By Dongyun Kwon
Coldstream resident travelled to London to attend a prestigious ceremony with his wife where his dedication to flying was honoured.
Mission Aviation Fellowship (MAF) pilot Marcus Grey was recognised by the Honourable Company of Air Pilots as a Master Air Pilot and presented with The Captain John Ashton Memorial Award for his exemplary professionalism, skill and contribution to pilot training and mentorship.
The pilot said he was very humbled that his colleagues in MAF applied to the Honourable Company for those awards.
“I trained most of these people to be qualified to work as pilots in MAF during my time teaching at the MAF Training Centre in Coldstream,” Mr Grey said.
“At the ceremony, it was very satisfying to be applauded by such a distinguished group.”
Mr Grey was always aware he wanted to be a pilot from a young age, but never wanted to fly airline-type operations.
All through his schooling and university, the pilot concentrated on subjects which helped him to get into flying.
Mr Grey said he wanted to do flying to help people who were disadvantaged by where they were born or the circumstances of their life.
“When I was 12 years old, I heard a talk by an experienced MAF pilot and realised that was the kind of flying I wanted to do,” he said.
“After I graduated as an aeronautical engineer, I started learning to fly at Essendon Airport and finished off my commercial pilot licence at the MAF Training Centre in Ballarat and joined MAF straight away.”
Mr Grey and his wife Julie with their three daughters joined the MAF in 1984.
“We left Preston, Melbourne and moved to Gove, Northern Territory to fly for MAF in the Aboriginal area of East Arnhem Land,” the award recipient said.
“In 1986 we moved to Papua New Guinea, where I flew in the MAF programs in Western Highlands, Eastern Highlands and Morobe Provinces, conducting community development, education system support, health system support, faith-based group support, medical patient transport, public transport and agricultural produce to market flights.”
In 1996, the pilot returned to the MAF Training Base in Ballarat to start his new journey as a flight instructor.
Mr Grey said since the early 70s, the MAF Training Centre has been a Civil Aviation Safety Authority approved flight school and it has trained hundreds of commercial pilots for MAF and the aviation industry.
“One of the reasons I relocated to the Training Centre at Ballarat was so I could pass on the knowledge and experience I had accumulated while flying in remote, demanding environments like Northern Territory and Papua New Guinea, to new, inexperienced pilots-in-training, so they could make their transition to operational flying well,” he said.
When MAF moved the engineering department to Mareeba, Queensland in 2002, Mr Grey became the chief flying instructor of the Training Centre, which then moved to Coldstream to be closer to MAF’s biggest student pilot pool at the Bible College of Victoria.
The flying instructor said qualifications taught in the Training Centre are Industry-recognised, and the bulk of students now come through TAFE colleges and universities in Queensland.
“The Training Centre is also approved by the Civil Aviation Safety Authority, Papua New Guinea to train and qualify Papua New Guinea commercial pilots and I have been training and testing Papua New Guinea nationals since 2015,” Mr Grey said.
“In 2014, MAF consolidated all its support departments in Mareeba, Queensland and I moved the Training Centre to Mareeba Airport, in Far North Queensland.
“Since 2019, Julie and I have been based back in Coldstream and I do flying tours to Mareeba, Northern Territory, Timor Leste and Papua New Guinea to teach and test pilots as required.”
In Papua New Guinea, Mr Grey went to Papua, Indonesia with a MAF team and Twin Otter aircraft, to assist with delivering disaster aid to remote airstrips during the famine in the early 2000s.
A few years ago, he also gained approval from CASA Australia to conduct proficiency checks for Australian flight examiners.
Mr Grey has served with MAF for 40 years, clocking up more than 17,000 flying hours to become one of MAF’s most experienced and highly qualified pilots.
He said he had the privilege of flying hundreds of medical evacuation flights in all the programs he has worked, many resulting in saving a life.
“I evacuated a 12-year-old girl, who had been bitten by a death adder, from a remote airstrip in Papua New Guinea to the hospital in Goroka,” the pilot said.
“This flight required a mercy flight because we had to land at Goroka in the dark, using the lights of dozens of car headlights because Goroka Airport was not equipped for Night Flying.
“Another one was an Aboriginal lady having birthing difficulty and I flew her to Gove hospital late in the day, only to have the baby born while we were en route.”
