The 2018 Outback Air Race will celebrate the 90th year of operations for Australia's Royal Flying Doctor Service (RFDS).
The OAR is a GPS-based navigation time trial where pilots are scored based on their ability to predict the time taken to fly each leg and their accuracy at flying over visual start and finish points.
This year's race will cover 2200 nm from Archerfield in Queensland to Broome in WA, leaving Archerfield on Sunday 19 August.
According to organisers, a record 42 aircraft will take part in this year's RFDS fundraiser, which is timed to celebrate the first operational flight of the RFDS, done out of Cloncurry on 17 May 1928.
OAR event manager Stuart Payne said it was great to have the 2018 event fully subscribed as the RFDS celebrates 90 years of service.
“This event provides competitors with a unique opportunity to raise much needed funds for Australia’s most iconic charity, to see the beauty of outback Australia from light aircraft,” he said.
“Teams will also get the opportunity to visit outback centres and meet new people there, people who are so appreciative of the life saving service that the RFDS provides.
“For the 100 plus people participating in our event, it really is a case of ordinary people doing extraordinary things.”
Since its inception in 1996, the Outback Air Race (OAR) has raised over $2 million for the RFDS, and in the last event alone in 2015, raised in excess of $585,000.
The RFDS is one of the largest and most comprehensive aeromedical organisations in the world, providing primary health care and 24-hour emergency service to people over an area of 7.69 million square kilometres.
Last year, the RFDS made nearly 337,000 patient contacts through healthcare clinics, aeromedical transports and tele-health consultations to those living in remote and regional Australia. The RFDS fleet of 69 aircraft flew nearly 26.5 million kilometres.
Founder of the RFDS, Reverend John Flynn, set up the organisation after the death of WA stockman Jimmy Darcy on a Kimberley cattle station in 1917. The first flight 11 years later was conducted as the Australian Inland Mission Aerial Medical Service using an aircraft leased from Qantas.
More information is available on the 2018 Outback Air Race website.