Bali bombing anniversary: Ground zero with the disaster victim identification team

When the raging infernos were finally extinguished, the task was grim. How many had been killed in the blasts, who were they and where were they from?

Bali has long been a playground for Australians, and the tourist hot spot of Kuta was brimming with locals and holidaymakers when the attacks occurred.

On October 12, 2002, just after 11pm, two bombs were detonated - one inside Paddy's Bar, the other outside the Sari Club. The nightspots were on the same street, just 40 metres apart and they were packed.

The explosions killed 202 people, including 88 Australians, 38 Indonesians and people from 20 other countries.

A third bomb was remotely detonated near the United States consulate in nearby Denpasar. Nobody died during this explosion.

The Australian Federal Police disaster victim identification (DVI) team arrived in Bali less than 24 hours after the attacks, and it was a horror none of their personnel had ever faced before.

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"The most I had ever done in a mass casualty incident, was four young men who died in a plane crash just outside Canberra," DVI site coordinator Mick Travers said.

"Absolutely nothing prepared me for the sights, sounds, smells in Bali."

He was sent to Sanglah Hospital when some of the bodies of the 202 victims had been taken.

"It was basically a covered alleyway between the mortuary and the hospital, and it was just body, after body, after body. Some covered, some not. It was either side of this walkway through to the hospital," he said.

"That's one of the sights that lives with me."

DVI is the forensic process of identifying human remains, whether that be a complete body or a small fragment. There are five steps:

The scene

The mortuary - post-mortem

Ante-mortem

Reconciliation

Debriefing

While some of the AFP's DVI work was conducted at the hospital, Travers was sent to ground zero around Paddy's Bar and the Sari Club.

He was tasked to "process the scene" which is AFP speak for searching for human remains, no matter how small.

"Most of the bodies that had been recovered to the hospital were mainly intact. Some were in a horrific state, but they were mainly intact," he said.

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"What we were looking for was those smaller parts of human remains and other evidence. As morbid as it might sound, we recovered everything down to charred bones of human fingers."

The damage from the blast was so extensive that Balinese locals had brought human remains to the AFP officers that had been found outside the cordoned off blast zone.

The first few identifications were completed within a week, but others took much, much longer.

"There were families who were literally waited up to a year," Travers said.

Despite the hard work by investigators, three of the 202 people who died were unable to be identified.

As horrific as the experiences were, the AFP learned a lot about DVI in Bali.

The following year Travers was asked to head the force's newly-created forensic counter terrorism DVI team and trained police across South East Asia in DVI procedures.

Travers was deployed to work in DVI at subsequent multiple-fatality incidents, including the Boxing Day tsunami (2004), the second Bali bombing attack (2005) and a plane crash in Yogyakarta, Indonesia (2007).

Twenty years on from the 2002 Bali bombings, there are moments that stick with the now retired AFP officer - the rows of bodies and the smell. The smell is impossible to forget.

"You smell of death, especially if you've been at the hospital or you've been working around the deceased," Travers said.

Travers will go to Bali for a 20th anniversary service at as part of the AFP's contingent and will speak at the Australian Consulate-General about his experiences.

He's feeling apprehensive and sad, but is looking forward to seeing how Bali's moved on.

"I try not to take life too seriously, you just don't know what's around the corner unfortunately. From all those tragedies, you really have to take every opportunity in your life and make sure you live life to the fullest," he said.

Mick Travers is among the current and former AFP members who are featured on a new podcast, Operation Alliance: 2002 Bali Bombings, which relives one of the most significant moments in Australia's history.