The training question seems to have visited all quarters since the beginning of this new venture. SAR partners are worried about getting enough training time with civilian aircraft even though over the decades of CivSAR provision they have never actually asked for as much training time as the contractor is ready to provide. Some military flyers go off on one about the contracted flying training time without proper consideration of the different crew responsibilities in different providers, the lack of a war-fighting requirements in CivSAR aircrew training, the standard of the facilities available, the contractor's position as a helicopter training provider, and the extended career pattern of CivSAR aircrew.
If you want something to criticise then get a letter off to your MP asking why the DfT and their predecessors took 40 years to come up with a competent SAR helicopter contract technical specification. Importantly, without such a contract specification, there was never any need for the CAA to regulate for the specialist environment in which only military SAR aircraft were operating. Nearly every mistaken assertion and real problem associated with this change derive from that same origin: past inadequacy of government contract specifications. When they eventually get it together, everybody is behind the curve.
Exciting times ahead.
La oss gå flyr.
