A tourist has suffered burns to 80 per cent of his body after falling into a hot spring in South Australia's far north.
The Adelaide man in his 50s was travelling in a 4WD convoy on the Birdsville Track on Thursday when, during a stop, he fell into a hot artesian bore near Mungerannie.
The Royal Flying Doctor Service says it spent several hours stabilising the man before flying him to Royal Adelaide Hospital, where he remains in a critical condition.
Royal Flying Doctors spokesman Charlie Patterson praised the quick thinking of those in the convoy.
"They withdrew the man immediately and took all his clothes off, which was holding the heat into the body, and then poured cold water all over him," Mr Patterson told ABC radio.
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The manager of the Mungerannie Hotel said the man's friends were distraught after the incident and were travelling south on Friday.
According to local tourism operators, the bores near Mungerannie, about 800km from Adelaide, reach almost 100C.
The Birdsville Track stretches from Marree, in South Australia's mid-north, to Birdsville in the southwestern corner of Queensland and includes numerous bores fuelled by the Great Artesian Basin.
