Eric E Hird started at DSS41 Island Lagoon – the first Deep Space Tracking Station outside the US – in January 1962.
As an EO3 (Experimental Officer 3) he was appointed Operations Supervisor
In January 1963, Jake Kerr, who had run Minitrack since 1957 (initially under Jack Dowling at the first site, on the Range) resigned to go back to WRE Salisbury in Adelaide. As a result, Eric was asked to go to the Minitrack site as Station Director. Station Manager was Noel Johnson.
Bruce Window remembers (2018),
[Eric] suddenly appeared at Minitrack in 1963 for a new launch pass after Jake Kerr had left. (Quite unbeknown to me, Jake went to Salisbury, having had enough from 1957 to 1963). Eric was wandering around with a notebook. I had never seen him before. He never introduced himself. When we were waiting for the first pass one evening and he started asking questions, and I said to him, “you are making us nervous…. we do this all the time… just leave us alone to do the job”. With that, he went and sat down while we did the pass. I later found out that he was our new E03. We became good friends and he went to the Dish thereafter.”
