Stawell’s Garry Lewis has been on call 24 hours a day, seven days a week across 50 years, ensuring the coolrooms, refrigerators and air conditioners at Stawell’s Grampians Health campus and MacPherson Smith Residential Care Community have not missed a beat.

Mr Lewis said many of his call-outs were during the night.

“My most recent call-out was about 2am – we were on the roof on a cold and rainy night to fix the refrigeration,” he said.

“Many of the calls are after midnight, because that’s the time the refrigeration defrosts are generally cutting in and refrigeration is more likely to break down.”

When Mr Lewis first started working at the Stawell hospital, he was completing an apprenticeship and attending trade school at RMIT in Melbourne.

“Trade school was a lot different then,” he said.

“I remember the OH&S element of our learning basically took an hour and a half, and that was it. 

“The instructor would look around and say, ‘well there’s 20 of you here today. If there had been 25 of you, I would have said one of you will be dead by the end of your apprenticeship, so make sure it’s not you’.”

Throughout the years, the job has changed from fan motors and refrigerant leaks, to the introduction of coolrooms in kitchens and dedicated pharmacy fridges.

“They used to just use domestic fridges and write ‘drugs’ on the front of them,” Mr Lewis said.

Mr Lewis eventually started his own business, but continued working as a contractor at both the hospital and residential care facility.

He has no immediate plans for retirement. 

“People tell me I’m an idiot for still doing this role, but I don’t want to retire and leave my clients in the lurch,” he said. 

“I haven’t had a holiday since before COVID because I just don’t get time to get away, but sometimes I will get away for a weekend in the winter.

“I’ve always tried to be available, no matter what time of day or night.”

The entire July 10, 2024 edition of The Weekly Advertiser is available online. READ IT HERE!