Thai cave rescuers Dr Richard Harris and Dr Craig Challen jointly named Australian of the Year 2019

South Australian anaesthetist and cave diver Dr Richard Harris and his diving partner Dr Craig Challen have been jointly named the Australian of the Year.

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Who else but Dr Richard Harris and his West Australian diving buddy Dr Craig Challen could we imagine as this year’s Australians of the Year?

It is no slight to the other contenders to say the 2019 award was destined to go to the extraordinary South Australian anaesthetist and cave diver, Dr Richard Harris, and his diving companion and support, West Australian vet Craig Challen.

Dr Harris’s bravery has done another service to South Australia.

Cave Divers Dr Craig Challen and Dr Richard Harris have jointly been named Australian of the Year for 2019. Picture: Gary Ramage

Apart from putting the state in the international spotlight as the home of the Thai-cave miracle worker, he has brought the award home for the first time in 34 years.

The notably modest doctor is the first Australian of the Year from South Australia since the inaugural chair of ATSIC, Lowitja O’Donoghue was honoured in 1984.

Acting Premier Vickie Chapman called Dr Harris a shining example of everything Australians hold dear, including determination, bravery and compassion.

“He showed what it is to be a true hero,” she said. “It’s a proud day for South Australia. Congratulations to Dr Harris!”

The spellbinding drama of 12 young Thai boys and their coach trapped in a cave, alive but with the threat of monsoonal flooding rising by the day, riveted the world.

Near the entrance to the Tham Luang caves in northern Thailand. Picture: Thai Navy SEALS / Facebook

People everywhere began to care deeply about the lives of the boys who were in a desperate race against time while facing impossible odds.

Could the Thai rescuers drill down into the cave and bring them out through a shaft? When that was ruled out it became obvious their only hope was to make their way through more than three kilometres of murky water, even though none of them could swim.

Richard Harris and Craig Challen were uniquely qualified and crucial to the rescue operation.

Dr Harris was uniquely qualified and knew it.

He has never sought the limelight but was both medically trained and an experienced cave diver, so he put himself and Dr Challen forward to help.

“I was just going about my two passions, cave diving and medicine,” he has said.

“They have grown in parallel since my early 20s. It seems bizarre that they combined for an event like the one in Thailand.”

The odds were so stacked against the boys, who were weak and skinny and trapped on a shrinking ledge, he was never optimistic and when he stepped off the plane into the Thai heat last July, he put their odds of survival at zero.

The likelihood of failure was so great the two divers were granted diplomatic immunity, giving them legal protection in case something went wrong.

But while the boys were alive they had to try.

Thai Navy SEALS enter the Tham Luang caves during the enormous mission to rescue the 12 boys and their coach. Picture: Thai Navy SEAL / Getty Images

Harris took advice from experts, from divers and from doctors.

He initially ruled out sedation to disable the boys so they could be be swum out but finally, it was the only hope.

He took every precaution he could, using full face masks which would keep the water out and administering an anti-saliva drug to minimise the risk of choking while unconscious.

Over 48 hours the boys, and their coach, were drugged and carried out – their hands loosely bound to stop them from snagging on rocks –in a relay operation that saved them all.

It was the good news story the world badly needed.

And yes, a movie and a book are in the wings.

Richard Harris and Craig Challen in an RAAF C17, on the way back from Thailand.