I had the luck to be on board a SAR helicopter called to rescue a fifty year old man from a rig in the north sea roughly an hours transit from base.
The casualty had suffered suspected multiple heart attacks and was at the end of a .5km long platform.
we arrived at the overhead to be told that we were not to winch the casualty from the walkway connecting the rig complez.
we were told that the casualty was to be evacuated via a Dauphin that was on the far side of the complex.
the cas had to endure a transit up and down stairs............over a long distance...........and then pulled up the vertical steps to the helideck.
whilst this was going on i watched as the Dauphin crew re-rolled the seats of the aircraft to take the cas to shore.
said cas then boarded the a/c without a defib or paramedic and was flown to shore......
Assistance was offered to the rig but was refused over and over again......all this after we had made a 45 min transit to pick the guy up?????
our only thoughts were that the company was trying to either reduce costs or incident signals?????
Ralph