Anne Sprague will never forget watching her son learn to ride a bike in the yard on a remote cattle station north-east of Blackall.
“Wilson was very full on — he walked by the time he was nine months old,” Ms Sprague said.
“He wanted to learn to ride the pushbike without training wheels. He just had that grit and determination.”
Chopper pilot Wilson Sprague died in a helicopter crash while tracking a bushfire near Kowanyama, west of Cairns, on October 9 last year.
“He was flying back from picking up parts and he’d noticed a fire started by lightning,” Ms Sprague said.
“He just wasn’t a bloke who would’ve thought, ‘No, it’s late in the afternoon, someone else will sort that.’ He wouldn’t stop until the job was done.“
In a report last month, the Australian Transport Safety Bureau found the 27-year-old was not qualified for night flying and the helicopter wasn’t equipped to fly after dark.
Nine months on, his family and close friends are remembering Wilson as a passionate stockman and a “good bloke”.
‘Gentle’ but ‘tough as nails’
Growing up on a grazing property in central west Queensland, 95 kilometres from the nearest town, life was busy for the Sprague family.
From a young age, Wilson would play cattle stations with his sisters, Georgia and Holly, under the backyard camphor laurel tree.
“It was dirt under the tree, but they’d have their tracks and roads, and they’d have yards built, trucks, loaders,” Ms Sprague said.
Wilson Sprague grew up with his two sisters, Georgia and Holly. (Supplied: Anne Sprague)
Like many who grew up on remote stations, the young boy showed a keen interest in stock work and helped muster cattle on horseback.
Ms Sprague said she remembered Wilson racing down to the stockyards to help with branding in between his on-air school lessons.
“He just had a quiet, gentle nature with animals. He always wanted to go work on stations,”
she said.
Wilson Sprague was known to be gentle with livestock and animals. (Supplied: Anne Sprague)
For his 14th birthday, parents Anne and Jason bought their son a trial helicopter flight on the Sunshine Coast, where he sat in the pilot’s seat and gave flying a go.
Ms Sprague said her son’s “eyes lit up”.
“He never stopped talking about that,” she said.
The water incident
In 2016, Wilson graduated high school and went to work for a cattle operation near Cloncurry as a first-year ringer, before mustering in the Northern Territory.
Later, he obtained a private helicopter licence and worked across three cattle stations for family-owned MDH Pty Ltd, from Mt Windsor to Rutland Plains, as a mustering pilot.
Wilson Sprague worked on cattle stations across Queensland, as well as the Northern Territory. (Supplied: Anne Sprague)
Muttaburra chopper pilot Gordon Magoffin said Wilson was the strongest person he had ever met.
“He was tough as nails — [you] could not get tougher than Wilson Sprague,” Mr Magoffin said, adding that his mate could weld, drive a bulldozer, a loader and a grader.
Mr Magoffin said he had known Wilson longer than anyone else in his life, except for his own family.
He was a natural in the yards, but more importantly, a good friend.
“Wilson used to always have this water bottle at the front of his bike,” Mr Magoffin said.
“Everybody would be getting thirsty and they’d linger closer and closer to Wilson as the day went on.
“He never turned anyone down a sip of water.
“He’d be lucky to get two sips out of it by the time everyone else had leeched off him.”
A quiet legacy
Will Long was a first-year ringer at Brightlands Station near Cloncurry when he first met Wilson, then head stockmen.
“He’s just so good with cattle and puts you in the right place, and makes you aware of everything you need to know,” Mr Long said.
The pair soon became good mates.
Before his death, Wilson had plans to return home and work as a chopper pilot. (Supplied: Anne Sprague)
Mr Long said Wilson taught him to be a leader.
“If you [were] doing something wrong, he’d make sure next time you were doing it right, instead of letting everyone get away with doing the wrong thing.”
Mr Magoffin agreed.
“I think, in huge ways — and I’ve thought this for years — Wilson could instil a lot of confidence in you,”
he said.
“I started flying 12 months before Wilson, and I remember one of the reasons I felt so confident getting my licence was I knew Wilson would be there.
“If he lived to 80 years old, they could have written a book on him.
“We might yet still.”
Wilson made a “big difference” no matter what he did. (Supplied: Anne Sprague)
Ms Sprague said she hoped Wilson would be remembered as a tenacious, loyal and gentle soul.
“He was just a good bloke,”
she said.
“There’s a lot of good blokes out there, it’s just some of them don’t get taken so early.”
