Out of interest, how has the number of based helicopters and number of helicopter passengers changed over the decades at Aberdeen? Perhaps a chart of these statistics would give a good correlation with the state of health, and illustrate the long-term volatility, of the offshore industry? A comparison with similar statistics from Norway would be interesting.
Have similar trends happened with helicopter traffic from Shetland or have recent oil and gas developments nearer to Shetland resulted in the proportion of traffic from Aberdeen and Shetland shifting North? Or have longer range helicopters negated any such affect?
I'm hoping someone can point me to industry statistics that will objectively quantify some of these issues.
Quite a significant increase in exploration has been forecast by industry experts so perhaps the offshore related traffic from Aberdeen will start to recover, or at least bottom out, this year.