First and foremost - I do not denigrate any paramedic - I appear to have damned them with faint praise unintentionally. If you want me to say they did a fantastic job I will. Equally if you want to jump to conclusions about my views on paramedics (which some of you certainly have, and come to the wrong ones) then that is up to you.
Secondly - EC135 passed the aircraft reg to his control room who passed it to the ARCC - that is nowhere near the same as the ARCC being alerted to the incident straight away as they should be.
Third - the being out of area comment is farcical - how would your patient feel if the AA didn't launch because it was a. US, b. fogged in or c. on another job.
Fourth - how long does it take an AA to generate a second aircraft and crew and do all ambulance authorities have access to 2 aircraft?
Lastly - I am not slagging off civvy SAR as it stands at the moment but when Harmonisation occurs and the DfT looks at the bill for the whole of UKSAR, the bean counters will start cutting corners and capability - hence my comments. Will the CAA allow operators to hover taxi up the sides of mountains or under wires in cloud day or night? Let's see shall we.