Dr Richard Harris keynote speaker

Dr. Richard Harris OAM

  • Keynote Speaker
  • 2019 Australian of the Year
  • Based in Australia
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Few stories have captured global attention quite like the rescue Dr Richard “Harry” Harris found himself at the centre of, an operation that briefly held the entire world’s attention and turned an Adelaide-based anaesthetist into an unlikely global hero overnight. As an Australian doctor and expert cave diver, Harry played an absolutely crucial role in bringing twelve young boys and their soccer coach safely out of a flooded cave system in Thailand, a rescue where every single decision carried genuine life-or-death consequences for everyone involved, watched anxiously by millions around the world.

What made Harry’s contribution so remarkable was the sheer scale of the technical and medical challenge involved. Drawing on his dual expertise as both an anaesthetist and a highly experienced cave diver, he helped guide the boys through nearly four kilometres of flooded, pitch-black cave passages, navigating conditions where visibility dropped to absolutely zero. Very few people on Earth possessed the precise combination of medical training and technical diving skill needed to even attempt what he did, let alone execute it successfully under that level of pressure and scrutiny from a watching world.

It is that rare intersection of expertise, calm judgement, and courage under genuinely extreme circumstances that Harry now brings to corporate and conference stages around the world. Rather than a story told secondhand, audiences hear directly from the person who was there, making the split-second calls, in one of the most complex and high-stakes rescue operations in recent memory. His account offers a level of authenticity and insight that few speakers anywhere could ever hope to match.

Based in Adelaide, Harry continues to share this remarkable story with organisations and audiences seeking a genuine, first-hand perspective on courage, decision-making and performing under the most extreme pressure imaginable, whether in medicine, business or life more broadly, and what it truly costs to hold your nerve when it matters most.

Description

Long before the world knew his name, Dr Richard “Harry” Harris OAM had already spent decades quietly building one of the most respected reputations in extreme dive medicine. A South Australian anaesthetist and cave diver based in Adelaide, Harry pushed the boundaries of underwater cave exploration at some of the deepest and most dangerous sites on the planet, leading dives to the Pearse Resurgence in New Zealand at 229 metres, Daxing Spring in China at 213 metres, and Song Hong Cave in Thailand at 196 metres. Operating in those remote, high-pressure environments for years forged the calm, methodical mindset that would later define him on a genuinely global stage.

That mindset was tested to its absolute limit in 2018, when Harry was called upon to help save twelve boys and their football coach trapped deep inside a flooded cave system during the Tham Luang cave rescue in Thailand. As the operation’s lead diving doctor, he made an extraordinary and deeply difficult call: to sedate each boy individually for the perilous journey back out through the flooded passages, a decision that ultimately saved every single life involved in the rescue. For his role in the operation, Harry was awarded the Star of Courage, Australia’s second-highest bravery honour, and was appointed a Member of the Order of Australia.

On stage, Harry’s keynote sessions explore what it genuinely takes to make life-or-death decisions under extreme pressure, how to weigh calculated risk honestly and carefully, how teams from completely different disciplines can work together effectively when failure is simply not an option, and what real composure looks like when everything is on the line. His story resonates powerfully with audiences in healthcare, emergency services, leadership and any corporate team navigating high-stakes environments of their own, delivered with the humility and precision of someone who has genuinely lived through it all.

​Dr Richard Harris works in anaesthesia and also aeromedical retrieval medicine in Adelaide, South Australia.

​He has expertise in diving, wilderness and remote area health. His passion for cave diving goes back to the 1980’s and has taken him to the corners of the globe in search of new adventures.

​Harry and his colleagues have explored the Pearse Resurgence in New Zealand to 229m depth, Daxing Spring in China to 213m and Song Hong Cave in Thailand to 196m to name a few.

​Harry has a professional and voluntary interest in search and rescue operations, establishing the first sump rescue training course in Australasia. By building relationships with emergency services locally he has been preparing for such an event. The 2018 Thailand cave rescue was an opportunity to put this training to work.

​In 2018 he received the Star of Courage, Australia’s second highest civilian award for bravery, and the medal of the Order of Australia for his role in the Thailand cave rescue.

​Harry is the 2019 Australian of the Year for South Australia and the joint 2019 Australian of the Year with his dive partner Craig Challen.

​A truly remarkable man who has an incredible story to tell.

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