Royal Flying Doctor Service Aircraft AccidentPrint Page

This memorial was erected in memory of those who lost their lives in the crash of the Royal Flying Doctor Service aircraft on the 30th April 1981. The memorial shows the face of flight nurse Judith Osborne, and the stone came from one of the goldmines at Kalgoorlie. 

Pilot Arthur Turner, Flight Nurse Judith Osborne, passenger Alexander Coxall and an infant patient, Stephen Lane died in the accident. A 16 year old girl, Daphne McLean was the only survivor.

The plane, a twin engine Piper Navajo Chieftain was returning from Jamieson, near Warburton, after dark when it was hit by a severe squall at Boulder, 4 kilometres east of Kalgoorlie. The aircraft entered a dust cloud and the turbulent conditions took the craft through varying altitudes. It then collided with the head frame at the Chaffers Gold Mine. The left wing was torn off and the plane crashed to the ground.

Captain Turner, a former fighter pilot with the Indian Air Force, was one of the most experienced pilots in Australia after clocking up nearly 23,000 hours across more than three decades in the cockpit. Sister Osborne had seven years’ experience with the Royal Flying Doctor Service.

The crash was the first in the 44 year history of the Eastern Goldfields division of the Royal Flying Doctor Service. 

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