GOOD PAIR: A lifetime of service and mateship

Todd Phillips
08:00am September 27 2024

Clay Allison (left) and Tony Waller AOM stand in front of a Westpac Life Saver Rescue Helicopter. (Supplied)

Tony Waller OAM and Clay Allison’s careers have run in parallel for more than four decades.  

Having met at school as teenagers, the two bonded as fellow surfers and surf lifesavers before they both joined the Fire Brigade in 1981. 

“We ended up in the same recruitment class at the college and then spent the next 42 years there and our careers bounced off each other’s the whole time,” Tony recalls.  

Early in their fire service career, they saw a notice at their surf club asking for volunteers for the Westpac Life Saver Rescue Helicopter Service.  

Clay, who as a surf lifesaver had experience as operator of the inflatable rescue boats, was looking for a challenge and being part of the helicopter crew seemed like an exciting opportunity. 

“The advertisement went around all the surf clubs for anybody wanting to have a bash at it,” Clay says. “I just thought, I'll have a go at that and put in an application. I saw Tony down the surf club the next day and found out that he’d also applied.”

Of the 120 that signed up, only six made it through the arduous selection process. 

“The first thing they did was throw us in the ocean in the middle of winter and we had to swim from Collaroy (on Sydney's northern beaches) across to Long Reef headland,” Tony said. “We were basically hypothermic and then they put us straight into a helicopter, took us up to 50 feet, and said jump out the door.

“A number of people went, ‘No, not doing that.’ And us young blokes went, ‘Yeah, we'll have a crack.” 

Forty years later, Tony and Clay are the last of the original six still working as part time crew.

Game changer

The Westpac Life Saver Rescue Helicopter Service celebrates 51 years of service this month. With more than 100,000 missions performed in that time, and countless lives saved, Tony and Clay often hear how grateful people are for the role they play in keeping Aussies safe.  

“When you say to people I work on the Life Saver Rescue Helicopter, they look a bit puzzled and try to place it. Then I say, ‘the Westpac helicopter’ and they go ‘Oh yeah, yeah!” Clay says. 

Tony and Clay have seen a lot of change over the course of 40 years. Technological advances including the mobile phone and GPS navigation systems have dramatically improved response times. 

“In the early days, we left with the information we had,” Tony said. “Scratchy communications, AM radios from the aircraft back to a little radio base at Long Reef.”  

The helicopters themselves have also evolved, but Clay points out that even in the 1980s they were game changers for how emergency situations were attended to.

“The reliance on helicopters has made a massive difference in response times. They're in hospital in 45 minutes now, whereas it might have been 5-6 hours some 40 years ago.” 

The pair have had many memorable moments among the thousands of missions they’ve carried out across their careers. Clay cites a recent example near the Royal National Park where three fishermen were on their capsized boat, blowing toward the rocks.  

“All three were rescued from the boat and we got back to land and unloaded. That's when they told me about the 15-foot shark that had swam under them just before we'd arrived,” Clay says.  

“And I jokingly say, ‘If you had told me that when I first hit the water, I would have done everything a lot faster!” 

Understandably, not every rescue has a happy ending and Tony and Clay point to the resilience that’s been required over the past four decades. 

“You’ve got be the right person to last as long as me and Clay have, and it comes down to resilience. We don’t dwell on it,” Tony says.

September 29 marks the 51-year anniversary of the bank's support of the Westpac Life Saver Rescue Helicopter Service.

See also: Westpac Rescue Helicopter marks fifty years of saving lives 
 

Todd Phillips

Todd is the Lead Storyteller in Westpac’s Corporate Communication team. He has been a communications and public relations professional for over 30 years, working across financial services, media, live events, and retail in the United States, Asia Pacific and Australia.

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