Ten minutes from Pearce airbase and I hear on the radio that the search has just been called off because of bad weather.
My first thought is my upcoming live cross could look strange as I talk about bad weather under a blazing sun in what feels like 40 degrees.
My second thought is another delay for the families and friends. Their agony is extended.
My thoughts should be the other way around, but not when I’m reporting on a story.
It’s the same for everyone here.
Reporters, journalists, camera operators and photographers first; fellow human beings second.
It’s how the conversations go out here at the base in the northern semi-rural suburb of Bullsbrook.
What’s the latest you’ve heard? When are the planes coming back? Where is the Chinese media going? Who is that (insert derogatory noun here) that has to drive his car through my live cross nearly knocking over the camera?
Then we talk about the theories.
Try to imagine the horror of being onboard an airplane as concern gradually seeps through that something’s not right. Why are we still over water? What’s going on?
Or the other scenario: people sitting in accepting silence as the plane gradually falls to the water below.
Yet another possibility: blessedly, everyone was knocked off because of fire, lack of oxygen, a technical fault, something, and they never knew.
So now we wait some more.
Members of the media on the tarmac prior to a Japanese Maritime Self Defence Force P-3 Orion departing from the RAAF Pearce air base, to commence a search for possible debris from the Malaysian Airlines flight MH370, in Perth. (AAP)
It’s been eight days that I’ve been coming to the base: waiting for planes to take off, planes to land and any opportunity to talk to the crew or pilots onboard.
When news does break, like the two objects spotted by the RAAF P3 Orion, we find out after the Prime Minister Tony Abbott has told parliament even though the plane is less than 400 metres away from the media camp.
The weather is supposed to be better tomorrow, so hopefully the search will continue even into Saturday.
After that the weather bureau doesn’t want to predict what the conditions will be.
Surely tomorrow they will find something.
It feels like we are getting closer with each new image and satellite data released - or maybe we’re just chasing ocean rubbish.
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