Episode 15 Emergency Rescue Down Under

They're the Brits who race to the rescue down under.

Multiple patients critical.

Everyday heroes, saving lives.

12 miles to run.

Battling fires...

Do not go out now, it's too late.

It can be extremely dangerous.

..and fighting crime.

-Put your arm down.

-Police! Open the door!

From the big city to the outback.

Our policing district is bigger than the whole of the UK.

From the bush...

He's been crushed between one of those Dingo diggers and a ute.

..to Bondi beach.

The search continues for a British tourist who hasn't been seen

since he went for a swim.

You never quite know what you're in for or what's going to happen.

3-3-2, mate, on the head in.

Very high impact. He's really quite critically injured.

Brits on blue lights under blue skies.

Today, down under - a British flying doctor's scrambled

to save a jockey with a head injury.

Can you tell me what day it is?

Friday, are you sure? It's actually Thursday.

An elderly motorist is trapped under the wreckage of his garage.

As soon as that structure goes, then it could be

a disaster for those inside it.

And UK vet Lucy is called to treat a very rare bird.

And they've got like, razors along their beaks, so they can peck

and they can bite and it can hurt.

Australia's bush is a place where the horse is still king,

many of them wild and untamed.

But they have a special place in the hearts of big city Aussies, too.

'Melbourne Cup is approaching fast

'so secure your place for the exciting...'

'And if your horse finishes second, third or fourth, cashback up to 50.'

It's the eve of the biggest event in the Australian racing calendar.

Ambulance emergency, what town or suburb, please?

But on the outskirts of Sydney, one jockey's had a potentially

fatal fall.

Just stay on the line for a second,

I'll tell you exactly what to do next, OK?

British flying doctor Persia Waldock used to treat

patients from the Grand National when she worked in Liverpool.

Now she's about to rescue the victim of another racing accident.

Yeah, good morning. We're just airborne out of Westmead,

medevac for an accident in, er...

INDISTINCT

30 miles away, jockey Amanda Williams is showing signs

of confusion, potential symptoms of a serious head injury.

She was headbutted by her horse, then thrown off.

-Nine miles to run, about five minutes, mate.

-Copy.

OK, so I think we've got this clear area.

Former RAF crewman John Legge is in charge of navigation.

There's a road that's running right to left.

Power lines just over here on the right, we need to be wary of those.

Right-oh, guys, we got no ambulances and they're 40 minutes out.

Landing site is a helipad with a big H on it down near the river.

Oh, yeah - someone's waving at the H, look.

Three, two, one.

Clear to low clear down.

Down to ground. And two...

one,

six inches.

They've landed in dense woods near the picturesque Hawkesbury River.

Road paramedics are still half an hour away.

G'day.

How we doing?

Hi, guys - you guys are stars.

Did she black out or anything?

-Ah, she's been like spinning out kind of thing.

-Just been spinning out?

-Yeah.

She knows who she is and where she is? OK, cool.

OK, what time did this happen?

Um, about 9.30.

-And what's her name?

-Amanda.

Amanda. Excellent.

Amanda's lying on the floor of the stables where she works.

-Hello.

-How are you?

-This is Amanda, is it?

Yeah.

Hi, Amanda. Do you know where you are?

With the race horses.

With race horses.

And um, can you tell me what day it is?

Friday.

Friday, are you sure? It's actually Thursday.

Now, are you sore anywhere?

Your head. OK.

Have you got pain anywhere else?

Every year, jockeys die in accidents like this

and Amanda's symptoms are concerning Dr Persia.

A serious head injury can only be ruled out by a scan in hospital.

So is this sore over your forehead, there? Yep.

This side?

Yeah.

How about over your face? That's sore.

Dr Persia needs to get her patient to hospital in Sydney.

Time is critical.

If she DOES have a bleed on the brain,

CareFlight 4 is her best chance of survival.

It's the early hours of the morning in the city of Perth.

Every year there are 35,000 burglaries in Western Australia

and British police officers Andy Motson

and Carly Hall get their fair share to investigate.

INDISTINCT

An automatic alarm has alerted the key-holder of a suburban store.

Oh, yeah - someone's smashed the window. Ah, somebody's broke in.

Andy once pursued burglars

as a beat bobby on the streets of Middlesbrough.

Where's the key-holder then? He said he was inside.

Carly took calls from the victims as a 999 operator in the Midlands.

Hello.

Want to open this from inside?

Here you are - do you want to put some gloves on?

Fewer than one in five burglaries around Perth

results in a conviction.

It's a hard crime to solve the world over

and in some British cities, it's fewer than one in ten.

So you've had a good look around and there's nothing else gone?

I've had a quick scout around. This is only place I can see that's had any kind of damage.

We had another one earlier this year in about

-April or May time.

-OK.

Similar things. Through the front doors.

Forensics have to come and um, dust for prints

and take any further photographs that we have missed.

But often, the best evidence is on tape.

What's your cameras like inside?

Uh, yeah, pretty good. I've not looked at the cameras yet.

-I've only just been here about five minutes myself.

-OK.

So it's probably about four o'clock onwards is it, or...?

-Uh, yeah, I think it probably would be.

-Yeah.

Although the burglar has been caught on camera,

he's difficult to identify.

He's not got... He hasn't got any gloves on.

Yeah, doesn't look like he's wearing gloves.

Obviously from that, it's really imperative

-that no-one touches that area.

-Yeah.

-OK.

The store opens at 11,

-think we can get someone in before that?

-Yeah, hopefully.

-Yeah.

-Forensics will come up.

-Is there any cameras on the actual entrance, or not?

-No.

-Yeah.

-Oh, there is?

Is that him coming out?

-That is him coming in.

-Ah, OK. Yeah.

A Caucasian.

The store has millions of dollars worth of stock,

but the burglar knew what he was looking for.

-He's just grabbed something, it looks like clothing probably.

-OK.

Which is bizarre, cos he's in the cabinet where all the GPSs are,

so if you wanted to make money, then you'd have just taken a GPS.

-So yeah, he took, he took pretty much all the Leathermans and Gerber multi-tools.

-OK. So it...

-It will be hard to track what that is, cos there's just...

-Oh, really.

It seems likely the damage caused by the burglars is going to add up

to more than the value of the stock they stole, but no-one's quite sure.

So you don't do stock takes or anything?

We've literally just done one, but whether it's accurate or

not in such a big store, it's kind of another thing.

-Thanks, Jack.

-Thank you very much.

The chances are this is yet another theft committed to fund

a drug habit. Andy and Carly know it will be a difficult crime to solve.

We'll see you later, mate.

But in Perth tonight, the police are going to

be on the lookout for people wearing new coats.

30 miles north of Sydney, jockey Amanda Williams is showing

the classic signs of a serious head injury after a freak accident

involving the race horse she was exercising.

So I'm just having a quick look at your helmet.

You can tell I don't ride horses. But that looks pretty decent.

British flying doctor Persia Waldock

has ruled out a spinal injury,

but she's concerned Amanda could have a bleed on the brain.

Amanda?

I'm just going to shine a light in your eyes, OK?

That's good.

They need to get Amanda to the chopper

and crewman John has been improvising.

We've landed maybe 200, 300 metres away

and it's not the easiest place

to transport her, so what we're actually going to do is see if

we can get hold of a vehicle and um, put her in the back of that to take

her to the aircraft and then we'll load her in before we take off.

They're going to fly her direct to hospital in Sydney.

Many years ago, I used to work at Aintree hospital in Liverpool

near to Aintree racecourse so there were certain times of the year

where we'd get a fair few jockeys in with anything

from really minor injuries to quite severe trauma from horse racing.

Coming out here to Sydney,

there's a surprising number

of horse stables and race tracks

and a lot of horse-related work.

Not your normal way to travel, is it?

It's not the first time that we've had to do this, actually.

But we can't carry her all the way to the aircraft.

Um, it's a good like 200, 300 metres or whatever.

There's lots of vehicles and as long as

the medics stay with her, then it's all good.

And then once we feed it in, if you guys just peel off.

When we've come to her, she's been GCS 15.

Um, she has um, some tenderness around her face and scalp,

um, but otherwise has no other associated injuries.

Our ETA is about 20 minutes.

Amanda's on her way to X-rays and scans.

We need to make sure that she's not had a significant head injury.

Um, I can't find anything else.

Um, she seems to be quite stable

and a bit more relaxed now.

INDISTINCT

At 160mph, it will take CareFlight 4 just ten minutes

to fly Amanda from the heart of the Hawkesbury valley

into the centre of the city.

Westmead already know we're coming.

Yeah, no dramas.

OK, so I'm going to come round and do a bit of a flyover

and a late right-hand turn.

OK, yeah. Sure.

30 to run, 20 below.

20 below, 20 to run.

Ten to run. Five...

Four, three,

two, one...

After an assessment,

Amanda's given a clean bill of health, apart from minor concussion.

She's sent home and she's soon back in the saddle.

At Sydney's International Airport, Juanita Ameghino is a flight nurse

caring for some of Australia's sickest people.

OK, retrieval kit two.

One, two, three, four, five.

One, two. One. One, two, three. One. One.

-Yep.

-Beautiful.

For up to two hours, patients' lives are solely in her hands

and she's prepared for anything.

Midazolam 15 in 3.

-COUNTS ITEMS

-Perfect.

Every morning we have to make sure that all the morphine, midazolam

um, fentanyl and all the other drugs of addiction are correct.

So we count them all every morning

and then we're good to go for the rest of the day.

This is the ambulance of the outback, transferring patients

from minor hospitals to specialist units in the big city.

Oh, hi - can you put me through to the medical level 2, please?

Oh, hi, Sue - my name's Juanita. I'm a flight nurse phoning from Sydney.

Just wanting a bit of a handover about Kerry Macintosh

with a view to flying, please.

OK, so she last had her aspirin yesterday.

Aspirin ceased since 30th, yeah.

And just a set of observations, please.

FLIGHT CREW RECITE CHECKS

We haven't got a flight plan at all for her at the moment.

As soon as we get one, we'll let you know.

But the trouble is, you know like,

these patients, they get fasted for so long and then, and it makes them

feel quite nauseated in the plane as well if they're on an empty stomach.

And today Juanita has a difficult case, a patient with

a serious heart condition who needs urgent treatment in Sydney.

Oh, what a nice day for flying.

The patient we're getting from Canberra today

is a 60-year-old lady.

She had a aortic valve replacement a year ago at St Vincent's hospital

and that's closed up again and she's, um,

got chest pain with that, so we're bringing her back into St Vincent's private

to get that assessed and possibly she'll have

to have a re-do of the aortic valve replacement.

This is a potentially risky case for Juanita.

Flying can affect cardiac patients.

The thinner air at altitude is a real danger to some.

PILOT GIVES COORDINATES OVER RADIO

With the aortic valve replacement, she could become short of breath

and with the physiology of flying anyway,

so that's something I'm going to have to observe for.

And also to make sure that she doesn't get any chest pain

with that shortness of breath.

So I would be trying to make her comfortable.

I'd probably put her on ECG recordings just to make sure

that her heart is OK and uh,

I'll certainly, um, put her on saturation monitoring

to make sure that she doesn't de-saturate too much.

She may need a little bit of oxygen and just to keep her comfortable.

But the speed of flying the patient outweighs the risks.

From Canberra to Sydney by plane will be less than an hour.

I'm thinking 45 minutes

and to bring her by road would take three to four hours.

But because it's Friday afternoon, she could get caught

in the rush hour, so we could be looking at five hours.

So coming by plane will be a lot more comfortable for her.

Thousands of people in the Australian countryside

owe their lives to these planes.

Farmer's wife Kerry Mackintosh needs surgery.

The oxygen levels in her blood have fallen dangerously low.

The flight back across the Blue Mountains

will be a tense one for Juanita.

Vic Larusso here,

significant traffic delays citybound for the M5.

River road...

In the crowded streets of Sydney,

a life-or-death drama is unfolding.

We haven't got a huge amount of detail, but we're going to an 87-year-old gentleman

that's trapped inside a car that's in a garage which has collapsed

onto the car, so he's trapped in there just now.

We don't know his injuries right now.

But um, obviously cos he's trapped and they'd like us to go and get there as soon as possible.

Scottish doctor Caroline Macari is joining the rescue operation.

It looks like a Christchurch earthquake garage. This is what all the garages did.

Hello.

How you doing?

We got an elderly gentlemen who's um...

Where he put his accelerator on the, on the pedal,

he took out the middle pillar.

Yeah.

Uh, half the garage has collapsed onto his roof.

-He hasn't been crushed.

-Yeah.

At the moment, we can see he's got an isolated hand injury.

It's feared the roof could collapse at any moment.

What they're trying to do is just prop up the passenger side,

on that side of the garage, so we can access him through there.

Doctor Caroline would like to see her patient, but it's too risky.

If those walls go, he's going to get... I'd like to get a monitor

on him before we move him out of the car.

Obviously there's quite a few rescue crew inside there.

So if that structure goes, then it could be a disaster

for those inside it.

So it's very easy to rush into a scene like that knowing there's

a patient inside, and getting yourself into a lot of trouble.

Um, but the commander is just telling me to stand back.

They're happy with him just now and

I need to just stay out the way because there is

some potentially very unstable walls still.

It's an hour before the trapped man is finally released.

His injuries are minor,

but it could've been much worse.

The fire brigade were able to cut the door away and um, able to

get him out and actually he was able to walk out, which is brilliant.

So that's an amazing result.

Um, he's been very lucky.

I think he feels very embarrassed, but it's just one of those things

and he's just so lucky. And who cares about a garage?

On the other side of the Blue Mountains

in the Aussie capital Canberra,

flight nurse Juanita Ameghino is ready to

take off with patient Kerry Mackintosh, who's on her way

to open heart surgery in Sydney.

Pop yourself on here.

There's just a thing here - just watch yourself on there.

So I'd get your bum here.

Kerry needs a new valve in her heart.

That's it, well done.

-..Move you this way.

-Thank you.

I noticed when you were talking to me that you're quite short of breath,

-so that's normal for you, is it?

-Well, I'm good now.

Yes, that's good for you.

OK. So, look - I might need to give you some oxygen during flight.

-Yeah. I've been on oxygen.

-Have you? Yeah.

-Yeah.

-I just, what I'll do is...

I get down to about 91 or something and they put the oxygen on

-and I come back up.

-That sounds right.

I might do... I might do it before 91, if that's all right?

THEY LAUGH

Flight nurse Juanita, originally from Jersey, is concerned

that as the plane climbs into thinner air to cross

the Blue Mountains, Kerry's condition may deteriorate.

She's happier sitting up.

She gets quite short of breath when she's laying down.

So she's in the chair.

Her respiratory rate's quite high - it's 30 - but she said

just to talk to her, she is quite short of breath.

She looks pale.

Yeah, and she certainly needs to um,

have a cardiac assessment

and probably some kind of treatment done sooner rather than later.

At last, the pilot can descend.

In less than an hour,

Kerry has been flown 300 miles from Canberra to Sydney.

50, 40, 30,

20, 10.

Juanita is pleased with Kerry's condition.

She's now just a few miles from the Sydney hospital where she's

scheduled for surgery.

This is her oxygen, just in case needs it.

Hold on to that handle there.

I'll give you this. Thank you. You got it.

I'm not bringing you back for a third time, OK,

so make sure this time works!

I bloody will! I said I'd never, ever go back for the second time.

Kerry's gone to St Vincent's private

and she'll be assessed this afternoon.

She's going for an urgent angiogram and they'll probably

re-do her cardiac surgery tomorrow morning.

Juanita moved down under in the 1990s,

but many of her patients can still tell where she came from.

She said, "What part of England are you from, then?"

A lot of the country people pick up on my English accent straight away.

They say you never lose it. I don't know.

I'm neutral to it now.

Do I still sound English?

Perth is often called the world's most isolated city.

Sydney is more than 2,000 miles away.

That's around the same distance as London to Jerusalem.

But British policemen Rob and Colin enjoy technology that's world-class.

Rob's spotted a biker whose speed has put him on the team's radar.

Within a few seconds, Colin knows who he is,

thanks to the onboard computer.

Has he got a bike licence?

I think he's got a provisional and a learner's.

In that case, he's driving out of class.

They're going to pull him over.

-So who owns the bike?

-Uh, me.

-It's registered in your name?

-Yeah.

OK. What type of licence do you hold?

RE and C.

What uh, licence or learner's?

-Licence.

-Yeah?

-Yeah.

-OK.

Rob finds that Australian lawbreakers are rather more

straightforward than those in London.

'The culture there is very much,'

fail to stop your car and then

if you have to stop, you try and run away.

Then if you get caught, you lie about who you are and then

when you get into custody and you get your prints taken

and you're cornered you might, you MIGHT put your hands up.

Whereas here, it's kind of as a general rule, probably the opposite.

Most people you stop and you ask them a straight question,

they give you a straight answer.

But this time it's the technology that's found guilty

of providing misleading information.

When did you get your bike licence?

Uh, last year around Christmas time, I think.

OK. Just, on ours, it comes up that you got, er,

C class and then RE learner's on our system, but...

Oh, you're joking.

You got it on there, so, I'm satisfied. No dramas, mate.

The biker's free to go, but their night shift is not over yet.

Many British officers feel they don't work as hard in Australia and

have time to attend minor incidents

like a man seen lying in the park.

So we're just going up, there's another car on scene though, we're

just going to go up and have a look and see what the score is.

It was just reported there was a male lying in the park.

When I first turned up here, I worked at a police station called

Mirrabooka which is probably the biggest

or busiest police station in the northern suburbs of Perth.

I was kind of ready to jump into it

and I quickly realised that the busy station was actually pretty quiet.

The workload here is definitely a lot less.

INDISTINCT RADIO TRANSMISSION

Is he breathing?

Another unit has beaten Rob and Colin and discovered that the body

in the park is actually a homeless man sleeping off the day before.

Uh, November, Bravo, 104,

do we need ambos there to uh, look him over, or are we all good?

Looks all good from here, mate, but I'll check.

I'll get back to you if we do.

He's one of 10,000 homeless people who hoped to find a better life

in Western Australia, but didn't.

4,000 feet up in Australia's spectacular Blue Mountains,

British emergency vet Lucy King is settling into a new life down under.

Lay down. Good boy. Go!

Get your ball, come on - quick!

Lucy used to practise in Bristol -

now, the mountain town of Katoomba is home.

I came over here with my husband Ben.

We got married a couple of weeks before we moved over.

And we brought the dog with us cos he's like our little fur child,

so we couldn't leave him behind.

So, yeah, it's living up to our expectations.

We're going to make a few tweaks and changes but

it's going really well so far.

It's the different animals that I was wanting to see,

and it was part of the reason we moved over, so it's good

to see all of the strange creatures that Australia has to offer.

And today, her first patient is a very rare species

rescued by two local farmers.

This fella was found in a narrow creek in the back

of a property about 200ks from the ocean, so...

Yeah, I don't know. We'll see what we can do with him.

-Hey, buddy.

-Just here?

Back of Kendall's place.

The cows were all looking at one spot, which they never do unless there's something going on.

-Yeah.

-And I went down and there was the pelican, caught in scrub.

The pelican's a sea bird and he was well and truly off course.

How flappy was he when you got to him?

Um, reasonably.

Flappy!

Oh, no - he has cut the webbing on his foot a little bit.

Yeah, he sort of climbed in through a fence.

Are you guys good to help hold him while I pull his wings out to look?

Cos I think he's probably quite strong.

Yeah, no worries, I'll grab both legs while you grab that end.

-You grab that end. Yeah.

-Yeah?

His medical problem is a bit of a mystery.

He was sort of flapping, but I don't think...

I couldn't see anything broken.

Hmm, this side's sore.

Been flapping around in the scrub for a while,

-so probably did a fair bit of damage.

-Yeah. All right, bird.

Handling a pelican can be risky.

They've got like, razors along their beak so they can peck

and they can bite and it can hurt and it can be quite scary.

I don't think he could cause any major damage to any people,

but he could still cause injuries.

Cor! It goes a long way.

-Can you see me watch?

-LAUGHTER

Good. I mean, other than being sore in his arms,

I can't find anything obvious.

He's a little bit skinny, but not too bad.

So, I'll see... See if we're happy to keep him here overnight

and maybe do some X-rays tomorrow.

Hi, buddy.

-Cool, I'll go and pop him in a kennel.

-All right.

-Thanks very much.

-No worries, take care.

And give us a call if you want to know what happens with him.

-We'd love to, actually.

-Yeah, we'd love to know about him.

-No worries, thank you very much.

-Thanks, guys.

-See you later.

Newly christened Mr Percival after the star of an Aussie kids' film,

the pelican is being kept under observation.

He'll spend tonight in the surgery.

24 hours later, Mr Percival is off the danger list

and anxious to check out of the mountain vets'.

PELICAN CROAKS

I didn't know they made that noise! He sounded like a cow.

He's being driven to a safe takeoff area nearer the coast.

Duck your head, buddy.

And is soon back in the skies with the rest of Australia's sea birds.