Sick Australian In Antarctic Flown To Christchurch

Press, Volume CI, Issue 29716, 9 January 1962, Page 13

Sick Australian In Antarctic Flown To Christchurch

A critically-ill Australian who has had seven brain hemorrhages since November 2, was flown to Christchurch from the Antarctic yesterday morning and will be flown to Sydney in an Electra this afternoon.

He is Mr A Newman, aged about 40, who was a diesel mechanic at the small Australian Davis station. 400 miles east of Mawson. He arrived from McMurdo Sound with Dr. R. Pardoe, the Mawson station doctor, who has performed two emergency brain operations on him and has hardly stirred from his side for more than two months. It was a 4910-mile trip from Mawson to Christchurch. Dr. Pardoe, who described himself as a general practitioner "with a little surgery,” said that Mr Newman had a congenital condition which caused an artery at the base of the brain to rupture repeatedly. Operations at Mawson Mr Newman had spent the winter at Davis station, and when the first hemorrhage occurred he was immediately taken to Mawson. Dr. Pardoe said he had to perform two relieving operations at Mawson. Each time the camp cook, Mr E, Giddings, was his theatre assistant, and the station geophysicist, Mr R. Hollingsworth. administered the anaesthetic. "He improved greatly after the operations,” said Dr. Pardos, “but then he would hemorrhage again. We asked

the Russians if they would help us to get him out. “I didn’t show my nose outside the surgery for two months,” said Dr. Pardoe. “I was in constant radio contact with a Melbourne neurosurgeon, and he told me how to go about the operations.

“There is a chance that Mr Newman will need a major neurosurgical operation when he gets to Sydney. That is only my diagnosis, of course, and I am not a neurosurgeon, but I am pretty sure I’m right.”

Dr. Pardoe said the Australian supply ship was due at Mawson on January 15. He decided to take a gamble and travel with his patient, leaving Mawson without a doctor until mid-January. The Russians agreed to take them to McMurdo, and an IL-12 returning from New Lazarev, the base south of South Africa, stopped at Mawson and took Dr. Pardoe and his patient to Mirny. They were there for New Year’s Eve, and stayed seven days before going to McMurdo Sound on Friday morning. “I thought I was going to lose him at Mirny,” said Dr. Pardoe. “He had an allergic shock there, but I had a lot of help from the Russians, and also at McMurdo Sound, where the corpsmen took over and let me get my first rest in weeks.” Mawson to McMurdo He said that Mr Newman was taken from Mawson in the Ilyushin 18 which flew to the Antarctic through Christ-

church recently. Mr Newman was taken from the ice airstrip at McMurdo to the camp by helicopter. “He went down a lot after each flight.” said Dr. Pardoe, "and he needs rest between flights. We stayed there 36 hours and then took off in the Hercules for Christchurch.” The Hercules arrived here at 6.30 a.m. yesterday and Mr Newman was taken to the American sick bay at Harewood. Dr. Pardoe stayed with him all day yesterday, and said last evening that his condition had improved slightly. It had deteriorated slightly on the flight to Christchurch. Mr Newman, who comes from Sydney, and is married with one son, was near the end of his second term in the Antarctic. He was previously at the 25-man Mawson base in 1959-60.