Cockney Steve,
I don't think any of the contributors to this thread would hesitate for one second to do whatever it took to rescue someone if it was possible at the time, and some already have. Unfortunately, a single, spur of the moment, risky/lucky/courageous act is one thing. Planning to achieve a rescue by helicopter is a different matter and needs a proper risk assessment and the proper equipment and training for it to be acceptable.
I once turned down a "spur of the moment" SAR mission in a police helicopter in very severe weather (night, heavy snowfall and thick fog) because I knew the risk to the aircraft was too great. The likelihood of finding, let alone rescuing, the lost persons was unlikely because the search area was enormous, there wasn't even a known start point. At that stage it wasn't even certain that the persons needed rescuing, but it was known that they were well equipped to stay out overnight. I was strongly criticised at the time by the control room supervisor, a senior policeman. He tried to call out another police helicopter from a neighbouring force and then RAF Search and Rescue. Both declined the job, for exactly the same reasons as myself. The following day, the lost persons walked out of the hills, fit, healthy, totally unharmed and happy and returned home, blissfully unaware that a rescue mission was even being considered.
Had I flown the mission and had an accident, (and with three persons on board as against two "survivors"), who would have been held responsible? Not the senior policeman, not the "survivors".....just me.
Sometimes we shouldn't try to learn from scratch from our own mistakes, we should learn from the experience of others. Sometimes that involves saying NO!
