High-flying heroes: the

our high-flying first responders

WORDS by GENEV EV GANNON PHOTOGRAP Y by ALANA LANDSBERRY

When someone’s in trouble in Australia’s rugged wilderness or wild oceans, first responders put their own lives on the line to get there. The Weekly salutes our rescue chopper crews.

Often, the most dangerous moment in a drowning rescue is when the valiant says you can literally see their urgency drain away when they know help is

But he’s never lost a soul that way. The rescue choppers’ three-person crews are finely calibrated teams trained to be their best in critical situations. While Geoff works the winch, rescue crew officer Nick Pavlakis is lowered into the freezing ocean where he puts his capable arms around the shivering, submerged human and tells them everything is going to be okay. Pilot Andrew Chapman holds the chopper steady while they work. Geoff can see the relief and gratitude in the faces of the people who’ve just been saved. They break into a smile. Sometimes tears. “They’re flooded with all different emotions,” he says. It can be overwhelming. One moment, all hope was lost, and the next, a team of smiling heroes has shown up, confident and strong. Nick slips the “snatch strap” under the arms of the rescuee and soon the two of them are being lifted out of the waves, towards the safety of the chopper. It’s a high stakes game. But this is what they’re trained for, and they’re world class. Since it started in 1973, the Westpac Lifesaver Rescue Helicopter Service (WLRHS) has saved more than 24,000 Australian lives.

“It’s the oldest civilian rescue service in the world,” says Shane Daw, General Manager of the service’s Southern Region. “It was out of Maroubra that the first service really kicked off. There were a lot of drowning deaths happening at the time and they were saying, how can we be more effective to get out there in the surf?”

Surf Lifesaving searched the world for ways to reduce drownings. The UK coast guard was using helicopters and the all-volunteer crew at Maroubra, in Sydney’s south, realised a chopper could help them reach swimmers and surfers out past the big surf. They got some money from Westpac for a chopper that they used to drop lifesavers in budgie smugglers into the surf. Eighty thousand missions later, the idea that grew out of a community’s determination to save as many lives as possible has wrapped its arms right around Australia. The service has 15 choppers and one boat operating out of 13 bases. A three-person crew can complete as many as 12 rescues a day flying at speeds of up to 300 km/h. Missions range from disoriented bushwalkers to capsized boats. They turn up to national emergencies. Some choppers do urgent hospital transfers. There are giddy triumphs, and devastating lows. Often, they don’t know what they’re flying into.

On his very first day, Nick Pavlakis was part of the team responding to a cryptic call about an empty vessel drifting out to sea. It was a 40ft yacht sighted off the coast near Bundeena, so the crew leapt into the chopper and took off.

“We didn’t really know what to make of it, so we started heading there,” he says. They arrived within five minutes, by which time the waves had turned the boat around, and it had smashed into the headland. As far as they knew there was no one on board, but they couldn’t be sure. NSW Police, Fire and Marine Rescue had also responded to the call but none of them could get close enough to the boat. It was a critical situation.

“We had to do a risk assessment because the boat was up on the rocks getting smashed by the waves,” Nick says. They hovered overhead, trying to gauge whether it was safe to go down. Every second was vital. The nose of the yacht was wedged under a rock and if Nick was dropped onto the boat, his weight could dislodge it.

Above: The first rescue chopper was used to take lifesavers out past the big surf. Right: A three-man crew from 1980. Previous page: Rescue officer Nick Pavlakis in action.

Pilot Andrew Chapman, aircraft officer Geoff Jansen and rescue officer Nick Pavlakis keep our seas safe as part of the Westpac Lifesaver Rescue Helicopter Service.

“The tricky part was that the helicopter was moving and the boat was moving, and everything was out of sync,” he says. They decided to send him into the unknown, and soon he was searching the yacht for signs of life. What he found was chaos.“I peeked into the cabin and all the furniture, the tables, cabinets, everything, was just absolutely buried from the impact when it hit the cliff-line,” he says.

But the engine was running and keys were in the ignition, so he knew he had to search for survivors.

“I was thinking, someone had to have been here. Did they jump? A thousand things were going through my head.” He tried to get into the cabin, but his path was blocked by the furniture that had been thrown into disarray. Then he noticed a clue: a smear of blood on an upturned table.

“Then I saw him. On the floor was a gentleman.” He was unconscious, and pinned under furniture, but he still had some colour, so Nick began furiously pulling the obstructions out of the way. The man was in a wetsuit, which made things harder. “I dragged him out, harnessed him up, put it under the legs and got a clear winch to winch him up. We continued CPR on board. We did a handover with doctors and paramedics.”

Sadly, the man died in hospital a few days later. The team did everything they could, but the reality of life in a rescue crew is that happy endings are sometimes out of reach. They still give everything they have to every mission. When it pays off, it is incredible.

Andrew tells the story of four fishermen who had become trapped between two rocks as the tide rushed in, cutting them off from the mainland.

“They were all jammed down between these rocks and the surf’s just washing over the top of them. It was night. There was a 30-knot crosswind. We brought up two individually. By the time the rescue crew went down for the third guy, they were just about awash and in danger of being washed away.” They pulled the last two out together and flew them over the rising tide. “It was a great achievement to save their lives,” Andrew says, modest, but smiling.

Another time, he was sent to track an Emergency Locator Transmitter (ELT) that was pinging off the coast at Long Reef, on Sydney’s Northern Beaches. The instructions were to “find out if it’s for real”. Several times a year, rescue choppers are sent to track down ELTs that have been disposed of incorrectly or set off as a prank. That’s what Andrew thought this call-out was when he leapt into his pilot’s seat.

He was travelling east when he spotted a container ship, so he started tracking it, but as he drew nearer, his cockpit instruments started telling him he’d passed the ELT.

“We came around and did another pass,” he says. Still nothing. “We descended to 500 feet and turned on the night sun, which is a light that can literally light up a valley. Lo and behold, there’s an overturned boat with three people on it, clinging to the hull.” The choppers can’t winch at night, so they stayed above the boat until the water police arrived. All three were pulled aboard, overjoyed. “They were pretty happy,” Andrew says, adding that saving one person makes all the dark and difficult missions worthwhile.

The choppers’ crews have accomplished breathtaking rescues, winching people from tough spots and

swooping in to save the lives of swimmers swept out to sea. But the service has evolved to do so much more.

Rosalynd O’Shannassy, 70, is emotional as she talks about the day she joined what she calls “the rescue club”. A day that was pre-empted a year earlier.

In 2013, Rosalynd was at lunch with a group of ladies called the Red Hatters when they made a spontaneous decision to take up a collection for the Rescue Helicopter Service. They presented the cheque to the local chopper station, in Broadmeadow, Newcastle, where they met crew member Glen Ramplin. Glen was something of a local hero for helping save 22 lives when a coal carrier ran aground off Newcastle in 2007. He’d worked under perilous conditions including, famously, getting an electric shock every time he touched the carrier’s deck.

Rosalynd was thrilled to meet the crew. “I love helicopters,” she says. “There was an ambition many, many years ago to be a helicopter pilot.” Little did she know what a critical role they were about to play in her life.

A year later, in October 2014, she was awake, pottering around the house at 3.30 in the morning, when unbearable pains started shooting through her back, neck and head. Her husband, Tony, called triple-zero, and an ambulance arrived on the scene. Then everything went black.

“I was unconscious from the time the ambos came. I woke up in the helicopter and I saw the bloke putting a mask on my face, and dragging me in. I saw the blades going around. That’s all I remember about the helicopter.”

“I next woke up in ICU [in Sydney]. The neurosurgeon said, ‘You’re lucky to be alive. You’ve got a second life’.”

Rosalynd had suffered a brain bleed which, she later realised, has a survival rate of only 30 per cent. Her recovery process was arduous. She was in hospital for six weeks and it wasn’t until she returned home that the full weight of her narrow escape finally dawned on her.

“That’s when I actually broke,” says Rosalynd. “I just cried and cried. There were so many tears, happy and sad. Now, I celebrate every single day.”

Part of that celebration involves raising money for the rescue service. When she was well enough, Rosalynd went to the base to meet the crew that had saved her life. Among them was Glen Ramplin. She says meeting her saviours face-to-face was healing.

“It was overwhelming. Glen showed me the entry from my rescue. I linked my arm in his. He was so lovely.”

They still communicate to this day, and Rosalynd has begun making angels that she sells to raise money to support the Rescue Chopper service. She’s amazed how many people who she meets through her fundraising efforts are also part of the rescue club.

“There’s a gentleman who makes the boxes [for her angels]. He’s a recipient. He’s had three heart operations. The helicopter is part of his story. Then there’s a young man in the Westpac branch here. I told him my story, and he’s been rescued by the helicopter too.

“The helicopter flies directly over us here, and I always wave at them. I know they’re on a mission. I know they’re out there to transport someone – they’re part of someone’s survival –and it makes me very, very thankful.”

For their part, Andrew, Geoff and Nick love it when people they’ve helped come by the Sydney base to say hello, but none of the heroes in the nationwide service do it for the recognition. Photos of their rescues show how meaningful the work is to them. It captures their compassion, as crew members lay a protective hand on a shaking shoulder. It shows the warmth of a hug when someone is safely inside the chopper.

“You’re trying to provide the support that you can,” says Shane. “There’s a lot of tragedy as well. I’ve been involved in a lot of fatalities, as have all the crew, but the thing is, if we weren’t there, how many other lives would be lost? We’ll do whatever it takes.” AWW

Pilot Andrew Chapman flew his first rescue mission 23 years ago. Below: Geoff Jansen demonstrates some of the safety equipment on board the rescue chopper.

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