CareFlight

CareFlight is an aeromedical rescue and retrieval service. Their mission is to save lives, speed recovery and serve the community by providing the highest standard of rapid response critical care.

Their specially trained medical crews use helicopters, planes and road ambulances to bring a hospital level of care to their patients.

CareFlight has bases in New South Wales and Australia’s Northern Territories, and they serve much of Australia. CareFlight was founded in 1995 and began running one aircraft. Today they run twenty aircraft and have over five hundred staff on board.

The Challenge

Keeping track of their growing fleet

It was vital that CareFlight had the ability to obtain complete fleet situational awareness for the growing organisation. Their team and fleet now service much of Australia, operating in some of the most remote parts of the world. 

Remote and expansive terrain

CareFlight operate in extremely remote locations. It’s therefore imperative that they can rely on a tracking and communication system which keeps their team safe and accounted for. The CareFlight tracker that was chosen is provided by TracPlus.

“We can fly for an hour and a half in the Northern Territories and not see anybody. That is how vast and remote it is up here.”
Greg Ohlsson, Fleet Manager

The distances between their rescues are expansive. In the same day, they can fly 140 miles offshore for a winch rescue, and then the same distance inland to one of Australia’s most remote National Parks.

“I measured the distance of a day’s work that I had done to Daly Waters and back, and it was the same distance between London to Frankfurt. Those distances are unique in the world for a helicopter pilot.”
Greg Ohlsson, Fleet Manager

Flying these distances offers up unique challenges, including planning and accounting for fuel. TracPlus ensures company-wide transparency — everyone knows where their aircraft, staff and resources are headed, so they can respond if the team run into any challenges along the way.

Why TracPlus?

TracPlus allows the CareFlight team to organise their growing fleet, and ensure their team is safe and accounted for in remote terrain.

CareFlight run TracPlus on the boards in their mission centres continuously — this is the way they track both their aircraft and ground vehicles. TracPlus allows their crews to know and understand where a vehicle is, and also where it’s been, so they can plan out their jobs effectively.

“For us, TracPlus is an essential tool because we fly in some of the most remote areas of Australia, and some of the most remote areas in the world that have a helicopter responding to them.”
Greg Ohlsson, Fleet Manager

Due to the remoteness of their work, reliable communication is key. Once they leave the Darwin greater area, they have no way to communicate for the next two hours. Having TracPlus offers their team peace of mind, so if they’re well out of cellular range, they’re always in reach.

“The rescue centre can see exactly where we are, and where we’ve been. So if anything was to go wrong, this reduces rescue times down from days or weeks — to hours.”
Greg Ohlsson, Fleet Manager

Having TracPlus allows for a greater understanding across the entire team, and also means crews can be left to do their job effectively without the distraction of having to call in or answer messages.

“We know where all our vehicles are, and more importantly where all of our crews are, all of the time.”
Craig Gibbons, General Manager

TracPlus ensures the team at CareFlight can get their work done safely and effectively so they can continue to selflessly serve the community.