Wipeout Publications

17/04/2024

Sincerest apologies to anyone who has been trying unsuccessfully to contact me by email via [email protected].

I was kidnapped for four months by a crazy sect of librarians who mistook me for Jean-Claude Van Damme.

Or, alternatively, my PA didn’t pay my bill and, unbeknown to me, my email account was suspended.

That is the last time I employ Year 9 work experience students!

In any case, everything is back to normal. I guarantee that if you mark your email as “URGENT”, I will reply within 28 days.

In other news, while hard copies of the most recent edition of Footprints are out of print*, I can give anyone a price for printing bulk copies on demand**.

Once your order is processed it usually only takes a week or two to get the books printed.

* Downloadable PDFs are available in perpetuity.

** I.e. 10 or more.

24/03/2022

An article I wrote that was published in Overland Literary Journal last October has just come on-line:

I want to begin by acknowledging the enduring loss experienced by those whose family members, loved ones and workmates died in Australia’s worst industrial accident. I started on the West Gate Bridge well after the collapse, and I often wondered if only those there on the day could fully comprehen...

09/03/2022

Just updated my banner pic. That’s me, trying to surf on a hired fully waterlogged foamie with a snapped leash at Malibu a few years ago having just had someone who looked and sounded a helluva lot like Ted Danson go nuts at me for 15 minutes (from a distance) for reasons I still don’t understand. Welcome to Malibu!

And BTW this page was hacked a day or two ago.

31/12/2021

This amazing photo of Woolamai Surf Beach was taken by Woolamai SLSC member Darryl Clark. It illustrates brilliantly the way rip channels alternate with surf zones.

04/01/2021

This painting by an artist from the East Kimberley (used by agreement with the Copyright Association) provides the sole stimulus for one of two new worksheets in the third edition of Footprints that replace old worksheets.
The key task is for students to look at the painting and describe how the painting makes them feel.
While no other information is provided to students, the backstory is that, around 2000, aunties from the community known as Crocodile Hole were asked to paint stories that their elders had told them about the colonisation of their country.
Unfortunately, the colour was lost in the laying out because all of the 90 worksheets are photocopiable black-and-white masters.
I had hope to include as a small inset in the worksheet a photograph, by way of comparison, of a girl in the US around 1970 being chased by a mounted trooper during a protest against the Vietnam War, but I was unable to obtain copyright approval to use it.
The other worksheet that has changed is the first worksheet where students had been asked to create a personal profile, but are now being asked to look at issues such as whose country they will be visiting on the Outdoor Education trips.

21/10/2020

14/10/2020

The first print run of the third edition of Footprints is about to take place. Here is a visual history of Footprints since it was first published in 2003.

06/10/2020

Out now! New e-book:
Colonisation of Australia, as told by a nine-year-old in 1960. Available through www.wipeout.com.au.

20/02/2020

big board, little wave, helping hand

26/05/2019

So far, 10 climbers have died on Everest in this current climbing season. It is difficult not to be cynical about anyone who would queue in this manner just to bag a peak, albeit the highest peak on the planet. Bob Brown once said, we should all have a place that we won't visit. Mine is right there in the photograph.

14/01/2019

wipeout poobah Robbo Bennetts has been a part of a crew that has operated a not-for-profit called desert2surf for the past ten years or so. desert2surf has run stand-up paddling programs with indigenous kids in the Territory and brought kids down here to surf. Now, desert2surf is pulling the pin, but not without leaving countless memories.