On a different note (and more on topic) I am led to believe that the Humberside crew took 3 attempts to successfully perform a wet winching demo at the Armed Forces day at Cleethorpes.............
Not quite:
3 pre-planned runs to conduct basic winch man 'touch and goes' with the Cleethorpes ILB - something that unfortunately had yet to be practiced with this particular crew/boat prior to the event despite Humberside SAR's intensive training work-up period prior to going live back in April. Wets were certainly not intended or indeed planned.
1st run was simply a dummy to facilitate boat positioning training using weighted bag; 2nd and 3rd being live runs. All runs had to be curtailed earlier than planned due to the ILB running out of water depth below her keel due to tide conditions.
The ILB crew had never exercised with an S92 helo before and were training two new boat drivers on the day which was far from ideal hence they for-mated on the winch hook/winchman rather than remaining below the aircraft door as expected. They also did not follow the approach/departure SoP that is expected...
There is only so much you can do in a 'role demo' versus full on SAR demonstration. I'm sure the crowds were pleased to see their local SAR helicopter put in an appearance after all...
