Australian
Screen

Teacher’s notes

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This clip shows a couple mining opal at Coober Pedy. The clip opens with a shot of a flat-tray truck pulling a caravan belonging to George and Judy Aslamatzis. They leave their truck to select an area to drill. Judy chooses a ‘lucky’ spot and George marks it out and then hails his assistants, who have the drilling rig. In their caravan, Judy makes casing for detonators needed for blasting. When the rig strikes rock, George is lowered into the hole with a stick of dynamite. George emerges and after a short blast the rock is cleared and drilling continues.

Educational value points

• Opal mining is one of the few mineral industries that still support sole operators such as George and Judy Aslamatzis. A pick, shovel, explosives and screwdriver are basic tools for extracting opals. As well, ‘noodlers’ search for opals by sifting through the tailings left by other miners. Today radar and electric current are used to detect opal, and machines such as the drilling rig used in this clip are replacing simple hand tools.

• The narrator of this clip reminds viewers that luck plays a crucial role in opal mining as, depending on the miner’s selection of a location at which to dig or drill ‘a fortune can be missed by an inch’. George has great faith in Judy’s ability to find the right spot, and when she chooses one he superstitiously marks out a circle rather than a cross. In an industry prone to accidents such as cave-ins, getting free of the blasting dynamite also involves luck.

• Coober Pedy is a major opal-mining centre, 850 km north-west of Adelaide, South Australia. In 1920 the Stuart Range Opal Field, named after explorer John McDouall Stuart (1815–66), was renamed Coober Pedy, an anglicised version of kupa piti, meaning ‘white man in a hole’ in the language of the Antakarinja, traditional owners of the land.

• As well as being a centre for opal production, Coober Pedy is famous for its underground homes, which miners have built or converted from old mines to escape from the extreme heat of the day and the cold of the night.

• In the clip Judy asks George whether the spot chosen is within their 'claim’. To mine opals in SA and other Australian states and territories, one must first obtain a permit to prospect for precious stones and an explosives permit, pay a fee for a land claim, and take account of Indigenous Land Use Agreements as well as other legal, technical and environmental matters.

• This clip demonstrates a common technique used by documentary makers, that of conveying information through personal stories. This particular narrative attracts interest partly due to Judy’s and George’s personalities and their relationship with each other, and partly due to the filmed events, such as the preparation for and execution of the blast.

• Opal is a mineral, an amorphous hydrated form of silica (silicon dioxide), not as solid as quartz but of a similar hardness to glass. It varies in colour, and is often milky-white. Its iridescence accounts for its appeal as a gemstone. The value of opals depends on their colour, pattern, soundness and size. Precious opal has more colour than common opal. About 90 per cent of all opal found is common opal, also known as potch.

• Australia accounts for 95 per cent of the world’s precious opal and the main mined deposits are at Lightning Ridge and White Cliffs in New South Wales, in central Queensland, and at Mintabie, Andamooka and Coober Pedy in SA. Opal is the official gemstone of SA, where the activities shown in the documentary are located. Opal was made the official gemstone of the Commonwealth of Australia in 1993.

This clip starts approximately 5 minutes into the documentary.

A small truck carrying a small trailer pulls up in the middle of a mining stretch in Coober Pedy and George Aslamatzis and his wife Judy get out and begin walking across the land, George carrying a pick axe.
Narrator Out here, in the vastness of the opal fields, a fortune could be missed by an inch.
George Aslamatzis Judy, come on! For good luck, where you like it? Tell me. And if opal doesn’t come up, I break your head.
Judy Aslamatzis (Laughs)
George Come on, show me, Judy. Judy’s a lucky woman. First of all, she’s lucky because she got me. Secondly, she’s lucky. Come on.
Judy Bullshit.
George (Laughs) Every time she goes to bingo, she wins something. Where you like it, Judy?
Judy Right here.
George OK. Whatever you say. Where you like it. Just here.
Judy Just here.
George I don’t like a cross, to make a cross, because I don’t believe in crosses. Just make one circle.
George draws a circle in the ground and hails a drilling machine.
Judy Are we still inside the claim here? We’re on the border.
George Yes, it’s ours. The planet, round. Beautiful. Come on, Judy! And if comes material, the whole town will run by afternoon. You see here pegs everywhere – if it’s opal. Otherwise, we disappear too.

Drilling begins.
George Judy, your lucky day will be today.
Judy Well, fingers crossed. Fingers crossed.

Judy is in the trailer, using newspaper to roll explosives.
Narrator While drilling continues, Judy makes newspaper rolls which will be filled with powerful explosive and filled with detonators. They will become the sausages or bombs George will use to blast a cavity at the bottom of the shaft, but George has struck a problem with the drilling.

Back outside, George is descending into a hole in the ground.
George What I’m going to do now, because we found hard rock, big rock underneath and we can’t go through. That’s why I’m going down now to blast. OK, down. I’m very light, I can’t go down! Keep going. Press down. Keep going. Keep going.

Judy reluctantly watches from a slight distance.
Judy But I don’t like him going down this type of hole because, as you can see, it’s not that deep.

Narrator George has lit a 2-minute fuse but still wants to get clear as quickly as he can. The heavy drill bucket is lowered into the shaft to block it a keep the rocks from flying out.
George Always I hold my ears, just in case, you know.

The bomb explodes.
Judy Made you jump, didn’t it? (Laughs)

Narrator The shaft is clear. Now they can drill down to the opal level -30 metres below the surface.