The Complete Book of Australian Flying Doctor Stories

by Bill Marsh

  By the time the Pilatus arrived, about half an hour later, Tony and Rhonda had all the patients organised and ready to be flown out. Then, lo and behold, who should jump off the army plane, none other than one of Tony’s old mates from his medical student days. But this was no time for grand reunions, not on your life. It was a quick handshake, a hello, then they got stuck into loading the patients into both the planes.

  Now, as I said, the Pilatus was a short landing/take-off aircraft so it got out with no problem at all. Now came the scary bit. The Queen Air had needed every inch of the road-strip to land and, with the extra weight of the patients, things looked grim. As Jan prepared for take-off he calculated that he needed to reach a speed of at least 90 knots just to get the thing off the ground.

  ‘Here we go,’ Jan said to Tony.

  Then he gunned it, and they went thundering down the road. The trouble was that by the time he got to 70 knots they were rapidly running out of straight road.

  ‘Jan,’ Tony asked, ‘do you reckon we’ll make it?’

  ‘A piece o’ piss,’ replied Jan.

  But Tony reckoned that Jan wasn’t looking anywhere near as confident as he sounded. He’d gone a fearful whitish-grey colour. His face had set like concrete. He was sweating profusely, and his eyes had taken on a fixed glassy stare.

  ‘Go, you bastard, go!’ Jan called, and gunned that Queen Air like it’d never been gunned before.

  At 75 knots Tony knew that they were done for. At 85 knots they’d run out of road. That’s when Tony ducked for cover. Then as Jan attempted to lift the plane off the ground there came the horrible crunching sound of the propellers cutting the low shrubbery to shreds.

  The next Tony knew, they were in the air.

  ‘There,’ called Jan. ‘I told you so. A piece o’ piss.’

  A Stitch in Time

  We were up at Mintabie one time, Mintabie being a small opal-mining town in the far north of South Australia. Anyway, we’d just finished doing a clinic there and we were about to pile into the car to go out to the airstrip when this ute came hurtling down the road.

  ‘Oh, my God, something terrible’s happened,’ I mumbled.

  ‘Obviously some disaster or other,’ replied the doctor.

  Anyway, somewhere among a cloud of dust and spitting gravel the ute skidded to a halt beside us, and out from the ute jumped this bloke. He was in a blind panic, we could see that, and he starts calling, ‘You’ve gotta help me, doc. There’s been a huge fight, an’ Igor’s had his chest cut open. There’s blood an’ guts everywhere.’

  ‘Okay,’ said the doctor. ‘So where’s Igor?’

  ‘I brung him along,’ this bloke replied, rushing around to the back of his vehicle. ‘Here he is, right here in the back o’ me ute.’

  So we grabbed our medical gear and shot around to where the bloke was standing and there was Igor, all sprawled out on the floor, blood everywhere, his guts hanging out, just like the bloke had said.

  ‘Oh, my God!’ I gasped.

  But it wasn’t so much the sight of the blood and guts that made me gasp. What really did it was the mere sight of Igor himself. Because Igor turned out to be a dog. What’s more, he wasn’t your normal sort of average household mutt. Not on your life. Igor was absolutely huge, massive even, and without a doubt he was most surely the ugliest thing that’d ever been born into the dog kingdom.

  And not only was Igor abnormally huge and abnormally ugly, he was also abnormally angry, more angry than I’ve ever seen a dog be angry. Even with his intestines spilling out all over the back floor of the ute, Igor still had enough anger in him to snap off your hand in one bite. No beg pardons. And that would’ve been no problem at all because he had teeth on him like walrus tusks which, in a subliminal flash, made me wonder just how big and angry the other dog might have been and just how ugly it might have looked, as well. That’s the dog that caused so much damage to Igor, I’m talking about.

  ‘But Igor’s a dog,’ I protested.

  ‘Igor’s more than a bloody dog,’ the bloke replied. ‘He’s me bloody best mate. Got a heart o’ gold, he has.’

  ‘But we’re from the Flying Doctor Service,’ I said. ‘We’re not vets. We don’t work on animals.’

  ‘Fer Christ’s sake,’ spat the bloke, ‘if’n yer can stitch up a bloody person, surely yer can stitch up a bloody dog.’

  Now there was no way that I wanted to get within cooee of the brute, ‘heart o’ gold’ or not. I’m not too keen on those sorts of dogs at the best of times and I made my feelings felt. But I could see that there was a flicker in the doctor’s eye and I could see that he was of a different mind and, what’s more, that at that very moment he was thinking along the lines of having a go at sewing Igor back together.

  ‘Let’s have a go,’ he said.

  There. I was right.

  So, among much fear and trepidation we got the bloke to hold Igor still and I stuck a drip into him and gave him an anaesthetic. Then, when he was knocked out, away we went.

  I tell you it was one of the quickest operations in the history of canine-kind. A electric sewing machine couldn’t have done the job any faster. In a flash we’d stuffed Igor’s stomach back up where it was supposed to go and the doctor was busy doing a frantic stitch-up job.

  Then, just as the last stitch was completed and tied off, Igor started to come to. That was made obvious because he gave a guttural growl which shook the ute right down to its bald tyres.

  ‘Let’s get out of here,’ I called.

  So we did. We were in that car and out of there like greased lightning.

  A Very Merry Christmas

  One year, just before Christmas, a small bush town hospital got in contact with us. They said they had an extremely ill patient and could we fly down and transport the person back for treatment.

  ‘It’s an emergency,’ they said, so we headed down there straight away.

  Unfortunately, by the time we arrived, landed and drove to the hospital, the patient had died. We were about to turn around and go back out to the airport to return to base when we were confronted by some members of the hospital staff.

  ‘Could you take the body with you, please?’ they asked.

  This seemed to be a strange request, and we said so. Usually, if someone dies in one of these small towns that has a hospital, and that person’s going to be buried there, in the local cemetery, they go straight into the morgue awaiting the funeral.

  ‘Is the morgue full or something?’ we asked.

  ‘Yes, in a sort of a fashion,’ came their reply.

  We thought this was a little odd so we asked what they meant by their morgue being full ‘in a sort of a fashion’. Either it was too full to store the body or it wasn’t. Fashion had nothing to do with it. And if it was full, what kind of disaster had occurred in the town? What’s more, why hadn’t the Royal Flying Doctor Service been notified about it?

  ‘What’s happened then?’ we asked, thinking the worst. ‘A plague? A bus accident, perhaps? Shootings?’

  ‘Something like that,’ they said.

  ‘Well?’ we asked.

  ‘Well, what?’ they replied.

  ‘Well, what sort of disaster’s happened that’s caused the morgue to be too full to put the body in it and why haven’t we been informed?’

  ‘Look, fellers, where’s your good will?’ they pleaded. ‘It’s almost Christmas and it’d help relieve the town of a potentially disastrous situation if you just took the body back with you and we could arrange to pick it up, say, in the New Year.’

  This intrigued us even more so we decided to investigate. And it was only then that the extent of the potentially disastrous situation was revealed. The staff were right. There was no possible way that the body could have fitted into the hospital morgue. Not on your life. It was chock-a-block full of the town’s supply of Christmas beer.

  An Egg a Day

  Back in April 1988 I was involved in the Great Camel Race, which was a fundraising event for the
Royal Flying Doctor Service. A big ado it was, too. It took two years of planning and involved almost a hundred locally bred camels and a couple of hundred people, some from all parts of the world. To take part each competitor and their support crew had to be totally self-contained food-wise, drink-wise, medical wise and otherwise, in the race on camel-back from Uluru through the desert and over to the Gold Coast. The total distance of the journey was 3329 kilometres.

  There were seven of us in our team from Coonawarra in south-east South Australia, comprising the competitor and his six support crew. Originally, I went as the first-aider but before long I landed the job of truck driver as well.

  Pretty organised we were too. We even took along four White Leghorn chooks — May, Colleen, Penny and Sally — who helped us out egg-wise. On our trip up to Uluru to meet with the other competitors, after we’d set up camp each night we let the chooks out to stretch their legs and have a scratch around. To start with we used to tie string onto their little ankles which, in turn, was tied to our folding chairs so that they wouldn’t get away. And they were fine with that. Friendly little things, they were. They really fitted in.

  Then on one particular night, I forget where we were exactly, but there was this one-eyed dog from the caravan park where we were staying. And while we were having tea we could see this dog under the truck, slinking along on his belly, eyeing the chooks off with his one eye, thinking that here was an easy feed in the offing.

  ‘Someone’s gonna have to keep a close eye on those chooks,’ the cook said, half as a play on words and half seriously because, as I said, the dog only had one eye. Do you get it?

  So I guess that’s when it was decided that my responsibilities as first-aider and truck driver were to be expanded to include the all-important job of — Chief Chook Minder.

  This added responsibility was something I didn’t mind at all. As I said, the chooks were friendly little things and we’d sort of hit it off right away. What’s more, as it turned out, being Chief Chook Minder fitted in well with my other jobs. See, I had a fair amount of time on my hands, because being the truck driver, what I did was to drive ahead down the track for about 10 kilometres, then wait for our competitor, Chatter Box the camel, and the remainder of the support crew to catch up.

  So each time I stopped, I’d let the chooks out of their cage which was on the back of the truck and they’d wander around and have a bit of freedom, like. Still I felt sorry for the poor things, being attached to something solid, so over time I weaned them off the camp chair by tying a wee rock on the end of the string so that they couldn’t run too far. Then when it looked like they were comfortable with that, I got brave and took off the rocks, which meant that they just had the strings attached to their legs. Then finally I got very brave and pissed the strings off and they were fine. They’d stick close by me, no problems at all.

  As I said, I had a fair amount of time up my sleeve so, after I’d sorted out the chooks and got them settled, I’d sit back and read a book or something until everyone arrived. Then, by the time the competitor got off Chatter Box I’d have his chair ready and he’d sit down and I’d change his socks and give him something to drink. After I made sure that he was okay, he’d walk for a while because with Chatter Box being the smallest camel in the race we’d worked out that if the poor thing was to last the distance our competitor had to walk at least two-thirds of the total journey.

  After everyone had left, I’d pack things up and call out, ‘Hey, Penny, Colleen, May, Sally,’ and the chooks would come scampering over and I’d pick them up, put them back in their cage, and off we’d go again.

  They became more than animals, more than pets even. They were more like companions really because they got very attached to me, Sally in particular. At night, when we were sitting round the camp fire, if she was looking for somewhere to roost she’d perch herself on my head. That’d cause Penny, Colleen and May to get jealous and they’d come over and snuggle in beside me, a bit like the way that little children do. Thinking about it now, they kept me sane in many ways. Chooks are very faithful animals, you know, those ones especially.

  Anyway, one time the chooks and I were sitting in the truck up in the channel country, about 250 kilometres out of Boulia, waiting for our rider to catch up. Boulia, if you don’t know, is about 300 kilometres south of Mount Isa, on the Burke River. There I was, deeply engrossed in my book. I should’ve known that something was wrong because the chooks weren’t keen on scratching around outside that time. Instead, they’d gone real quiet and were snuggling into me like they wanted protection. So there we were, sitting in the truck, and all of a sudden a massive drop of rain hit the windscreen.

  ‘Wow,’ I said.

  I was so excited. But the chooks weren’t. They started cackling and carrying on. The next thing I heard was a yell from behind the truck and when I turned around there was our rider in a real panic. He hopped off Chatter Box, ran over, and jumped into the truck with me and the chooks.

  What happened next was unbelievable. I’ve never seen rain like it. It just poured and poured, and it continued pouring and pouring for a couple of days, non-stop, until we were stuck, true and proper. The mud was so deep that it was up to the top of the wheels of the trail bike we’d brought along with us. We couldn’t go forward, couldn’t go back. We were stuck, with the rain still pelting down. And believe it or not, that’s the only time the chooks went off the lay. Right up until the rain came they each produced an egg a day like they knew that they had an important job to do as well.

  But the rain upset them. It upset the rest of us too, mind you. I got ill. The race was called off for a while due to the conditions. Yet, true to form, after the wet, those hens took up laying again.

  When we finally got to the Gold Coast there was a rumour going around that they were going to knock the chooks on the head and kill them, like. But I wasn’t going to be in that, no way.

  ‘Over my dead body,’ I said.

  So in the end Penny, Colleen, May and Sally were taken back to their old farm in Coonawarra where they had lots of space to scratch around in. That’s where they spent their well-earned retirement, no doubt telling their chickens and their grand-chickens all about their epic journey from Uluru to the Gold Coast, and the big rain that came and caused them to stop laying. And I also hope that they mentioned me in passing too, just like I do them when I tell the story, because it’s amazing just how attached you can get to chooks, those ones in particular. I still miss them. They had such loving personalities.

  And He Survived!

  Gee, it was pretty rudimentary back in those days. Basically, the only aircraft that were available for emergency evacuations in and around Tasmania were those that were owned by the local Aero Clubs. The main one that we used at Launceston was a single-engine Auster J5 Autocar, which was a tiny four-seater, fabric aircraft. And I tell you what, things could get pretty hairy at times, especially if the evacuation was done at night.

  For example, just say a call came through in the middle of the night from one of the islands out in Bass Strait. Take Flinders Island, for instance. When that happened, the Aero Club would respond and the Chief Flying Instructor, a chap called Reg Munro, would come out and hop into the little Auster. Mind you, this aeroplane had no landing lights, no navigation lights, no instrument lights, no radio. All he had for navigational aid was a magnetic compass and a torch. In actual fact, knowing Reg, he probably took two torches along, just in case the battery went flat in the first one.

  So off he’d go. Now if it was a really nice, clear, moonlit night then Reg might go direct from Launceston to Flinders Island. But that would’ve been a very rare occurrence. More often than not it was a bit murky so he’d have to rely on getting his bearings from the various lighthouses and townships along the way.

  First, he tracked down the Tamar River to the lighthouse at Low Head. Then he headed along the north-east coast over Bridport and over a few of the other small settlements along that way where he could po
sition himself from their streetlights. From there he tracked to Swan Island which is off the north-east tip of Tasmania.

  When he came across the Swan Island lighthouse Reg turned north and headed to the lighthouse on Goose Island which was just to the west of Cape Barren Island. So he tracked to that, then just kept flying north until he reached Flinders Island. By the time he got to Flinders Island, they’d have arranged some cars along the airstrip and he landed the Auster using their vehicles’ headlights as a guide. Then, once he’d landed, he’d load the patient, then fly back to Launceston taking the same route.

  Now the particular incident that I’d like to tell you about wasn’t a night-time evacuation, thank God, but it was just one of the many that got us thinking along the lines of ‘Gee, we’d better get a bit more coordinated than this.’ And that’s when we first went about getting the Royal Flying Doctor Service set up here in Tasmania, which was around 1960.

  What happened in this case was that a call came through that a chap from Flinders Island had received serious spinal injuries after he’d been involved in either a tractor or a bulldozer accident, I’m not certain which. Now the locals knew about the Auster’s limitations so they made it very clear to us that the patient was a big man. ‘A very big chap, indeed,’ they said. And why they made that point was because they were only too well aware of our awkward stretcher-loading technique.

  Normally, what we did to get the patient into the Auster was to first strap the person tight onto the old stretcher to minimise their movement. Then we’d open the door, tip the stretcher up sideways, and sort of wriggle it inside. When that manoeuvre had been completed we’d then have to slide the stretcher forward as far as it could go until the patient’s head ended up on the floor underneath the instrument panel and their feet were facing aft. That left one seat for the pilot and one seat alongside the patient, in the back of the aircraft, for an attendant.