Although my friend was delighted to meet me just by chance, the reason for her journey was not a lucky one: On account of a medical problem she had been advised to see a specialist in Port Augusta. Although her case was no acute emergency, a specialist’s advice was nonetheless necessary. Hence a one-way-drive of 400km. A friend had decided to come along and keep her company to ease the strain of the drive. Now they were late for her appointment, still 40 km away, so we did not even have time for a coffee and a comfortable chat. I exchanged a few words with her good-hearted friend, wished her well and then watched the red utility dash out of Quorn, towards the doctor. Living just 200 yards behind Dublin’s Meath-Hospital, I found it difficult to comprehend this kind of medical-trip, although I knew very well at what kind of a place my friend lived. The nearest doctor (and hospital) was in Leigh Creek ‘only’ 135km away, there were hospitals in Hawker (280km) and Port Augusta (400km). Emergency cases were handled by the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS), and a number of staff at Arkaroola had thoroughly welcomed the arrival of the RFDS plane from Port Augusta in various, rather uncomfortable situations.
Port Augusta is one of Australia’s 15 RFDS-bases, eight of which are situated in Western Australia alone. Victoria appears to be the only state without a need for the Flying Doctors. This service, which was established in Queensland in 1925 operates financially on equal contributions from a) the federal government, b) the state-government and c) private contributions. The initial mastermind behind its operation was Reverend John Flynn, a dedicated Presbyterian who build up the Australian Inland Mission at the beginning of the century. In the harsh conditions of the outback, concerns for spiritual welfare could not be separated from concerns for physical welfare. However it took a long time before Flynn’s 1914-idea of a medical service via radio and plane could be put into practice. Unavailability of electricity to run a two-way radio presented a major obstacle. This was overcome, when in 1927 the first cheap, pedal-driven transmitters came into use. One year later Cloncurry in northwest Queensland became the first base of a medical ambulance system by air. The choice of Cloncurry as a first base was obvious. Although initially not envisaged as a base, Cloncurry’s advantage over other towns in similar positions was this: it already functioned as a base for an aerial service across a wide area of Queensland and the Northern Territory: a service which was particularly welcome during the wet season, when many roads were impassable. Today, the name of the young company which contracted for the first medical air service for the Australian Inland Mission is a very well-known name: Qantas – “Queensland And Northern Territory Aerial Services”.
Happy about the fact that my friend had been seen fit to drive herself to the hospital, I entered Quorn’s railway station. Today only nostalgic steam trains terminate here after a journey through the winding Pitchi-Richi-Pass, but at one time, before the endless variety of differently gauged Australian railway lines gave way to a reformed standard gauge-system, Quorn was at the cross-roads of long-distance-trains. Trains running from Perth on the Indian Ocean to Sydney on the Pacific coast met the trains from Melbourne and Adelaide to the centre of the continent. The latter ones initially terminated at Oodnadatta, from where Afghan camel drovers transported everything to Alice Springs. Later, the line was extended as far as Alice Springs. The importance of the railway to Australia’s development during the last century, is probably best described by the historian BIainey:
“The railway so cheapened the cost of transport that it created industries where previously there were none. It gave birth to distant wheat lands and new dairy districts, and opened forests to the timbermiller. The railway enabled low-grade or remote mining fields to treat ores which, without a railway, were unpayable. It saved pastoral districts in time of drought and sent their wool quickly to the market.”
BIainey, G. “
A land half won, p.292-293
Quorn’s nicely renovated railway station is home to a railway museum, paying tribute to the enormous engineering efforts in order to cross the vast distances of the continent, having to cope with extreme heat (what it must have been like, working a steam engine in the middle of the summer one can only guess), little water and sudden, powerful flash-floods across normally dry creekbeds. No railway buff should miss this museum! But then, I am not a railway buff, so I happily crossed the old tracks to find a comfortable caravan at Quorn’s camping ground.
Royal Flying Doctor Service
