ON ANY given day in Berriwillock, you may find people wandering around in circles with their arms outstretched towards the sky.
These wanderers are no nomads — just local residents in search of what is considered a basic part of everyday life to people around the world: mobile phone coverage.
Berriwillock, located 20km south east of Sea Lake, is situated within arm’s length of communications towers at Sea Lake, Culgoa and Woomelang, but it remains in the dark in accessing mobile and internet service.
A town of 200 people, pleas from the local population to install improved coverage have not yet come to fruition.
The coverage issues — particularly internet — see “what should be a 20 second job, take 20 minutes”, for Landmark sales agronomist Luke Symes, and “there are only so many cups of coffee you can make in a day” to pass the time.
“There is nothing here, it is non-existent inside the store — it is almost non-existent in the whole town, sometimes we have got to go out and climb into the back of the ute to make a call,” he said.
“Sometimes we have customers coming from outside on their phone and it drops out, when we tell them they have to go back outside to get service they look at you like you’ve got two heads.”
For more on this story, pick up a copy of Wednesday’s Guardian (January 21).
