they needed. Tramps, too, often interfere with the line, and they get what they expect—a ride back to the nearest settlement, and a stretch in jail.

The line was erected more than 60 years ago at a cost of £300.000 and was supposed to run along a railway Hue. But the railway was never completed, and this single strand of cable now often means life or death to those within reach of it.