A base for the outback.

The Arrernte people are the traditional owners of the Alice Springs area and the MacDonnell Ranges around it. The town’s Arrernte name, Mparntwe, refers to a waterhole in the Todd River.

The story of the Flying Doctor here is one recent chapter in a much longer history of this country.

The Flying Doctor began working in the Northern Territory in 1939. Its Alice Springs base on Stuart Terrace housed the first base radio operator, and the original building now holds the tourist facility.

Inside, the Operations Communications Centre is shown as it was in 1939, beside the radio rooms that were once the service’s link with people across the outback.

• Read the history of the base→

John Flynn founded the Aerial Medical Service, whose first flight left Cloncurry in 1928. He died in 1951, and his grave near Alice Springs, beneath a boulder from the Devils Marbles, became part of a historical reserve proclaimed in 1957.

This history belongs to the place and the people who shaped it. The History page offers a longer introduction, and the timeline gives a short route through selected milestones.

• Read the history of the base→
• Explore the timeline→