Dedicated fundraisers recognised at the 2011 Spirit of Queensland Awards night

Over 200 people gathered on Saturday 19 November in the Presidential Ballroom of the Sebel & Citigate,King George Square,Brisbane to applaud and recognise the efforts of the Spirit of Queensland Awards finalists for 2011.

Master of Ceremonies was Steven Bradbury (Australia’s speed skating Olympic gold medal winner) who entertained guests with his story of being the “last man standing” but the focus of the evening was on the wonderful efforts of the finalists who had come from all over the state to be interviewed by the judging panel on the Friday. Each year, the judges have the very difficult job of choosing the award winners.

Tension built as the evening progressed but finally the envelopes were opened and the winners announced. The 2011 Spirit of Queensland Winner was Leanne Pullen from Mackay. This was Leanne’s seventh year taking part in the Spirit of Queensland program and the judges were in agreement that her tireless energy and inspirational fundraising effort made her the worthy winner. Also recognised on the night for their achievements were Stephanie Avis fromSt.George (Corporate Charity Award), Trish Connors from Weipa (Charity Award), Doug Field from Brisbane (Outstanding Achievement Award) and Shelly Norton from Boulia (Ergon Energy Judges’ Encouragement Award).

The night was attended by RFDS supporters from the corporate sector as well as staff and friends and family of the finalists and was the perfect setting for acknowledging the passionate support given to the RFDS by all the finalists as well as the award winners.

The RFDS would like to thank Hawker Pacific as Gala Ball sponsor and program sponsors of Qantas Foundation, Carlton United Brewers, Breville, Mirvac, Queensland Country Life, ABC Radio, BMA Event Group and Top Dog Advertising for their support of the Spirit of Queensland Awards.

Princess Mary at Broken Hill today

Today HRH Crown Princess Mary of Denmark visits the RFDS Broken Hill Base as part of her Royal Tour and will announce the appointment of the new McGrath Elders Breast Care Nurse and commencement of the service.

Thanks to a unique friendship between the McGrath Foundation and the Royal Flying Doctor Service, and the fundraising efforts of Elders staff nationally, a McGrath Elders Breast Care Nurse will be based at the Royal Flying Doctor Service Base in Broken Hill.

The newly appointed nurse, Jo Bevan, will travel across the region by plane, to support Australian families in rural and remote areas experiencing breast cancer. She will hold clinics both at the Base and on regular clinic runs that fly to 18 remote locations across three states (NSW, Northern South Australia and South Western Queensland). Jo has worked in healthcare since 1986 when she started working as a Registered Nurse at Broken Hill Hospital. She moved into oncology in 2000 and has spent the last eleven and a half years caring for women fighting cancer.

During her visit today Princess Mary will also take a grand tour of the RFDS base visiting our medical and visitor facilities. She will enjoy a luncheon prepared by local TAFE students in our hangar and a performance by children from the School of the Air.

The Flying Doctor is a not-for-profit organisation and requires support from the public to keep its aircraft in the air. You can show your support by making a donation here.

Follow today’s action at the Broken Hill Base by following us on Twitter or Facebook. You can see pictures here at our Flickr account.

Pictured: Channel 7 interview RFDS Medical Officer Dr Solange Costermans-Imseih about the new women’s health collaboration between the RFDS and the McGrath Foundation

Pictured above: The RFDS hangar at Broken Hill Base is converted to a dining room to host lunch with Princess Mary

Crown Princess Mary to visit Broken Hill

Seems like a visit to an RFDS base is a must-see for visiting Royals to Australia.

We had just calmed down from our brush with royalty when Prince William visited the RFDS Cairns base earlier in the year – when it was announced today that Crown Princess Mary of Denmark will be visiting the Broken Hill base on Friday.

The wonderful thing about these visits is that they are more than just a royal wave at the work we do. Prince William – with his background as a pilot – was genuinely interested in our planes, our people, the distances we travel and the amount of people we help across Australia. So much so that the RFDS was the only Australian charity nominated to benefit from a gift fund established for his wedding to Catherine Middleton.

As is Crown Princess Mary whose role as Patron of UNFPA, the United Nations Population Fund, supports the agency’s work to promote maternal health and safer motherhood in more than 150 developing nations.

At Broken Hill on Friday Crown Princess Mary will be launching a new initiative with the McGrath Foundation, to support women living with breast cancer in remote areas.

In the last year, the RFDS Women and Children’s Health Service based in Broken Hill saw 610 patients at 170 clinics in 20 locations from Ballera in Queensland to Pooncarie in New South Wales. As only a third of healthcare professionals in remote areas are female, women living in these areas have limited access to women’s healthcare.

We’re doing our utmost to deliver essential primary healthcare to Outback Australia and we’re especially honoured to have the support of someone like Crown Princess Mary take an interest in the work we do.

More than everyday heroes

I’m always amazed at the incredible things people will do to raise money for the Flying Doctor. This year there’s been eighty year old drovers revisiting long forgotten drovers trails on horseback,  a 19 year old pilot flying a replica spitfire around Australia to raise money and inspire youth and of course Flying 4 the Doctors earlier this year, who followed in the footsteps of Charles Kingsford Smith. 

Right now there are some amazing feats being undertaken. QLD police officer and father of three Dave Alley, is embarking on a challenge never completed before – to cycle around Australia in 40 days or less and next week a gyrocopter will be flown from Mackay to Uluru.

But it’s not just the big, record-breaking, media-worthy events that inspire. Every day we hear stories of bake-offs and barbecues, of school students raising money, of people walking, running or even just shaking a tin at community events and gatherings.

There are so many ways the Flying Doctor helps people every day but I’ve come to realise there are so many ways, so many people help us every day.

For that we’d like to say thank you.

Wings of Life

Wings of Life is an organisation formed in June 2010 by Douglas Field a Griffith University Bachelor of Aviation student. The aim of the organisation is to raise funds for the Royal Flying Doctor Service and inspire youth in aviation – both of which they are doing in this ambitious flight.

Flying a replica spitfire, Doug set off with the Wings of Life team, on Friday morning on a 25 day journey to circumnavigate Australia, not just to raise money for the RFDS but to honour an inspirational friend, Barry Ucinski a passionate aviator who recently passed away in an aviation accident.

Find out more about the route they are taking and the planes making the journey on their website, you can also sponsor the team with all moneys being donated to the RFDS.

We’re going to be following the pilot’s blog on their website.

But you can find out more about the pilots involved with Wings of Life and some of their amazing aircraft here.

Flying 4 The Doctors – What a Welcome Home!

On Tuesday 19th April we landed in Sydney’s Bankstown Airport, and what a welcome we received. Friends, family, members of our support team, the Royal Flying Doctor Service and the media were all there. The support we have received since we made our announcement about our trip last month has been amazing. I would especially like to thank the media for getting behind us, sharing our story and for being so supportive of our cause to raise money for the Flying Doctor.
During the final stages of the flight we flew from Christmas Island to US Samoa to Norfolk Island and then onto Australia. We encountered some bad weather as we embarked on the last leg back to Australia and it was hard flying, however clear skies welcomed us home in the end.

As we flew closer to the NSW coastline and over the beaches, the Channel Ten helicopter flew along side us and accompanied us up to Sydney Harbour before landing at Bankstown Airport.

When we landed and turned the engine off, Jane Austin from the RFDS (General Manager Marketing & Public Relations 
RFDS South Eastern Section) came over to the plane and said, “I never knew the plane was so small!” This made me laugh as this wonderful plane had carried us so far.

What a trip, what an adventure and what a reason to do it. We hope we have inspired people to follow their dream. We have chosen to support an amazing group of people at the RFDS who are heroes everyday they go to work. We thank everyone for their thoughts, best wishes and their generosity of spirit and kindness.

We received a couple of questions from followers on Facebook about our journey and I wanted to share these questions and my response with you.

Q. How does it feel creating a new part of Australian history? From Marian Slight.

I feel immensely proud to be part of Australia, to be an Australian and to honour Sir Charles Kingsford Smith and his crew as well as the Flying Doctors. I have seen first hand the ocean they flew over. Their courage was staggering given the nature of the aircraft they flew and the time they did it. To support the RFDS on this flight was my reason for doing this and I hope our adventure has inspired and helped.

Q. What was the most challenging part of the flight? What was most memorable? From Charles Ma.

The most challenging part of the flight was facing the unknown. Jim had mentioned to me that a chap had fallen apart on him and said he could not fly over water – I knew I had to face any fears I had and meet the challenge. I met that challenge and was fine especially as I had undergone some training with the Red Alert team.

The hardest part was the heavy load takeoff. When you fly the A36 normally you takeoff at about 70kts. I had to wait until almost 100 knots and then climb so gently to avoid any issues with the aircraft. This is heart in the mouth stuff but after each one my confidence grew and Jim was always quietly guiding me to make sure I got better with each one.

There were also huge challenges getting the plane prepared, addressing the paperwork and obtaining approvals to do certain things. As I had never done it before, it was all new to me.

There have been so many highlights. The beauty of the ocean, the loneliness of being out there, the kindness of so many people along the way, the challenges that had to be overcome were all highlights. Flying with Jim was amazing. His calm, steady guiding nature and pure aviation knowledge are staggering. I can never thank him enough.

Overall, I think the best highlight is being able to inspire people and promote the RFDS. Meeting the pilots, nurses and team at Broken Hill and Dubbo made this experience real in so many ways. The trip we have undertaken is no mean feat, but in their own quiet and dedicated way, the team at RFDS help people every day. Flying in Kingsford Smith’s footsteps experiencing what he did for such a good cause means the world to me.

Jeremy Rowsell

More information about Flying 4 The Doctors can be found at www.flying4thedoctors.com
Follow the journey on RFDS social media: FACEBOOK / TWITTER / YOUTUBE / FLICKR Please support us by donating now to the Royal Flying Doctor Service.

Flying 4 The Doctors are Homeward Bound

Jeremy Rowsell and Jim Hazelton, who are following in the pioneering steps of Charles Kingsford Smith and other aviators, are scheduled to arrive back in Sydney’s Bankstown airport this morning, Tuesday 19th April, at around 8.30 am AEST.

As they emulate Kingsford Smith’s 1928 trans-Pacific trip in a single-engine Beechcraft 36, the first 10,000 kms have taken them via Hawaii and Samoa to Norfolk Island. “Smithy,” as he was known, gained fame as the first man to fly from America to Australia in a three-engined monoplane called the Southern Cross. He later set the record for a Sydney to London trip before disappearing off the coast of Burma in 1935.

“Even with the modern flight technology at our disposal, physically, mentally and logistically it’s been a real challenge,” said Jeremy.

“Jim’s expertise and experience has been invaluable – especially when we had to turn back to San Francisco with full tanks. He’s almost 80, but he’s still got it.”

“We’ve had a few little dramas like our radio failing and having to turn back and land with full fuel tanks, then finding that the Middle East crisis has affected the supply of aviation fuel, forcing us to fly longer legs, but so far so good.”

“We’ve been overwhelmed by the kindness of strangers, particularly in Kiribati (Samoa) and here in Norfolk Island where people have been extremely supportive once they found out what we were doing and for whom.”

While re-creating aviation history has long been his dream, Jeremy, a long-time supporter of the Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS), is also aiming to raise money to help RFDS buy seven flight data recorders for their aircraft. They will enable RFDS aircraft to carry additional weight, in the shape of sophisticated medical equipment and clinicians to the remotest corners of NSW.

“I’ve flown across the Pacific for the RFDS because I know that if I were in trouble they would fly anywhere in Australia to help me.”

Clyde Thomson, Executive Director of the RFDS SE Section said, “I’d like to be the first to congratulate Jeremy and Jim on a magnificent achievement – flying across the Pacific is a true feat of skill and endurance.”

“We are very grateful that they chose the Royal Flying Doctor Service to receive the proceeds of their flight. The support of people in the community, like Jim and Jeremy, helps ensure the continuation of our services to people in rural and remote areas of Australia”.

Royal Flying Doctor Service (South Eastern Section)

More information about Flying 4 The Doctors can be found at www.flying4thedoctors.com
Follow the journey on RFDS social media: FACEBOOK / TWITTER / YOUTUBE / FLICKR
Please support us by donating now to the Royal Flying Doctor Service.

Flying 4 The Doctors – video footage of the flight

Here are a few videos we’ve received from Jim and Jeremy as they cross The Pacific.

A view inside the Beechcraft Bonanza A36 with Jim on the radio.

Side by side, Jim and Jeremy cross The Pacific.

Looking out the window approaching Samoa.

Jim and Jeremy will be back in Australia very soon.
More information about Flying 4 The Doctors can be found at www.flying4thedoctors.com
Follow the journey on RFDS social media: FACEBOOK / TWITTER / YOUTUBE / FLICKR Please support us by donating now to the Royal Flying Doctor Service.