Spoken like a real VFR EMS Astar Pilot Devil.
I believe 430EMSPilot nailed it.
Even within the same corporate identity the separation between HBM and CBM services, and their continued comparation in the quarterly financial reports evidentiates the different mindset.
This is however a problem endemic to this company and one that does not apply per se to EMS operations, or perhaps does it?
I said it before and I'll repeat it.
Get the customer out of the cockpit, out of the cockpit decisions and out of OPERATIONAL decisions.
The problem is that in 'community based' programs the pilot is generally part of the customer and (specially these days) the completion of a certain number of flights may or may not mean the continued existance of a particular base (where he/she happens to live).
Also, since CB programs are notoriously for profit the need to cut expenses is far more evident than in a program where the customer is highly visible within the community and willing to avoid the bad publicity resulting from a crash.
So let's add yet another comparison parameter in this year accidents and establish the percentage of CB and HB crashes as compared to the respective program numbers.
I.e. what is the percentage of CB crashes vs the number of CB programs and HB crashes vs the number of HB programs?
How did THOSE crashes take place and what type of equipment was being flown.
One more suggestion, one I've made before:
Anyone establishing a "rural" pad for "community" service ought to be made responsible for establishing an FAA accepted WX reporting station (one of those Super AWOS comes to mind, about 75,000$) and within a set amount of time have approved GPS approaches to it; two things shall come out of that: virtually ensuring that program is not a fly by night (no pun intended) and the commitment to safety.
Not to mention the aircraft has to be IFR and NVG certificated and EQUIPPED for night operations, until there exists a will to enforce those conditions ya'll are an accident waiting to happen and a statistic on the drawing board.
Edited three times for content and spelling.
