You often criticise our stricter UK rules and anyone who dares to mention them here, but the proof is in the pudding - we don't suffer the same losses. From experience, the risk of these kind of flights (i.e. are they VFR or are they IFR) is deemed to outweigh the benefit by the regulatory body.
Well almost correct Shy.....I criticize the unrealistic UK Rules and those who hit us with a "Father knows best" attitude about them.
I am quite willing to bet one of the reasons you don't suffer the same losses is you don't do the same tasking. For sure your loss rate will be better if one does not leave the ground but then if you don't fly....injured and ill folks pay the price for that kind of mindset.
Do it in an unsafe manner and the EMS crews and some patients will pay the that price as well.
The UK Helicopter industry ashore is quite limited compared to the sheer size of the US helicopter industry.
There are between 400-500 EMS helicopters in the USA providing a 24/7 service to the country. Compare that to the the UK please and tell us it is an Apples to Apples comparison.
That we lose too many people and aircraft.....for way too many of the same reasons year after year is a true statement and if you recall I am critical of the US EMS industry for its seemingly cavalier attitude towards that.
The past two years has seen a marked improvement in the loss rate as the industry and the government has been forced to reconcile the old way of doing business with the adverse
PR they have had to face up to due to the number of fatalities the industry has experienced in the past.
One metric that is not measured is the numbers of lives lost due to the lack of a 24/7 EMS service in the UK and Europe due to the strict rules of flight. That might be a telling number?
The sad truth is trying to provide the 24/7 service but doing so in a safe effiecient manner is always going to be a balancing act.
The CAA/FAA rules should assist in improving safety but do so without preventing the provision of the service for unnecessary bureaucratical reasons.
Just what is different between VFR weather (1000/3 miles) in the UK and the USA....same aircraft, same standard of pilots, same weather....yet we can fly and you cannot. Does it not seem just a wee bit odd to you?
The UK legal environment for Helicopter EMS operations is different than that here in the USA and one set of rules does not fit both situations.
People died before the advent of ground ambulances, EMT's, Paramedics, and Helicopter EMS with its Paramedics and Flight Nurses and the current EMS crews should accept they will not be able to "save" every life in jepordady. Way too many forget they are in the medical transport business and not the life saving business.