We get called for them from time to time here, there can be a whole lot of waiting around and fatigue issues, and when you commit to go that commitment is that you will get in, so weather minima are pretty important. Longest one I did was a trip from Plymouth to Oxford. Arrived Plymouth at 20:00 and left the next morning at 10:00. Sometimes it can take quite a while to get all the teams together.
The one that really sticks in my mind was a helicopter transfer from Manchester to a hospital near London, I was at the Manchester site waiting when Lady Dementia rang and told me her brother, who had been on the waiting list for a kidney for years had been called in to receive a new kidney, I delivered two to that hospital that night one of which went to him. Its' still going 16 years later, he has brought up his family, lived a full and active life and raised a huge amount of money for research. Every day a lot of thanks are given for the genorosity of the donor's family, their courage at such a time and the team who had to make that first, dreadful approach.
Whenever I'm on a transplant task my mind and heart go to the donor family, their awful loss can mean so much good can be done for so many others, I just don't know how you see past the immediate misery to the good that will be done.
SND