Ah Sun Who? possibly small, loud, recently retired radop????
Since 90 plus% of UK SAR involves rescuing less than 3 people, how is that extra size, downwash and expense going to make itself useful??
I believe you actually weren't that complementary about it when you did the trials!
The move from the Wessex to Sea King did involve increasing hover heights to mitigate the downwash but the Merlin has a very concentrated downwash due to disc loading and blade design that takes it into another league entirely.
I guess those that dismiss decent hover references as unimportant must be such Gods that the rest of us poor mortal SAR pilots are not worthy
