XPD Australia
Beware the Beasts
Geoff Hunt (AR World Series Director) / 17.05.2010
The feeling as 'Neil' the park ranger described all the potentially dangerous animals and creatures, small and large, was one of awe. First it is the sea creatures; “if you get stung by a stinger your not going fast enough� - these were the last words on the screen as he finished talking about the deadly box jellyfish and the smaller and less poisonous Irukandi jellyfish. Now he has everyone's attention. <i>[Ed; Geoff says the teams have 2 litres of vinegar on their kit list for dealing with these ... though what they do with it isn’t clear!]</i>
To the land/sea edge and of course the first image is of a massive crocodile; “an estuarine salt water croc can grow to be 4 to 7 meters in length but don't worry you won't see one�. Hope these are not famous last words everyone thinks, as from the audience a small voice asks "How fast can they swim", "Plenty fast if they are hungry" is the quick reply.
Louise Foulkes (assistant Race Director) comes back to this detail later. "In the race booklet it describes a section where there has been recent activity of a large croc heading up a slow moving river. Louise's instruction to “get out of the water fast at this point� is greeted with a roar of concerned laughter.
Neil continues with the descriptions of the on land menaces. The first on the list is the Cassowary, and his first instruction is to “stay away from it�. Again a quiet voice from the back asks “What is it?�. This brings another round of laughter.
[Wikipedia describes a Cassowary as 'a very large flightless bird native to the tropical forests of New Guinea, nearby islands and North Eastern Australia'.]
He moves on to leeches, wasps and snakes. There is not much talking about these but we know from experience that they are in the bush after coming face to face with a snake while setting out the orienteering stage. The list of creatures is seemingly endless, but it doesn't stop there.
He moves on to the plants. The Wait-a-While (lawyer vine) is not to be laughed at, but beside some lost skin it is sort of harmless.
It is the stinging tree that he spends most time on, it’s the world's most painful plant. Louise describes how the sting is delivered through tiny silicon hairs that cover the leaves and the fruit of the plant. These silicon hairs penetrate your skin, and then break off. They're so tiny, that often the skin will close over the hairs. So sometimes, once you've been stung you can't remove the stinging hairs and any outside environmental factor will aggravate it - the wind, the heat or the cold. The worst possible thing to do is to rub it as this releases more of the toxin. The best way to remove it is with a a hair-removal wax strip - this is also a compulsory item in the teams first aid kit.
And this was meant to be a course and logistics briefing. Craig did cover of a few different things but I think all anyone will remember about this briefing is the images on the screen and all the nasty things that lurk in the backcountry of Queensland.
Tomorrow morning things get a little more serious with the handing out of the maps. Once this is done at 08.00 teams have until 15.00 to have all their 5 gear boxes packed and sorted and delivered to the trucks. Some think that they will struggle with this time table but Craig Brycroft has made it clear that the timetable will be stuck to.See All Event Posts
