SAS: When a police cab sucks fuel at base, it is recorded by the cops (a) on their fuel bowser gauge and (b) in the paperwork.
You can tell when you're up around the 400kg mark in an EC135 as you pull power - it feels sluggish and heavy!
Stashing fuel at ad hoc sites isn't necessary for city operators and for rural operators like myself (when we tried ad hoc sites of stashed fuel) they are more bother than the worth of it because of security issues and contamination issues. We ditched those ideas years ago. No police chopper is ever very far away from a proper refuelling depot.
I would go out on a limb here and say " a lot" of police pilots fly to the limits of their MLA simply because the job demands this. I cannot ever recall one incident where any single police helo landed on below minima's. Bottom line is, the cops are a canny lot and NEVER miss a trick (they have seen too much!) and if they EVER saw such an activity - they would raise hell! They would certainly make sure that pilot was suitably rebriefed by the chief pilot ASAP.
Hence my Q:
IF.....IF all appropriate captions were on AND audio alert......why did the TFO's NOT comment on it????