Our unique Royal Flying Doctor Service was born of the long and proud Australian tradition of helping a mate. John Flynn, a Presbyterian minister, saw the need for a " mantle of safety" for the people of the outback when be began preaching there in 1912. By 1920 Hudson Fysh, founder of our national airline QANTAS, had identified a plane suitable to carry a patient and doctor/pilot. When young engineer, Alf Traeger, provided the missing communications link with his invention of pedal radio in 1927, the vision became reality. The first flight was made from Cloncurry in north west Queensland in May, 1928. The tiny open cockpit plane and pedal radio have long been museum pieces, but Flynn's concept remains vital to those in remote areas of this vast continent which is as large as Western Europe, two-thirds the size of the U.S.A. and many times that of the U.K. and Japan. Life saving dramas are dally events with emergencies ranging from road, mining and cattle station accidents to difficult births and sudden illness. A significant number of medical evacuations involve tourists. Just as important to those far from a doctor are regular clinic visits to small towns and homestead communities and being able to consult an R.F.D.S. doctor 24 hours a day by radio and/or telephone.