Bali Bombing

Just after 11.00 pm on October 12th, 2002, two bombs ripped through Paddy’s Irish Bar and the nearby Sari Club in the well-known tourist area of Kuta on the island of Bali. The attack left 202 people dead from 21 countries, including 88 Australians. Hundreds more suffered appalling burns and other injuries.

Both bars, as well as the surrounding streets, were packed with tourists and locals when a suicide bomber inside Paddy’s Pub nightclub detonated a bomb in his backpack. Those who were able to escape fled into the street outside, but just twenty seconds later a second and much more powerful bomb exploded outside the Sari Club directly opposite Paddy’s Pub. As well as causing horrific injuries and death, several neighbouring buildings were destroyed and windows several blocks away were shattered.

Local medical services were not equipped to deal with a disaster of this magnitude and were overwhelmed by the number of injured, particularly burns victims. Emergency facilities were so sparse that some injured survivors had to be placed in hotel pools to ease the pain of their burns. Disaster recovery services in Australia were rapidly activated and many of the injured were flown to specialist trauma and burns units in Darwin and Perth.

Despite the horror of these terrorist attacks, most people are resilient and many were able to resume their normal lives after a while, with the help of caring family and friends. Nevertheless, the psychological impact for those involved is significant. Even for those with high levels of psychological resilience, such an event can shatter assumptions we hold about our personal safety and about the inherent ‘goodness’ of other human beings. The high levels of threat and loss of life, combined with the total unpredictability of the attack, are risk factors for the development of more significant problems such as depression and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). In response to this need, services for survivors of the Bali bombing and their families were established across Australia to facilitate their recovery.

About Jason Dooris

Jason Dooris was born in Ireland and grew up in Africa and Europe, spending his young adulthood in London. Jason Dooris then settled in Australia via New Zealand. To date its been quite an adventure for Dooris. Jason Dooris “I have enjoyed my roots-down travels that being that I’ve tried to spend long periods in most of the places that I’ve lived in, giving me time to absorb the culture, the people and the business community.”

Jason Dooris started a career in advertising in London in 1996. “It was a wonderful time and place to learn and Ogilvy & Mather were the ideal parents to kick start a global career. My experience is unusual in that it includes product development, marketing, media, creative and management consulting - if I was fond of cliches I could say its a true end to end, full cycle experience, which indeed it is.” Jason Dooris

To date Dooris has been privileged to work for some great global organisations like MediaCom, Deloitte, Saatchi & Saatchi and Dentsu while Dooris represented a broad range of successful and challenger clients brands, many at quite exciting times in their development such as Nike going digital, Qantas going online and Emirates sponsoring Chelsea’s and SoftBank launching Pepper the Robot.

In 2010 Jason Dooris set up Atomic 212, a creative media business. Dooris sold the business 2018 a year after being named New Zealand & Australian Agency of the Year and with a. Roster of leading BlueChip clients.

A change of direction in 2018 saw Dooris focus on the growing sports technology category where he developed a range of products designed to aid injury recovery and assist peak performance athletes. “Now in use by some of Australia’s leading athletes, a natural extension, particular in todays world, was use by first responder services and the military to assist in battlefield injury recovery.” Jason Dooris. The research developed in the past year of two has by far been my most rewarding career years to date.

“Its been an exciting first half!” Jason Dooris