Organ donations are a miracle of modern medicine, and they come with just as many logistical challenges as biological ones. Getting a donated organ to a patient is a time-critical endeavor, with positive outcomes dependent on quick delivery. Down in Australia, one state has shared how it gets organs from airport to hospital as quickly as humanly possible.
The challenge of timely organ delivery has been faced by authorities around the world. Italian police famously employed a Lamborghini Huracan to solve the problem, whipping kidneys across the countryside at rapid pace with the aid of searing V10 power. In contrast, Australia isn’t so blessed. It’s a nation without supercars of its own, and even the country’s famous V8s are no longer an option with the death of the local industry.
Instead, local authorities use the road network itself to their advantage. When it comes to getting organs where they need to go, speed isn’t just about the drivers—it comes down to the control room wizards at Transport for New South Wales.
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It’s all about creating what’s called a “green light corridor,” and it’s pretty much as Hollywood as it sounds. If you’ve ever seen one of those action movies where the hackers create themselves a perfect no-stop route across town, this is exactly that.
When transplant organs are scheduled for arrival in the state, Transport for NSW works to help ambulances and police escorts move the special cargo across Sydney as quickly as possible. “When the transplant team notifies us an organ is arriving, we work to identify a route that will get them from the airport to the hospital fastest,” says Brendan, a senior traffic controller with Transport for NSW. “Depending on the time of day and traffic conditions, we find a route we can clear quickly and make sure the vehicle arrives to every set of lights to a green.”
“Traffic can change quickly, so we pay close attention to the conditions and adjust the route manually in real time,” says Brendan. “Doing this can reduce the time it takes to get to hospital and potentially help patients receive life-saving treatment faster.” Obviously, this can have some effects on the broader flow of traffic, but Brendan notes that drivers should be aware that there is good reason behind this. “If you find yourself stuck at a red light for slightly longer than usual, keep in mind that it might be to save a life,” he explains.
Similar techniques are used around the world to ensure organs show up on time to save patient’s lives. Last year, The Times of India covered a particularly successful case where four green corridors were established to ferry organs from two donors at speed, saving eight lives in the process.
It’s nice to dream of getting all green lights on one’s way home from work. Sadly, few of us have the kind of pull with our local Department of Transport to get such favorable treatment. As it stands, the powers are willing to flick the lights one way or the other, but only for these critical delivery missions when lives are on the line.
Image credits: Transport for NSW
Us German drivers are conditioned to look at ways of letting an emergency vehicle through the second we notice a flashing blue light out of the corner of our eyes. I have seen astonishing co-operation among drivers to clear a path (taking part in it, if possible, of course).
German drivers can be complete arseholes at times, but when the twos and blues are upon us, we forget all that.
This is very cool!
I am totally fine with waiting for a transplant organ to go through as fast as possible. But then I am German, and we Germans are world-famous for making room for emergency vehicles in ways other nations could not even dream of. (And German traffic laws leave us a very wide margin to do that. We can violate just about every traffic law to allow passage of an emergency vehicle as long as it is safe.)
while you German found ways that no other country drivers though of to make room.
Almost every country in the EU has the same wiggle room when it comes to allow passage of an emergency vehicle as long as it’s safe… In France too we can violate about everything in the Code de la route as long as it’s safe to give room for an emergency vehicle.
Yes, but I still think that Germans are really good at this. AFAIK there are differences in what you can do to let emergency vehicles through between countries, and also what emergency vehicles can do themselves.
I would have thought they would just use helicopters or something to not have to deal with roads at all.
Agreed. Any hospital large enough to have a transplant team almost certainly has a helipad.
As a child I saw a documentary about a organ transport into the city of London, during rush hour. There are actually two different documenturies which are on Youtube, it is called ‘The Liver Run’. It is from 1987, involves 2 police Rover SD’s and a lot of police force in the city on foot, on the motorbike and by car to block crossings. It is still incredibly exiting / nerve wrecking to watch.
The first is the full run filmed from the police cars.
https://youtu.be/JNi7uMEGmOs?feature=shared
The second one is the one I saw as a child, with a presentator explaining the whole ordeal and why the time was so limited.
https://youtu.be/ZnW-sTwxeUM?feature=shared
This is amazing! With a Pontiac Trans Am appearing on the Embankment as a bonus. Makes me want a Rover Vitesse again…
They have a special division with V8 Interceptors for limb replacements. Perfect for when your mate Kundalini wants his hand back.
Just a p p p piece from here, and a pp p p piece from there…
That’s cool! Yeah, I prefer pianos vs. organs…oh you’re talking about those kinds of organs, ha ha
I’m ignorant as to the rationale for transporting organs quickly, and would love to be enlightened! Are these freshly “harvested” organs that need to be super quickly taken somewhere they can be preserved? Or are they being transported from storage somewhere to a hospital where a patient needs it extremely urgently?
To the best of my knowledge, many organs can’t readily be preserved for very long. They’re taking fresh donor organs and transporting them to patients in urgent need. Hearts and lungs, for example, can only survive outside the body for a few hours before they’re no longer viable for transplant.
Aww, what a disappointment. After reading the headline, I envisioned a division of special cops with leather jackets, hopped-up Holdens or Fords with Barras, and perhaps Autogyros.
But no, the truth is so mundane and practical.
Joking aside, what an awesome use of remote sensing and control. Most American stoplights can’t do that.
They have this for limb replacements like when Kundalini wants his hand back.
Oh, thanks, now I have the Love and Rockets song in my head.
If we had organs for transplant on the airplane the cooler rode in the cockpit with us and were the first thing off the plane ,We made the passengers wait a extra 1 minute while whomever that was meeting us at the gate ran on grabbed the cooler and ran back off. Never heard a complaint.We used to use to use the call sign “life flight” which is now medevac which prevented delays and holding that could be vital to saving a life. It was not taken lightly and only used when necessary.If it was a heart or something extremely vital then sometimes we would even delay a flight to wait for the cooler and some even the Dr.
A lot of times it was a police escort to the airport also.All in all it’s a pretty nice system that we all hope we never need.
Non critical eyes etc didn’t get as high a priority.
Great insight, thanks for sharing. Interesting to hear how much of this goes on behind the scenes.
Lewin ,
Thanks for all the great work you guys are putting into this fantastic site.
In these turbulent times we all need an escape and happily you guys provide that opportunity.
The love of all things auto is something that people from all walks of life enjoy no matter what.
Thanks again .
I hope you explained it to the passengers. “Dear passengers, we will have to let you wait for one or two minutes until deplaning while we send a transplant organ we have onboard to its recipient, and every second counts. We will deplane you as soon as we can, but saving a life takes priority.”
Yes I did .
I would say something like yes a slight delay in your life meant saving someone else’s life.
Some people just don’t think past themselves and have zero compassion for anyone else.
SMH
I would expect a round of applause for this PA.
They’re Aussomely Organized!
Amazing that a country that has helicopters for herding cattle hasn’t figured that flying over traffic is faster than driving green corridor or not. Also no accidents or jams to slow down for.
Not every hospital has helipad or close access to an open space that can be used as helipad.
Even for those hospitals that have helipads, most can only operate only one or maybe two helicopters at a time for everything, including picking up patients for the ER.
And it’s worth remembering that hospitals aren’t just bringing in a single organ for a single operation, when a single donor dies they’re potentially sending out multiple organs to multiple hospitals prepped for transplants.
This is a good example of how simple solutions aren’t simple anymore once they move to complex scenarios.
Well said. Helicopters don’t grow on trees, while ambulances do. (Well, no they don’t, but they are more plentiful.)
For anyone wondering, I believe that’s a police bmw 530d on escort duty
Most of America does not have that level of control of the traffic lights.
You say that like red lights would stop half the drivers
Does Australia have right turn on red?
No. We don’t even have turn left on red (seeing as we drive on the left hand side of the road).
Ha! That made me laugh. Thanks!!
We drive on the left so that would have us turning into cross traffic.
I don’t know about other states but NSW does have left turn on red at a limited number of intersections. If it’s not signposted that you can turn left on red, you are not permitted to do so.
But our hospitals all have heliports and helicopters to bypass that 60s era problem
Most – if not all – of Australia’s major hospitals (where I’d expect a complex organ transplant would be occurring) have helipads too. I imagine there’s sometimes a reason why it’d still need to go via the road network – no available choppers for example, or the organ is coming from somewhere that doesn’t have a helipad so it’s quicker to go by car.
It might be a bit hard to organise a heli flight from an airport what with flight paths etc. TBH I’m not sure if i’ve ever seen a helicoptor at a major airport. Only regional ones.
This could however be a great use of Drones.
“This could however be a great use of Drones”
Great. Now I’m imagining military drones delivering the latest target of a drone strike to the transplant hospital like a cat dropping half a mouse on the doorstep.
Thanks for the nightmare fuel..
Haha oh lordy. What a hellscape.
Oh pshaw! What could possibly go wrong with a non-commercial helicopter flight at a busy airport?
Oh, yeah, right. Maybe not the best idea. At least not until we have enough air traffic controllers. I’m sure the FAA will address that asap. What’s that? DOGE imposed staffing cuts?!?! OK, we’re fucked.
In Seattle, nearly all organ transportation flights land at Boeing Field, rather than Sea-Tac. Less traffic in the airspace and plenty of places to land a helicopter. But Boeing Field itself is only a few miles to the most likely place to get a transplant, which has three helipads. And other than some mass casualty event, at least two of them are usually open. When one comes in, the helicopter usually heads back to its home base within an hour.