Revealed: Map of Gympie’s mobile coverage black spots

A Gympie businessman whose phone routinely drops out or never rings at all says the inability to fix coverage black spots is risking lives. See the full black spot map.

Gympie businessman Michael Sheaffe says mobile blackspots across the Gympie region are costing businesses money and risking people’s lives.

The place where Michael Sheaffe lives, Glastonbury, is a quiet rural retreat only 9km from Gympie’s city centre.

But when it comes to taking and making mobile phone calls he might as well be in the outback.

“Customers can’t get hold of me and I can’t get hold of them,” the owner of Pumps, Filters and Irrigation said.

In the past 18 months, conversations routinely dropped out or his mobile phone did not ring at all.

He would only get the “missed call” messages about six hours later.

The shocking coverage was risking lives too, Mr Sheaffe said, as paramedics at a serious motorcycle crash near his property a few years ago discovered.

“They went to call in a chopper, and there was no reception,” Mr Sheaffe said.

They were instead forced to hunt down, and then use, a working landline at a nearby property before finally bringing in a satellite phone.

“There’s no excuse for it,” he said.

Mr Sheaffe’s frustrations with bad mobile reception were not unique to the patch he and his neighbours called home.

In January 2023, Curra residents were left unable to call triple-0 to report a fatal truck crash.

Federal government data shows 100 reported mobile coverage black spots cross the Gympie region, although the figures have not been updated since 2018 at the latest.

The organisers of the embattled Kilkivan Horse Ride have spent years struggling to deal with the fallout of non-existent reception, including a catastrophic outage in 2018, which cost the festival more than $12,000.

Federal government data identifies 100 reception black spots across the Gympie region.

The data has not been updated since at least October 2018, or even February 2016.

New timeline for controversial power lines as backlash grows

A Communications Department spokeswoman said the database was created to assist with the first round of the coalition government’s black spot program but, as the spots were nominated by the public, they “were not independently tested to verify the level of mobile coverage”.

“For this reason, the previous government took the decision to close the register,” she said.

New upgrades would be rolled out under the Better Connectivity program, which would build on the exiting Mobile Black Spot and Regional Connectivity schemes.

Wide Bay MP Llew O'Brien says the federal government’s latest black spot rollout was not expected to be finished until 2025, and there was no clarity or details around what would follow it.

It encouraged engagement between councils, residents, and state governments.

“Experience has shown that when local communities and councils engage with the telecommunications providers it increases the likelihood of an application being put forward for funding under these government funded programs,” the spokeswoman said.

Wide Bay MP Llew O’Brien said the coalition government, ousted at the May 2022 election, upgraded 19 black spots across the Wide Bay.

Given the number of black spots which remained he said it was “disappointing that the Labor Government’s Improving Mobile Coverage Round of the program cherry picked 54 sites, with just four of them in Queensland, and none in Wide Bay”.

“The Coalition’s Mobile Black Spot program was driven by the community, with people able to nominate black spot locations,” he said.

He said the latest rollout was not expected to be finished until 2025 and, while more were expected “the government hasn’t released details as to when these will be available”.

Mr Sheaffe said the coverage issues painted a troubling picture for the region.

“It’s not an outage, it’s an outrage,” Mr Sheaffe said.

“I’ve been to third world countries with better mobile coverage and reception.

“What does that make us then?”

Originally published as Revealed: Map of Gympie’s mobile coverage black spots