DUTY HOURS
To clear up the crew duty hours question, I was sitting in at the FAI when this aspect was raised. As I recall (from memory now without referring to notes), the aircraft had set out on its journey which, if it had completed the flight to Ft George in one go would indeed have the crew exceeding their duty hours and this would have been known before the flight.
The witness who had been CO (if I recall rightly) of Aldergrove at the time said that exceptions to the limit could be made but no application had been made in this instance and he added that he could not recall ANY previous instance of an extension being asked for on this type of flight (helo from NI to mainland on this route?).
The point is that the limitation in question was one for crews working in an operational area (ie NI) – was it 10 hrs? – because of the perceived increased stress levels – or something like that – and did not apply to the mainland at that time; this left a grey area for a/c leaving the op area for the mainland (as ZD576 was doing), from what I can gather.
This perspective should help in understanding that the duty hours was not a rigid limitation in the appreciation of what happened here.
Of course, they would still have been within their duty hours when in the Macrihanish area and so a brief touch down (for whatever reason) would have cleared the technicality of the duty hours limitation anyway as the remainder of the journey would have not been in an operational area – perhaps they had intended a brief landing and so did not stretch the rules at all by not applying for an extension. From what I can gather, it would have been out of character for these very professional men to not adhere strictly to such rules and so I am inferring that they did indeed intend such a stop (let the passengers have some putting practice, hand back some equipment, whatever …).
Regarding the flight plan, whatever the intentions on the return leg, from talking with locals I believe it was the common practice for helos making this crossing in this area from NI to come in close and turn just south of the lighthouse at low level and continue up the coast – on one occasion, I observed this myself in identical local mist conditions to that dreadful day.