I am aware that there are AW139 out there across the planet doing SAR and doing a decent job of it. However, when you put a couple of well-qualified paramedics, or the EMRS team, in the back of a SAR helicopter, up to a couple of hundred miles from their destination, they are there to do real work on the patient that will advance their survival chances.
I have listened to CHC rear-crew talking about how little they were able to do in the back of the AW139. I have listened to MERT guys moaning about how small and cramped the Merlin (AW101) is to work in.
Yes, to Chinook folks, the Merlin is a small and cramped work-space! I am convinced by those voices of comprehensive red and sticky experience.
The Norwegian and the Falkland Island SAR flights have had recent experience of really big evacuation jobs, so I am convinced by the need for larger aircraft for the occasional job like that. An entire crew of a decent sized fishing boat fits in a S-92. You then also have space for deploying large teams of MRT or CG for big search jobs.
We should give the DfT and MCA credit where credit is due. They have been landed with this by virtue of already have done maritime SAR contracts in the past but instead of a sitting in their maritime silo and creating a restricted service for their own purposes, the current contract serves the wider emergency service and civil contingency needs of the entire country.
Take a bow. If the next contract takes the same approach then that too will be world-class in that respect. We shall see.