The three 'T's of HEMS operations come to mind again.Technology, training and temperament.The first two obviously cost money.The FAA will always be reluctant to mandate anything to an operator due to it's dual mandate.
The last one is a little subjective but,here is my two cents worth:
Temperament includes the understanding, from the word go, that this is not about rescue or saving lives but about transportation.It includes cultural issues such as background and experience.Even today,I am amazed at how many people I meet who will say that they would never have flown in such- and- such scenarios and then proceed to tell me war stories of how they did just that and got away with it.The fact they don't get is that they were lucky not smarter or more skilled than the poor guy who lies dead in an Iowa cornfield.But they THINK they are.How do you train that out of a guy?
To me the big thing is the culture of an industry.The US HEMS world is going through the same growing pains the airline industry went through here in the 60s and 70s.Today , the airline world is a different industry altogether. Why ? Not because of the FAA or the airlines.Because of pilot groups like ALPA that demanded changes and got it.Hope we can get there someday.But, given the attitudes of helicopter pilots to collectively do anything over here,I am not holding my breath.
And, finally, you can throw all the bells and whistles into an aircraft but, as long as the average pilot here believes that anything that is not expressly forbidden is authorized (It is the other way around in the rest of the world) people will continue to die.How do you train that mindset out of a person? I asked Randy Mains that question.All I got was deafening silence.You see ,for all of Randy's new found enlightenment,the one thing he will never acknowledge is that folks like him and his generation are what created this monster.You just have to read his books to see that.
Now,everything we do or say or the FAA does is too little too late.That train left the station the moment the first single engine helicopter departed on an EMS flight in Colorado.
Alt3
Last edited by alouette3; 5th Jan 2013 at 00:49.