Nice looking neighbour

This little hawk is a resident of our hangar. He and his mate have a nest in the rafters and will soon have chicks to feed and care for. About the time the chicks are leaving the nest, the hangar will be torn down as we have three new hangars over the other side of the apron that we will be moving into next week. I guess the hawks will have to find a new home for next year....

Good looking oldie

Ok, here's something you don't see every day. This Sweringen Merlin 3A was in Pt Augusta for three hours with visiting government ministers for some kind of meeting. The Merlin was designed and built in the late 70's and this one is in excellent condition. They look like they're going a million miles per hour just sitting there. Actually, this one cruises at around 275 knots, just a little faster than the PC12. I couldn't resist a photo or two.

More scenery

I went to Coober Pedy yesterday, via the long way around Woomera restricted airspace because there were air force F111s messing around in the airspace and it isn't really too safe at times. The weather was hot an bumpy, with very strong winds on the ground and also at altitude. We were cruising at 24,000 feet when I snapped this shot of the salt lakes north of Tarcoola in (lower) central South Australia. We had rain very early this morning - though not very much - associated with some noisy electrical storms. It had all blown over by 0600 and the day just got warm and windy from there. On the way back, we got hit by a couple of really good bumps that would have put us all on the roof if we hadn't been strapped down. Gave us all a bit of a fright, especially the patient! It feels worse when you're lying down.

Marree clinic

Not specifically related to my aviation activities, but here's an interesting truck I see when I go Marree for the clinics. Marree is NNW of Port Augusta on the "Oodnadatta Track" - an old, disused narrow-gauge railway track. The trains haven't run through Marree for many years so it is a bit of a ghost town now, but there is still a human presence. I think the population is less than 100 now, and the RFDS has a clinic there with a full-time nurse living there to take care of immediate problems and help organise the regular clinics. There are a few interesting sights there, including three old narrow-gauge diesel locomotives that were obviously considered surplus to requirements and abandoned in the town. By now they've been well and truly vandalized of course, but they serve as a reminder of the once busy railway and thriving community. This is as close to a ghost town that I've seen in Australia.

Also note, the truck is "parked" right next to the fuel pump - I wonder which one of these machines "died" first?

Oldtimer visiting Pt Augusta

A little while back, we got an overnight visit from a Douglas DC3 on an outback tour. There were about 20 passengers (I didn't count them, but they had a LOT of luggage), on a "round-Australia" trip that took about a month to complete. Not all the passengers did the full trip as it cost around $25,000 EACH (including all accommodation and expenses). They all seemed to be enjoying themselves and the old Gooney bird was in great condition. It also sounded marvelous!! However, I couldn't convince the crew to let me have a circuit - maybe next time....

Marree Clinic

Well, it's been a while since I posted anything to this blog, so I thought I'd let you all see a couple of shots of the Marree airfield and clinic building. We go here every month for the day and nowdays we take at least one doctor, one nurse and one psych nurse for the regular clinic. In addition, we often meet up with another of our crews with their Allied Health passengers (Dietitian, Dentist, Physiotherapist etc.). It can get a little crowded in the small building, but we all get along pretty well and people come from all around to see the various medical folks. Meanwhile the pilots settle down on the couch and read, sleep or watch movies while we wait to take them all home. Pretty tough part of the job.....

While we're talking about "interesting" situations.... this is my propeller de-ice boot after a night flight in bad weather. At some time previously, the boot had been struck by a rock or something like that, and the two layers of metal had been compressed together to cause a short. It happened that the first person to use the deice boots was me, and of course it happened in cloud at night. We had a real shower of sparks going, and the prop looked like a pinwheel. The doctor in the back noticed the sparks going down the fuselage past his window! Fortunately nothing more serious than a couple of hours fixing it the next day, but it could have been much more memorable if the boot had delaminated and caused an imbalance with the prop. That could easily have neccessitated an emergency landing (at night, in bad weather!). It pays not to dwell too much on some of these possibilities though....

Cracked windscreen

A little while ago, one of our pilots was taxying at Yalata Mission after a clinic, doing his checks and preparing for takeoff, when suddenly the windscreen shattered. As you see here, it is laminated and was therefore completely safe, but it nevertheless caused some worry at the time. I guess it was just the heat of the day and perhaps the movement of the aircraft that caused it. It is not the first to do this, but thankfully it is quite rare all the same.

The aircraft was flown back without passengers, at low level and unpressurized just in case the outer layer shattered too - this would cause the entire window to cave in of course. Fortunately, nothing more serious than a warm and bumpy trip - and a good story to tell.

Sunset at Port Augusta

Just one of the many beautiful sunsets here in "the bush". These photos were taken a couple of weeks ago when we had a lot of dust around and they certainly brightened up my day at the time...

More wildlife

Since we're talking about wildlife.... here are a couple of visitors we had a few months back. Walking along the airport access road - dad and chicks. I've not seen so many chicks before - I thought they just had one or perhaps two at a time. As you can see, they didn't worry too much about me clicking away at them. They just wandered about like they owned the place. I'm told by those that know, that this is the FATHER of the chicks, and that the mother probably would have left him just after laying the eggs. He's had to keep them warm until they hatched and rear the chicks now, while the mother has gone off looking for another mate to do it all over again.... not too certain about Emu morals!!

Just imagine KFC serving up Emu drumsticks.....

Tuna fishing

On a recent trip to Port Lincoln for a patient, I had occasion to fly over a bunch of these rings on the water. I had only recently become aware of them and it was interesting to see modern tuna fishing in action. Because the local tuna stocks were in decline several years ago, and there were strong indications that the fishing was no longer sustainable, some clever folks got together to set up these floating nets and stocking them with tuna. They feed them three times a day and monitor their health for the entire time until they are big enough to "harvest". With the price of tuna being around $25.00 a kilo in the market, I guess it must be working for them.

Summer storms

On a recent trip to Marree in the far north, I had to weave in and out amongst a few thunderstorms. This picture of the weather radar shows part of the action, and it is one of only two photos I managed to get without blurring (I took about a dozen but there were so many bumps that most were of no use). Anyway, the magenta and red areas are large storm cells, with heavy rain and turbulence. The lightning flash indicates electrical activity, and at one stage I had these symbols all over the screen too. Funnily enough, by the time I got to Marree, there was no rain falling and the wind was no problem. However, there were large areas of raised dust as seen in the other photos.

More dust.....

I had a patient to pick up yesterday from "Prominent Hill" - just west of Coober Pedy. I must say that I didn't see any hills, but they have an open cut mine there so it may be that the hill is now gone..

Anyway on arrival, as I flew downwind I noticed a HUGE dust devil working its way towards the runway. It eventually went right across, and as I'd widened my circuit deliberately to avoid it, there weren't any problems. I didn't have the opportunity at that time to get a photo, but about fifteen minutes later I snapped a photo of a much smaller one doing the same thing. At that time I saw about four in the area.

Also interesting to note that the mine has HUGE tipper trucks for moving the gravel around and there is a track that goes past the end of the runway. As I approached, there was one waiting to cross under my approach path. I'm glad he waited because he's probably 40 feet high and would definitely have caused some consternation otherwise.

More Dust Storms

The other day I had a patient to pick up from Ceduna (about 1 hour west of Port Augusta) and the conditions at home were pretty horrible. Temperature was about 104 F and we had strong winds and poor visibility because of dust. The photo here was taken about half way to Ceduna as we cruised at 20,000 feet. The dust went to over 10,000 feet and as you can see, it made it impossible to see anything on the ground. Fortunately, we fly with some very sophisticated navigation equipment so this wasn't a real problem, but it looked interesting all the same.

The PC12

Just another couple of photos of the PC12. Not a particularly pretty aeroplane, but oh so capable!!!!

Outback vehicles

It stands to reason that in the outback, vehicles tend to get a very harsh workout, and sometimes don't necessarily get the kind of loving attention that they would in suburbia.... This is an interesting vehicle from Glendambo. As you can see the windscreen wipers have failed and been removed long ago, so now when (if) it rains, the driver has to resort to a more "manual" system.

Also note his refrigerator in the back. I checked to see that it wasn't plugged in and operating. I thought this chap had a drinking problem, but may have solved the difficulty of keeping his tinnies cold! No such luck - he was just transporting it to another house in the local area.

Dust cloud

I flew a clinic run yesterday up to William Creek (just north of the centre of South Australia. On the way, cruising at 23,000 feet, we noticed that there was a very large dust cloud covering the entire area and extending up to 10,000 feet. This made for an interesting approach to William Creek, which is just a small airstrip with a pub and two or three houses next to it. The airstrip is only gravel and sand, and is the same colour as the surrounding terrain - mostly red - so it is sometimes a little difficult to spot from a distance.

Yesterday, we flew right over it at 500 feet and still missed seeing it initially! I had to come back around and overfly the strip a little lower to be able to spot it, and then circle to land, keeping it in sight. This of course gave us a VERY tight circuit and when I got to final, I could see the threshold of the runway from 200 feet, but not the other end! Not an approach for the faint of heart.... We almost had to go home without landing, but managed to get down. Whis photo was taken just after we had shut down and you can see the conditions for yourself. When we left two hours later, it had improved somewhat, but still wasn't good enough to be a normal (visual) flight. We always fly on instrument flight plans so it was ok and legal, but that doesn't mean it was necessarily pleasant.

Aircraft equipment

Here is the inside of the PC12. The pictures show the stretchers and equipment racks in the rear of the aircraft. Note that the stretchers are actually on dollies so they can be wheeled around at will. The floor has been specially designed to be flat and easy to clean. If any blood gets between the joints, it MUST be cleaned properly and as soon as possible because it is reportedly very corrosive. Never knew that did you? I certainly didn't.

The third photo shows the stretcher loading device. Basically this is an electrically driven (by worm gear) platform that allows us to raise and lower the stretcher and patient without all the manhandling that would normally be needed. This saves our backs, and reduces the opportunity for further patient injury etc. Great little system, though very expensive as it is properly certified for use in aircraft and of course is made of expensive components, milled from solid blocks of metal. It has to be examined to be appreciated.

No longer glowing....

This is one of the salt lakes just out of Maralinga in central South Australia. In the 50's, this was the scene of the A-Bomb tests, and for a long time, nobody was allowed in the area for fear of radiation poisoning.

Now, you wouldn't know anything had happened there.

Taking off out of Mintabie

Just a quick photo of a takeoff from the airstrip at Mintabie after a clinic. As you can see, there is plenty of red dust in the area, and it can be quite a problem, depending on how much wind there is at the time and which way you turn. You don't want to turn into your own dust unless you have to.....