A valiant effort, sad result.
But hardly a surprise. That’s the level of local rotary SAR capability that now exists in NI. Up to March 2002 the first-rate, Aldergrove-based, Wessex SAR crews of ‘A’ Flt, 72 Squadron would have been there in c.20 minutes and the winchman would have had the casualty out of the lake and into Craigavon Area Hospital A&E in a further five, with a fair probability of saving his life.
No disrespect to the courage of the PSNI crew, or those in the dinghy, but that looked shambolic. Neither police EC135 / EC145 is winch-fitted – the crews aren’t trained anyway – and reports claim that an officer went out on the skids to pull the man out of the water on to thicker ice, so all that, coupled with the transit time for the Dublin-based Irish Coastguard Sikorsky, virtually ensured the unsuccessful result. Hypothermia doesn’t give you 35/40 minutes. With the lack of proper equipment they were extremely fortunate that there weren’t four fatalities and this coincides with fears that the NI Coastguard Centre in Bangor is one of those listed for closure. It beggars belief.