A former Miss Universe winner has revealed the pros and cons of trading in the catwalk for Outback Australia’s red dirt mines.
Hailing from County Donegal, in Ireland’s province of Ulster, Grainne Gallanagh moved to Perth with her fiancé Ryan Coleman in March last year.
After a brief holiday and taking on short-term jobs in Australia, the pair started FIFO work together at a Western Australian mine.
The 12-hour work days in the belting Aussie sun was a far cry from Ms Gallanagh’s glamorous life on the runway.
The 29-year-old won Miss Universe Ireland in 2018 before placing in the top 20 at the Miss Universe contest later that year.
However, she said her time as a truck driver at the mine was the first time she ‘didn’t have an ounce of anxiety or stress’ while going to work.
Ms Gallanagh said the high-paying job was great for saving money because most costs are covered onsite while extended time off allowed her time to travel.
The Irish model admitted it does come with some downsides in a candid Q&A post on her Instagram.
She said the long shifts, especially during the gruelling summer heat, while being swarmed by flies were some of the setbacks of the job.
Ireland’s representative for Miss Universe 2018, Grainne Gallanagh (pictured), has revealed the positive experience she had working FIFO in a West Australian mine
Ms Gallanagh added that the job meant she was on site more than at home making it hard to ‘make friends, join classes, clubs’ outside of FIFO.
Despite that, she said she will ‘miss’ her time in FIFO after moving back to Ireland in July this year to get married.
Ms Gallanagh said she was apprehensive and had ‘no idea what to expect’ when taking the three-hour flight from Perth to the worksite for the first time.
Her anxieties were quickly quelled after meeting her fellow workers and finding them ‘so nice, they were so friendly’.
‘I was like, “Grand! I know I’ll be absolutely fine”,’ she told Doireann Garrihy in a podcast in July.
Facing temperatures well above 40C in the summer, Ms Gallanagh said she was lucky after being given a job that kept her in an air conditioned truck.
‘The boys might need supplies or tools and they’re down in the field… so I’ll bring it down to them, it is busy and it is good,’ she said.
‘And when it was really hot I got to do the icy pole run which was my favourite job. I would just drive around with a big bunch of icy poles and hand them out.’
Despite being one of the few women on site, her positive attitude helped her fit in and earn ‘Employee of the Year’, an honour that she intends to frame on her wall.
She made the move to Australia with her now-fiancé Ryan Coleman (both pictured) who she worked with on site until July this year
Ms Gallanagh said the high-paying job was great for saving money because most costs are covered on site while extended time off site allowed time to travel
Having come to Australia on a working visa, Ms Gallanagh and her partner were required to work 88 days in a rural area within their first year.
She told her social media followers in April that they had both blown past the visa condition and chose to continue FIFO work because they enjoyed it.
The pair even got engaged on their R&R in November and have since moved back to Ireland for their wedding.
Ms Gallanagh said she would miss FIFO, in a post to Instagram marking her final day on site in July.
‘I had no idea what I was doing and it was mostly men,’ she wrote.
‘But I was so pleasantly surprised, they have genuinely been so unbelievably patient, helpful, kind and have made me laugh every single day.’
She also recommended others to come to Australia and try out FIFO work.
‘It’s not easy to leave your family and what you know, especially if you love it at home and have a great job and you’re surrounded by your family, it’s never easy,’ she said.
‘Australia’s great and I love it, the weather is amazing. You need to go into it with a with a bit of a realistic mindset, and a plan.’
