I hear a rumour that one or more police or air ambulance operators are planning to fit winches to their aircraft.
My questions are 1 Why? and
2. When will it be used and by whom?
From an AA point of view
1) To further reduce the amount of time it takes to get a resource to the patient, ORCON dominates everything amblance like.
2) Whenever the heli can't land due to the 2d rule.
IMHO it'll never happen with the current platforms used in UK HEMS. This has got nothing to do with the CAA, JAR Ops, etc but simply down to the fact that there it's a failry tight job working in the back of a 902, 135 as it is let alone when you have a litter swining into it. Add to this trying to get the casualty in single handed as your opo will still be hanging around outside or even worse still on the ground, H+S will be all over it like a rash qouting lifting and handling policy breaches.
SAR winch because they can't land, AA's can so there is little point in winches. I know that if I
really needed a winch lift then the local SAR will oblidge jobs permiting.