Editorial: ‘Chumpy’ was truly one of a kind
Alex ‘Chumpy’ Pullin’s was an adrenalin-filled life cut tragically short. As well as being an extreme sports star, he was also a talented surfer, a loving partner and a popular mate to many.
Opinion
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THE sporting world is mourning following the tragic death of superstar snowboarder Alex “Chumpy” Pullin on the Gold Coast yesterday.
Pullin, a two-time world champion and triple winter Olympian, was indulging in one of his other sporting loves – spearfishing – when he apparently blacked out and drowned.
Horror moment partner realised ‘Chumpy’ was gone
Remembering the legendary career and life of Alex ‘Chumpy’ Pullin
High-profile Australian snowboarder Alex ‘Chumpy’ Pullin drowns on Gold Coast
He was just 32. Pullin’s was an adrenalin-filled life cut tragically short. He was the first Australian to be world champion in boardercross and the first male ever to win back-to-back boardercross world championships. He was given the honour of carrying the Australian flag at the opening ceremony for the 2014 Winter Olympics.
But as well as being an extreme sports star, he was also a talented surfer, a loving partner to
long-term girlfriend Ellidy Vlug and a popular mate of many people worldwide. Friend champion surfer Mick Fanning summed it up nicely in a social media tribute yesterday.
“Brother, you were one of a kind!” Fanning posted.
IN POLE POSITION FOR DEFENCE BONANZA
QUEENSLAND is in pole position when it comes to mounting the case for a generous slice of the more than $270 billion in Defence spending up for grabs over the next decade. And it’s just the type of industry the state should be bending over backwards to attract.
The surge in Defence spending is expected to create jobs from Cairns to across the south-east and comes as the coronavirus pandemic feeds into a sharp increase in unemployment in pockets of the state.
Promisingly, Queensland is already well ahead in making a powerful case to secure a sizable chunk of the work.
In 2018 the state notched up a big victory, securing phase two of the $5.2 billion Land 400 contract to build 211 state-of-the-art combat reconnaissance vehicles in Ipswich.
The contract went to Queensland-based German-owned Rheinmetall Defence Australia and was a major victory over rival bidding from Victoria.
It promises to create 450 jobs over a decade at the newly built Military Vehicle Centre of Excellence at Redbank in Ipswich and contribute $1 billion to the state’s economy.
The lucrative work was secured after a long-running campaign by The Courier-Mail, proving a vote of confidence in the state’s high-tech manufacturing sector and put the state in top place to win the next phase of work under the program.
Now it is time to capitalise on the Land 400 victory and capture an even bigger portion of the newly announced Defence bonanza.
Already, the Redbank Centre of Excellence is tipped to secure almost $50 billion in new land defence force contracts, while local firearms contractor NIOA is working to secure the $2 billion Land 159 weapon system’s upgrade.
There’s also much to be said for Queensland’s geographic importance given its closeness to tension zones in the north compared to the southern states, such as in the South China Sea, and well established Defence bases in Amberley, Enoggera and Townsville.
Queensland is also at the forefront of developing technology that will reshape the Defence Force as we know it – from self-driving trucks to aircraft capable of achieving super-fast flight speeds.
Researchers at the Queensland University of Technology, for example, have been collaborating on engineering autonomous vehicles that could be used to drop soldiers into combat zones.
It would allow soldiers to concentrate on doing the job without worrying about driving the vehicle.
There’s also the University of Queensland’s hypersonic research, which began 40 years ago.
It is a global leader in testing methods that can enable and improve super-fast flight speeds.
The work is targeting speeds of 20km a second upon leaving or re-entering Earth’s atmosphere.
It’s highly technical, but in a graphic illustration, creates shock waves hotter than the sun.
There’s hopes the research will give rise to a new wave of manufacturing jobs within Australia, with the Defence White Paper released last week including a big focus on research.
As The Courier-Mail called for last week, it’s now time for politicians from both sides of the fence to jump on board the “Team Queensland” push.
That will give Queensland the jump on what will no doubt amount to a heavy bidding war among the state’s for work that will almost certain give the state an economic boost for years to come.