When Stuart Vollmerhausen went to work in January last year, he never expected he would need an aerial intensive care unit to fly him to a tertiary-level hospital more than 100 kilometres away.
But that is what happened when young bulls trampled the stud cattle breeder.
“I remember opening my eye; blood was dripping down, I was in the dirt,” Mr Vollmerhausen said.
In his tiny town of Theebine, population 145, in south-east Queensland – grateful hotel patrons and staff recently raised more than $13,000 for RACQ LifeFlight.
“It’s a great service; none of us know when we’ll need them. I didn’t think I would need them,” Mr Vollmerhausen said.
Publican Jackson MacDonald has needed LifeFlight’s rescue services twice, the first time to rescue a manager’s heavily pregnant wife at the height of the 2011 Mitchell flood.
“There was no dry land; it was up to the top step of the house, and we were starting to panic,” Mr MacDonald said.
The second time, the handlebar of a worker’s motorbike had lodged in his eye socket.
Mr MacDonald said the LifeFlight pilot skidded 40 metres through plumes of bulldust in a drought, to save his staff member.
“For a long time after [he] suffered a lot of memory loss, but he came good, made a full recovery, it was pretty amazing.”
Australia’s aeromedical history
In a vast country spanning 7.69 million square kms with a scattered population, Australia’s desperate need for aerial medical services was identified more than a century ago.
After 11 years of lobbying by Presbyterian minister John Flynn, the Royal Flying Doctor Service took off from Cloncurry in 1928 — leasing a single-engine, timber and fabric bi-plane named ‘Victory’ from QANTAS, for two shillings per mile flown.
But helicopters can land where planes cannot, and rapid-response retrieval has been a game-changer in saving lives.
Choppers take off
Ambulance Victoria has Australia’s longest-serving aeromedical helicopter services, dating back to the “Angel of Mercy”, a Bell 206A JetRanger launched in December 1970.
The South Australia Ambulance Service followed in 1973, while CareFlight — which now services Tasmania, New South Wales, the Northern Territory, and the ACT — added helicopters to its fleet in 1986.
The RAC Western Australia Emergency Rescue Helicopter Service began in 2003.
Community driven
In Queensland, tourism attraction owner Des Scanlan and philanthropist Roy Thompson, along with committed friends and Emergency Services leaders, pushed to establish the Sunshine Coast Helicopter Rescue Service in December 1979.
Launched by then premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen with the name The Big Cow emblazoned on its tail, the Bell 206 JetRanger was based beside the largest concrete Ayrshire cow in the world until 1983, when it moved to the Maroochydore airport.
The service became LifeFlight and will turn 45 this year having airlifted around 90,000 people suffering from everything including heart attacks, strokes, traffic crashes, farm accidents, mountain climbing mishaps, and floods.
Involved since its inception, Vietnam veteran Jim Campbell was the service’s chief pilot for 25 years and said before the helicopter was launched, death rates from accidents and emergencies were much higher.
“Being in Vietnam in the military and seeing that people were guaranteed of being in hospital within 20 minutes of being wounded … it was taking hours to do it in civilian life,” Mr Campbell said.
Flying intensive care units
Surf Life Saving legend Hayden Kenny was one of the first crewmen and has witnessed Queensland’s service grow from one helicopter to a fleet of 10, with bases along the Sunshine Coast, in Toowoomba, Brisbane, Bundaberg, Townsville, Roma and Mount Isa.
“It’s a mobile hospital; we’re not talking minor stuff, we’re talking very serious,” Mr Kenny said.
“It’s been one of the things that I’ve been the most proud of … to be involved with that from pretty much day one.”
End of an era
The RACQ (Royal Automobile Club of Queensland) has been LifeFlight’s naming sponsor for 30 years, providing more than $50 million in sponsorship and donations.
But that sponsorship ends on the first of July, when the state government will increase funding.
It has committed an additional $586.1 million over 10 years, towards a total of $1.2 billion.
A new base will be built at the Sunshine Coast airport, including a visitor experience centre.
“RACQ has done a great job supporting LifeFlight’s mission, but now I’m really proud that our government is building on that contribution from RACQ,” Queensland Health Minister Shannon Fentiman said.
LifeFlight chair Jim Elder said the service would retain its independence.
“We’re not government-run, we’re not government-owned, this government funding is not a donation, it is a commercial agreement … it gives us certainty,” Mr Elder said.
Operating a highly trained team of critical care doctors, nurses, engineers, and crew, Mr Elder said LifeFlight was one of only two vertically integrated aeromedical rescue services in the world.
He said the service ran “profit-for-purpose” ventures, including aeromedical and flight training, hiring out four jet air ambulances for inter-regional patient transfers and travel insurance industry and medical repatriation work within Australia and overseas.
The future
Mr Elder says community fundraising will still be critical to allow for innovations outside the LifeFlight’s “core” functions; like new helmets, neonatal equipment to transfer babies, and animal rescue capsules.
“What we learned in the floods in Queensland was that people wouldn’t leave without their pets … and big dogs and pets in helicopters can be scary.” he said.
A debrief led to the creation of collapsible capsules, which were used in catastrophic flood events in Queensland and northern New South Wales in 2022.
“When we went to Lismore, we made 18 rescues on the first day we were there including, I think; 13 dogs and cats and a pet turtle,” Mr Elder said.
Community commitment
Fiona Paterson, who organised the fundraising auction at the Theebine Hotel, is a former manager of Queensland’s Workplace Health and Safety agriculture unit and has seen the difference aeromedical retrieval can make.
“I went to so many farm accidents and the helicopter had picked those people up and no doubt saved their lives,” Ms Paterson said, adding that her brother and one of her sons have also been airlifted by LifeFlight.
“I don’t think people really understand the gravity of what happens when you’re in a farm accident or a road accident or you’ve got trauma at home, and you need someone.
“The chopper service is absolutely imperative, and they mean the world to me.”
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