How Little Wings transformed life for sick kids in regional areas

Libby was faced with either travelling almost six hours by car with an unwell baby or jumping on a commercial flight which are few and far between from Dubbo. When speaking to her, she remembers it costing “$300-$500 a pop” to fly, which was taking a toll on the family. One even the strongest of mothers couldn’t carry on their own. And as anyone will tell you, the strongest thing to do when one is struggling is to seek help, so she did. That’s when she heard about a charity that may be small but its heart huge: Little Wings.

Little Wings, based in Bankstown, is a charity that flies seriously ill children and their families from their homes in regional and rural areas to receive the medical care they need that would otherwise be unavailable. Their mission is to ease the financial, emotional and physical burden that inherently comes with needing essential medical treatment — all completely free of charge.

Within 24 hours, Libby and Winnie boarded their own plane with their own pilot named Wayne and were in Sydney for Winnie’s appointment and back home within a day. When I spoke to Libby, her voice changed when she described their first flight with Little Wings. All of a sudden, she was finding it hard to describe the impact this help had on her, on Winnie, and even on Winnie’s older brother Raffi. She paused for a moment and says, “I couldn’t get over it. I just cried.”

Libby and Winnie have been flying with Little Wings ever since, and the magic work that the organisation provides still stands as strong as it did four years ago on their first take-off. As Libby describes, Little Wings doesn’t just stick the child on a plane and say “See you later”.

“I cry every time, and so does Winnie, but Winnie never gets on that plane in tears and always returns with a smile.”

Much like its name, Little Wings takes pride in the little things they can do to ease the struggle. Winnie, for example, is a lover of KitKats and will always have a KitKat waiting for her on the plane. To the volunteer pilots and countless others who give their time and talents to Little Wings, it’s not just about going from point A to point B. It’s about the families and creating a chosen family that’ll be there when they are needed most.

One of the many driving forces behind Little Wings is its CEO, Clare Pearson. When speaking to Clare, it was obvious from the get-go that Little Wings was her passion and that her whole heart was dedicated to this charity. She began to describe the volunteers not as nameless faces that provide free work, but as close friends, as a second family. In fact, she’d probably disagree with me writing that she is its driving force. She’d say, “The magic of Little Wings is that it’s volunteer-led”, and she’d be right, of course.

Growing up, she lived in a regional community and her mother was a nurse. She’d often visit the children her mother looked after, instilling the understanding of the disparity in medical faculties between regional/rural and metropolitan NSW from a very early age. It’s like comparing apples and oranges – it just doesn’t match up. Without Little Wings, thousands of children would be left falling through the cracks. This year alone, the free service has transported more than 4,000 children and their families, flown over 4 million kilometres and completed nearly 1000 missions.
Trying to convey Little Wings’ impact is a job far greater than most. Libby told me countless small details about the extra mile they take to make a family feel at ease. She mentioned a woman named Wanda, originally from Goulburn, so she “gets country people” and the relationship that has grown between Wanda and her family. She tells me a story about when she knew she’d be able to count on Wanda and Clare to be there, no matter what.

While Winnie was in the hospital for an intensive test for example, Libby’s son, Raffi, was supposed to swim for NSW in a competition. Libby knew she couldn’t leave Winnie alone, so she rang Wanda. Wanda said, “Leave it with me,” and then the next thing Libby knew, Wanda had organised someone to go sit with Winnie while Libby and Raffi went to the swimming competition. In the end, the test couldn’t be performed on Winnie; however, knowing that there was going to be someone there, knowing that neither the medical appointment nor the swimming had to be cancelled, was a relief to the single mother raising two children. As Libby perfectly puts it, “It’s the constant reaching out, the ‘how are you going?’ texts and the check-ins especially during COVID-19. Nothing is an effort they are just phenomenal.”

Clare touched on the importance of the family unit when we spoke, saying, “Whilst we are supporting that little person who’s unwell, we’re really supporting the whole family because we’re keeping them connected, we’re keeping them together as much as possible.” Clare and the volunteers receive updates on the children and the families they’ve helped. Milestones like the first day of school or the first time they’ve ridden a bike without training wheels. “They aren’t just people we say hello to. They are family,” Libby says.

Completing an average of 40 missions a week, with a new base opened in Newcastle and 17 pilots, The work they do is constant with some of the children they transport needing multiple weekly trips. During the midst of COVID-19, when travel outside of your area was virtually impossible and commercial flights grounded, patients and doctors were left with no choice but to use telehealth. However, it has its limits. Some conditions need to be treated in person. A few specialists from John Hunter Children’s Hospital reached out to Little Wings during this time and asked them for its help. Little Wings took on transporting doctors to their patients without a second’s thought. Without them, hundreds of appointments and treatments would have had to be cancelled, and those that couldn’t leave their area, let alone their house because of the rising health risks, were provided with the care essential to their survival.

This spur-of-the-moment choice to do what it does best has become one of the proudest achievements for Little Wings – its Medical Wings program. Little Wings continues to fly doctors to remote areas to set up clinics. So far, they have set up 129 clinics in school halls, Aboriginal Medical Centres, small-town hospitals and even tents all over rural areas. The initiative has reduced unnecessary city-based referrals by 85 per cent in the Hunter region, freeing up 8000 beds. It’s a relief for the hospital but also for the children who can stay with their families, in their own homes and in their own beds. The financial impact of this program has also saved the government $38 million.

When Clare spoke about it, the pride in her voice was justly earned. “Little people could get their chemotherapy during the day at their local hospital and then go home and rest,” she says. “When you feel unwell, you just want to be at home, you want to be in your jammies snuggled up in bed and to think that has been made possible is amazing. I didn’t do it on my own. The whole team pulled together.”

Although Little Wings has previously received funding and partners with wonderful providers such as Bankstown Sports, it still relies on donations to keep it in the skies. After she and her children were invited to a Women’s Day event hosted by Little Wings, Libby thought enough was enough. Little Wings deserved more than it was getting. Upon returning, she contacted Clare and Wanda and told her the plan she had to raise funds, and after a discussion, she got to work.

She brought tins, painted them and made stickers with the Little Wings logo and scattered them around her local area. She pounded the pavement, putting content on social media. She approached the local newspaper for an ad and relied on word of mouth to raise funds, succeeding greatly. Throughout a couple of months, she raised $5,000 for Little Wings. Clients in the salon she works at as a hairdresser gave as much as they could. Local farmers who were lucky to be doing well that season donated anything they could spare. Rotary clubs, the local Woolworths and a Lions Club in Binnaway – a full 45km away from Coonabarabran – donated $2000. “It was the good salt-of-the-earth people who donated, not the people who have the money and just sit on it,” she says.

The sheer thought of a whole family, of a whole community, who need this glorious service taking it upon themselves to raise funds to keep Little Wings going is something I haven’t been able to shake. It’s sometimes hard to see the good in the world in current climate of things. However, Libby, the town of Coonabarabran, Clare and the people at Little Wings are right under our noses, and if we squint hard enough, we’ll be able to see the goodness.

I want to leave you, the readers of Australian Aviation, with one more thing.

Towards the end of 2020, when spirits were high, Christmas music filled our hearts, and a new beginning was just around the corner. A pair of tiny hands belonging to a boy of seven emptied his piggy bank of the loose change and half-spent allowances.

“$1, $2, $3, $3.50…” he counted while his grandfather watched the news depict a story of a boy not much older than him, who had lost his eye to cancer and was flying to and from the hospital for treatment. Later that week, Clare received a donation of $8.60. A strange amount, she thought, not quite $9 but purposely more than $8.50. Regardless, it was enough to buy a worried mother a cup of coffee or perhaps about 5 per cent of a tank of petrol for a plane. So nevertheless, she was extremely grateful.

How Little Wings works
Little Wings, a not-for-profit organisation founded in 2012, started off small with a hanger based in Bankstown, a handful of pilots, and one plane. It provided free, professional, and safe flight and ground transportation for seriously ill children in rural and regional areas in NSW.

Ten years later, Little Wings has expanded its reach significantly. It continue to operate from Bankstown and has since opened a base in Newcastle, and have transported children from all over NSW, ACT, QLD, VIC, and the NT with its 17 pilots and three planes.

This year, it have flown over 4 million kilometres, completed almost 1000 missions, and transported over 4000 children and their families. As a result of COVID-19, it has expanded its services and started the Medical Wings program, transporting specialists to rural areas and opening pop-up clinics to reduce the number of unnecessary city-based referrals.

Its aim is to ease the financial, emotional, and physical burden when it comes to needing medical treatment, “making sure no child misses out on medical care because of circumstance or postcode” as stated by Clare Pearson, CEO.

Little Wings in entirely volunteer-led and rely solely on donations to keep itself in the skies. Its long-term aim is sustainability — to be able to continue to provide free services for as long as it can. If you would can and would like to donate, you can find all the information on how to do so on their website at littlewings.org.au/ways-to-donate/ No donation is too big or too small.