SASless,
So what is
your "text book" solution to the issue in question, ie. how would
you make "VFR" Night Ops safer?
Can you land at an airport when the Control Tower is closed? Can you land at an airport that does not have on-site manned Fire Services? There are dozens of examples of where your system is so restrictive it kills the industry but will you accept it being so?
Yes, I can. I can also legally land off airfield by night, too. I try to avoid it like the plague.
I've done it many times in the past (UK Military/ Civilian Casevac & SAR, Far East / UK police/ Private). I'm fully aware of the risks involved and those risks are not to be underestimated.
Towards the end of my military service non-NVG ops became known as "reversionary night flying". Twenty years ago, a decision was made such that every night flight was made on NVG. Ad-hoc landing sites were not normally allowed unless a second aircraft could illuminate the site with black light. The military decided over two decades ago to desist from doing multi-crew what your EMS folk are still struggling to do single pilot and without NVG.
I'm fairly sure that the UK rules don't forbid night landings for EMS / Air Ambulance flights. Instead the individual authorities providing the service have risk assessed it and for now have decided not to do it. I was in conversation with the chief pilot of an air ambulance unit about three weeks ago and this was a subject he brought up. He said that it will be done in the not too distant future.
Hi-viz jackets? I don't see what that has to do with the issue at all, but some UK airfields (licensed or otherwise) don't mandate Hi-viz. Some actively discourage them. It's not a CAA requirement, but a local Health and Safety one. I
don't like wearing mine just because some graduate did a course on it, but I will wear it if I think it's safer to do so, such as on our unlit dispersal at night (shock horror, yes, totally unlit, in the dark).
Your inability to accept the CAA's rules as being excessive is the usual Achille's Heel Brits have when defending the rules you have to work under. The CAA has earned a nickname of "Crats Against Aviation" for valid reasons...some fairly applied and some not.
My inability....? I don't defend the rules (CAA always known as "Campaign Against Aviation", btw, not 'Crats).
I do however comply with their rules A) because I want to keep my licence and B) because I hope to reach my retirement in one piece without being put in a situation where I feel under commercial pressure to push the limits, risking my aircraft and crew / pax to get a job done. Let alone in an outdated aircraft. Did you operate differently? Does EMS USA operate differently to that? What's wrong with a planned IFR transit, in a properly equipped aircraft, followed by a letdown to VMC below?
SASless, Why not refrain from attacking the messenger and look outside the box?