Hello,
I hope I am posting this topic in the right section, I have 2 questions for the people here who know things (preferably from experience) about SAR operations around the world. First I'll tell why I am asking these questions and then I'll ask them.
I am a young person (18) who is currently looking for a goal in life, or at least a goal for the coming years. I like running, swimming, and see myself as an adventurous person. I only just graduated from middle school and am now a proud owner of a qualification with wich I can go to university. I found out about the occupation winchman trough my interest for helicopters. It seems like the perfect job for me. But..., and this is going to sound dumb, being only a winchman might not be enough for me. I want to really rescue people. Like the US coast guard AST's do and the (former) royal navy SAR divers. I want to be IN the water and do the rescue as opposed to only stay on the wire like the winchman do. I did alot of research about it and I found out that those 2 options are not possible as I am dutch and the SAR divers are removed form operational service a while ago.
So here are my 2 questions:
1. In this (
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Exljdc5xgjQ) video I think I see from 2:14 till 2:21 and from 2:52 till 2:58 that the winchman is carrying something on his belt wich I think are fins. That would suggest that the winchman seen on the video was prepared to get in the water and swim. That raises the actual question:"Do bristow winchman in norway get off the wire and actually swim to the survivors in the water and then rescue them?"
2. My second question is a less specific one. Everywhere I look on the internet there is always a very strict border between "rescue swimmers" and "winchman". Rescue swimmers get off the wire and put survivors in the basket and winchman stay on the wire and try to rescue survivors from there. Now I think that winchman are very limited in the types of rescues they can perform compared to rescue swimmers. For example:"How will a winchman rescue someone stranded in a cave?";"How will a winchman rescue someone that has gone underwater because of a big wave?". I don't think the type of SAR cases that occur on the US coasts are very different from the types that occur on the coasts of the UK. So my actual question is:"How will bristow fill the gap that the limitations of the winchman creates?"
I would be very gratefull if someone would answer my questions, it would really help me with deciding wich carreer path to take.
Thanks alot in advance!