When pilot Udo Kordeuter did his routine checks before the takeoff of a DRF Lear 35A on 12 August he did not know that the German Air

Rescue ambulance would not be back on its home base on the Karlsruhe/Baden-Bade Airport until six days later. Its non-stop mercy flights took in 12 countries.

The first mission for Kordeuter and his crew, a co-pilot, an emergency physician and a paramedic, involved central Asia. A patient was flown from Almaty in Kazakhstan to Linz in Austria with a stopover in Tiflis, Georgia. In Linz connecting flights with patients ensued: one from Wangen im Allgaeu in Germany to Athens and another from Damascus in Syria to Paris.

During this trip Udo Kordeuter and his team left the aircraft to enable a new medical and aviation crew to take over.

"Our first priority is the safety of the patients and the crew so we pay scrupulous attention to respecting all rest times", says Rainer Horcher of the alert centre in Filderstadt, Germany. "If a crew has reached the limit of the permitted mission time, a new team takes over as was the case during this mission series."

After the stop in France, the transport of a patient who had suffered several highly serious injuries in a traffic accident from Libya to Cyprus was next on the flight schedule. Then the crew flew from Egypt to the U.K. with a stopover in Italy, as they met the urgent new requirements of two patients. The first was picked up in Hurghada, and the second in Luxor. One was flown to Durham in the U.K. and the other to Belfast in Northern Ireland.

So it was not until 18 August that the Lear 35A finally flew back from the U.K. to land again at its home airport. Horcher says: "A total of 12 countries in six days might seem an exceptional schedule but August is the busiest month in the operation of our non-profit air rescue organisation. Our aircraft and personnel are very often en route almost without respite bringing seriously ill or injured patients to their home countries for urgently needed medical treatment."

But he admits: "It is, however, not every day that DRF Learjet of the DRF flies to 12 countries in seven days. Due credit must be given to the LAR (Luxembourg Air Rescue) which operates with us under the European Air Ambulance umbrella. We also have very experienced dispatchers at Filderstadt who organise the medical and aviation logistics behind the worldwide missions.

"Prior to each ambulance flight, the EAA dispatchers have to clarify all medical details: they collect the patient and hospital data and consult

a physician. This physician com-municates with the hospital abroad, questions are discussed to establish what kind of illness or injury the patient is suffering from and whether the patient can be transported."

EAA dispatchers then inform the medical crew designated to accompany the flight and organise the transport of the patient from hospital bed to hospital bed.