Aerotech spreads wings from crop sprayer to aerial fire fighter to South Australian aviation industry force
From origins in crop spraying in South Australia's southeast, then pioneering and leading aerial firefighting techniques, Aerotech kept diversifying with its fixed wing and helicopter fleet into areas such as medevac services, mining, construction, piiot training and aircraft maintenance.
Aerotech, South Australia’s largest privately-owned aviation company, spread its wings to became an aviation industry force beyond an Australian aerial firefighting prioneer with cutting-edge technology that attracted global attention.
A business founded in 1968 by Bob and Pam McCabe at Tintinara in South Australia’s southeast to supply crop spraying for local farmers, Aerotech was a leader in convincing South Australian agencies of the value of aerial fire fighting.
Under the McCabes’ son Sam, Aerotech moved into delivering innovative airborne solutions to problems across a broad range of sectors. Including emergency services, agriculture, mining, construction, media and more. The company’s most innovative and agile exercise in 2017 was using one of its helicopters to transfer millions of yellowtail kingfish fingerlings from a hatchery at Arno Bay to sea pens in South Australia's Spencer Gulf.
But it was Aerotech’s firefighting resources that gained global and national attention. The company sent four water bombers to Bordeaux, France, and two Black Hawk helicopters (an Australian civilian first to use the former United States military machines) to Sumatra, Indonesia in 2023 to help battle major pine forest and peat fires. Two planes and two helicopters were dispatched to the Queensland and Northern Territory fires.
With the South Australian Country Fire Service, Aerotech founded the rapid initial attack strategy later widely adopted around Australia and meaning the difference between a minor incident and a full-scale emergency. Aerotech achieved world-class response times to fires of within three to five minutes of a callout and only taking two minutes to land, reload and be airborne again. Aerotech had access to more than 100 airstrips and multiple water sources in South Australia.
Among the company’s diversified interests, with headquarters at Parafield airport in Adelaide’s north, was Aerotech Avionics, covering electrical, instrument and radio maintenance of aircraft and their components. Aerotech also had a commitment to providing sovereign industry to the Australian Defence Force by providing aircraft operations, personnel training and maintenance services.
