“I’ll jump on a tractor...
go mustering, sharpen
chainsaws. People respond
because they trust you.”
September–October 2015 39on the console blinks. It notes our departure as a safety precau-
tion and also sends an automated text to Colin’s wife, Kim,
in New Zealand.
The couple met at a wedding – he was officiating, she was
the photographer – and they married in November last year,
each for the second time. Now they meet every six weeks with
Kim occasionally joining Colin on his travels. “Every time I take
her with me, the pastoral visit is enhanced,” he says.
From an altitude of 6500 feet, the West MacDonnell Ranges
seem to snake westward like a fractured spine, disappearing into
a blue mist on the horizon. The temperature outside the aircraft
registers on a windscreen gauge at a surprisingly warm 13oC.
Tnorala, known also as Gosse Bluff, soon appears below – the
remnants of a crater produced by a meteor strike 142 million
years ago. Long ridges give way to giant bubbles of stone over
Kings Canyon, where Colin fondly recalls another recent
wedding and two park rangers he married there. It is as if the
Cessna has rendered the outback the flying padre’s backyard.
Salt and sand at Lake Amadeus fall away until Docker River’s
notoriously windy airstrip emerges from the tumbled intersec-
tion of the Petermann and Bloods ranges and we set down.
Our day is long: almost 12 hours in total. We refuel at Yulara- officially known as Ayers Rock Airport – near Uluru, leaving
at sunset with the surrounding desert lit like a coral- encrusted
seabed. By the time the padre sets the Cessna smoothly down
at Alice Springs once more, it is evening.
During the day we cut nearly a tonne of firewood, talked at
length to staff and patrons at an aged care centre and responded
to a pickup request from a School of the Air teacher for the next
day. Colin flies about 200 hours each year, and drives another
20,000km by road. At $268 for each aircraft hour, the service
is not cheap. But the time saved over road travel is enormous.
The padre points out that with remote health being a constant
worry in the bush, the value of his service is not easily measured
in dollars. But dollars are increasingly pressing for Frontier
Services, which receives no government funding and is financed
entirely through private sponsorship. While their loss would be
tragic, it remains to be seen how many of the nation’s 14 remain-
ing patrol ministers might still be operational by next year.
Until then, weather permitting, the flying padre will continue
to roam the skies over Australia’s Red Centre.AG
Ground work. Colin also
covers about 20,000km
by road, much of it along
dusty outback routes.