SEARCH
CareFlight pilot hailed as a hero
Posted in Medical News by Mat Packer.
A CareFlight medical evacuation flight operated by Pel-Air from Apia (Western Samoa) to Melbourne was scheduled to land at Norfolk Island for a planned fuel stop on Wednesday evening when it encountered deteriorating weather conditions.
After several unsuccessful approaches and with diminishing fuel, the pilot-in-command, Captain Dominic James, made the decision to carry out a controlled landing onto the water off the coast of Norfolk Island.
The aircraft, a specially-equipped medical retrieval Westwind jet carried out a successful landing on the water and the patient, accompanying spouse and two medical crew as well as the pilots evacuated safely. They were rescued by boat and brought to the local Norfolk Island hospital for observation. The Captain reported that all passengers and crew did not have any apparent injuries.
Further details are on CareFlight’s website.
CareFlight are a valued client of SCHILLER Australia, having outfitted several of their retrieval aircraft with ARGUS ProLifecare patient monitors, so we are very happy to see that no one was injured in the ditching of this aircraft.
And we’d like to extend a big “dude you’re awesome” to the Captain Dominic James for his text book ditching.
Feel free to comment below.