Word: islander
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...bilge water and interview the fishermen about their voyage. They also try to explain to the detainees - skinny boys and craggy grandfathers who live on fish and a cup of rice a day - what will happen to them. Cummins wants to hook up with Quarantine officials on Thursday Island before they call it a day. Otherwise, the ACV crew will be babysitting the detainees in the harbor until the morning - a hassle, and also a bureaucratic drag on a $A5 million asset and a highly skilled crew that is supposed to be on call around the clock. Cummins unleashes...
...Each week, about 500 papuan coastal dwellers and Torres Strait Islanders are granted permission by elders to make a short hop to the neighboring country without a passport or visa. They are able to do so within the designated Protected Zone because of an agreement between Australia and P.N.G. that tries to preserve age-old practices such as hunting, fishing, trading and ceremonies. ACV Commanding Officer Mark Fitzsimmons, a genial and thoughtful man with a reassuring smile, has been with Customs since 1980. Navigating the narrow channel between Saibai Island, part of Australia, and mainland P.N.G., Fitzsimmons notes the stark...
...overcast Saturday, Fitzsimmons anchors the Hervey Bay off Dalrymple Island, an uninhabited lush coral cay, to set up a checkpoint: 52 Papuans are traveling to Yorke Island for a funeral on Monday. Eight boats are expected to come from Daru Island down the Great North East Channel or, if the weather is rough, the western side of the Warrior Reefs; either way, they'll come past the stakeout position. Overnight, on a high tide, a boat has washed up on Dalrymple. Customs officer Peter Leeman and sailors Joe Homer and Peter Page take a tender to the island to investigate...
...Fitzsimmons and Leeman set off from the ACV in a tender to reconnoiter. Leeman is hoping to improve the knowledge base in the district office by taking photographs of little-known islands in the immediate area, recording their topography and the best sea approaches in case of a future incident, such as a search-and-rescue or a suspected illegal entry vessel. They've also brought along a rod and reel, hoping that dragging a lure in the water might attract a plump fish for dinner. Moored just off Masig, the larger of Yorke's islands, is Mr. Nobody...
...tropical sky, night falls almost instantly, and the navigational instruments now cast a greenish glow around the skipper. A fixed-wing "Islander" heads back to base at Horn Island as a Coastwatch helicopter (or "helo") code-named Lima 51 flies in to assist in the search; a forward-looking infra-red (flir) detection system in the helo's nose checks out the hides that have been cut in the mangroves around the island. No luck. Returning to base, the helo calls in to report that it's clocked a vessel 10 nautical mi. away, at 108 degrees. There's restrained...