When we heard about concerns from our fellow service providers on the APY Lands, we jumped into heavy machinery to help out.
Having CDP participants close by in Ernabella who can operate heavy machinery meant they could take part in the clean up required at Young’s Well Homeland. This operation of clearing buffalo grass and trees within the compound area and also clearing grass around the outskirts of the fence line was intended to avert a fire hazard. Our participants really enjoyed jumping on the machines and learning even more skills than they already had attained previously. The participants expressed extreme interest in doing activities like this job more often.
Important skills involved:
- Basic bucket techniques
- Back blading
- Creating piles to load on to the tipper truck
- Loading vegetation and top soil on to the tipper truck
This job was requested by a fellow service provider – Money Mob. This overgrown area was a concern due to buffalo grass growing out of control with the worry that it may eventually catch on fire which would be a risk to Money Mob staff.
This job was scheduled to take four days to complete, but because the local participants were able to pick up the machinery operating so quickly, working so well as a team, it was completed in three days.
