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Speaker 1: Now I've mentioned this next story a couple of times.

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Speaker 1: Care Flight crews were recently tasked with quite a unique mission,

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Speaker 1: rescuing a man and his dog stranded on a vessel

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Speaker 1: on the remote crocodile inhabited South Alligator River. It followed

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Speaker 1: the activation of their emergency beacon their e PERP. Now

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Speaker 1: Careflight's top end rescue helicopter was deployed to the scene,

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Speaker 1: and joining us on the line right now is CareFlight

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Speaker 1: nurse Dean Blackney.

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Speaker 2: Good morning, Dean, Hey Katie over hear from you love

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Speaker 2: your show.

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Speaker 1: Oh it's lovely to have you on the show mate.

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Speaker 1: I tell you what, when I saw this come through,

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Speaker 1: I thought, goodness me, how did you manage to winch

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Speaker 1: up a man and his dog?

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Speaker 2: Yes, well it was a pretty, i guess, unusual job

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Speaker 2: for us. So it's not that uncommon to obviously be

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Speaker 2: doing this with people, but for me personally, Yeah, this

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Speaker 2: is the first time winching in a dog up to

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Speaker 2: the helicopter, that's for sure.

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Speaker 1: How did you sort of become aware of the situation?

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Speaker 2: Yeah, So it wasn't long into our shift in the

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Speaker 2: morning and we got a call from the Australiat Maritime

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Speaker 2: Safety Authority or amps are and they are based in Canberra,

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Speaker 2: and they received that activation of the ear purpse. So

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Speaker 2: the man set up the EARPURV he had with him.

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Speaker 2: It was all properly registered and everything. So they were

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Speaker 2: pretty quickly to establish who he was and that in

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Speaker 2: fact he was in distress call and for help.

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Speaker 1: And so whereabouts were they? Obviously on the South Alligator

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Speaker 1: River there somewhere, but whereabouts were they? And you know,

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Speaker 1: and what had sort of gone wrong?

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Speaker 2: Yes, so he was pretty well right at the mouth

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Speaker 2: of the South Alligated River, so a really long way

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Speaker 2: from anywhere. And yeah, more or less, it's one of

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Speaker 2: them kind of issues that can happen to any of us,

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Speaker 2: you know, mechanical problem, unforeseen. And yeah, he was basically stranded,

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Speaker 2: fully uninjured or anything.

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Speaker 1: Well thankfully. So now, now, like, talk me through a

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Speaker 1: rescue like this, Dane. I know that you guys do

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Speaker 1: this all the time, but how does it work? Is that, like,

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Speaker 1: is the chopper flying up above the boat, You guys

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Speaker 1: have got to winch down. You've got to then go

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Speaker 1: down and rescue this man and his dog.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, exactly, So in this situation, first you got to

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Speaker 2: find them. So I'm pretty lucky. I sit in the

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Speaker 2: back and do the medical stuff. They're out pile and crewey.

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Speaker 2: They they really leave that section of the mission. And

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Speaker 2: so firstly finding the guy off. He's off the lat

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Speaker 2: long provided from his GPS, that's from the EBB storry

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Speaker 2: his GPS coordinate, so found him. He was pretty savvy

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Speaker 2: as well. He fired off a flare when we were

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Speaker 2: near by, so we were able to see him pretty quickly. Awesome,

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Speaker 2: which can be harder than what you think when it's

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Speaker 2: fairly sort of sparse and dense scrub like that. And

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Speaker 2: then yeah, so's something we trained and trained for is

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Speaker 2: this winching? So obviously highly skilled, highly trained pilot comes

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Speaker 2: in really carefully, and our air crewm and actually operates

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Speaker 2: the hook with people like myself on it too, and

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Speaker 2: with this fellow. It was only a very tiny, tiny really,

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Speaker 2: but it was nosed up sort of onto the muddy bank,

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Speaker 2: so obviously too soft to land a helicopter on. Soy

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Speaker 2: winched down to the bank itself where he was in

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Speaker 2: his with his little dog running around.

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Speaker 1: Now I think the question on everybody's lips is what

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Speaker 1: kind of dog was it?

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Speaker 2: Dean so tefully just a part but I'm actually told

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Speaker 2: it was a half people half mastiff. When he's going

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Speaker 2: to get rather large, very friendly.

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Speaker 1: It might have been a bit more difficult if he

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Speaker 1: was full grown.

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Speaker 2: Would yes, possibly, And.

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Speaker 1: So they were both okay. Then once they got on

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Speaker 1: the chopper.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, they were. He'd he's sort of been pretty stoic,

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Speaker 2: and he'd spend the night there. I think he was

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Speaker 2: hoping that someone might come past in the morning and

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Speaker 2: he could weigh it down, but just being so remote

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Speaker 2: didn't happen. But they were okay. You know, he gave

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Speaker 2: it some water, Yeah, pretty, he had had some, but

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Speaker 2: you know, you never really have enough in them situations.

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Speaker 2: You go, you get dehydrated pretty easily.

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Speaker 1: Well, yeah, thank goodness, are okay, And thank goodness you

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Speaker 1: guys are able to get out there and find them

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Speaker 1: and help them. I mean, it is a bit of

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Speaker 1: a reminder for everybody, isn't it, to make sure that

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Speaker 1: they've got an epur By the sounds of it, this

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Speaker 1: blog had done the right.

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Speaker 2: Thing, absolutely, Yeah, yeah, as a game change of having

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Speaker 2: that EPA. But I just read to think how long

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Speaker 2: it would have been before he was able to see

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Speaker 2: someone to raise that alarm, and people may have known

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Speaker 2: it was missing, but it's like finding a needle in

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Speaker 2: a haystack out there, it's so massive.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, you're spot on. Well, I'd tell you what, Dean,

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Speaker 1: what a cracking story. I'm so glad that the bloke

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Speaker 1: was okay and his little dog, and glad that you know,

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Speaker 1: you guys are able to get out there and help them.

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Speaker 2: Yeah. No, we we were really glad too, And you'll

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Speaker 2: bela liked to you to say that it wasn't a

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Speaker 2: fairly fun job really, but I was really could to

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Speaker 2: be able to make a difference.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, spot on. Well, Dean Blackney, lovely to talk to

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Speaker 1: you this morning. Thank you so much for your time.

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Speaker 2: No no raise, Katie, thank you.

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Speaker 1: Good on you. Thanks Dean,