Angel Flight is a Brisbane-based organisation that coordinates non-emergency flights to help country people coping with ``the triple trouble of bad health, poor finances and daunting distance''.

Angel Flight mission coordinator Geoff Marsh said the charity was looking for pilots to transport sick Latrobe Valley and Gippsland residents to Melbourne for treatments.

Angel flight number 2450 was a return trip from the Latrobe Valley to Essendon for an eight year-old boy from Churchill with juvenile onset of rheumatoid arthritis.

According to Angel Flight he was flown to Melbourne for treatment because the drive would have been too physically taxing on him.

Mr Marsh said there were six registered pilots in the Latrobe Valley but none had the experience to fly missions.

Pilots are required to have 250 hours pilot-in-command experience, but they can register and act as co-pilots while they build up their hours, he said.

``We're looking for private individuals with their own aircraft to transport people to places like the Peter MacCallum Cancer Centre for chemotherapy,'' Mr Marsh said.

He said passengers included families with children with developmental delays and those struggling financially from drought impact or because of frequent and expensive travel.

About 22 per cent of the almost 10,000 flights have been flown in Victoria.

Angel Flight founder Bill Bristow said he began the service because Australia ``badly'' needed a charity flight service to enable regional and rural Australians to access health services.

``With about 30 per cent of the Australian population living outside metropolitan areas a very large number of people do not have easy access to major hospitals and treatment centres,'' Mr Bristow said.

For more information, to register as a pilot or an Earth Angel, or to donate to Angel Flight visit www.angelflight.org.au