It saddens me that those who want to continue doing what they love doing, but as a civilian, are described as going begging 'cap in hand' to Bristow. For those that do I sincerely hope they are not welcomed with that attitude from many of their new compatriots. I suspect that once the disruption and uncertainty of the next few years subsides that it will all work quite nicely.
Please don't think some of the comments on this forum reflect the attitudes of the current MCA crewroom where civilian, ex-RAF & RN personnel all work very well together.
Naturally this is an unsettling period for all (more so for RAF/RN crews looking to transition out) but I sincerely believe Bristow not only want to recruit the experience currently operating in military SAR but they will need to.
I'm not entirely sure how the 7-9 month transition will work, or how the North Sea plan to gain experience will work with crewing. This is going to be a challenge no doubt but I've been through a few hand-overs to new operators or changes of contract in my career where the naysayers sat at the sidelines waiting for the whole show to collapse only to jump on board and join the celebrations when it somehow got done - usually through the hard work and flexibility of the people involved.
However, I think once the dust has settled there will be a huge sigh of relief from those who wanted to join civilian SAR when they realise that it doesn't really feel any different from what they are doing at the moment (where did most of the SOPs for civilian SAR came from in the first place?). The major difference will be working in a superb new aircraft operating from a bespoke modern facility (apart from Stornoway
).
Bring it on and welcome one and all.