212man
I think that is exactly the point Tenfour is making.
OEMs 'hedge' their production bets and compromise to ensure chopper sells across various sectors - rather than the O&G customers insisting - and paying the inevitable premium - for on an operator to use a machine that has been specifically designed to fly extended periods of time where, currently, if you do get a warning the only precautionary options are limited to ditching.
It will mean an extraodinarily-expensive machine when compared to a standard model.
However, this will never happen as the meticulously-costed Safety Case permits the use of 'compromised' machines in the cost-based analysis.
We all know that the helicopter logistic element is minuscule in the great scheme of O&G.
If clients stopped trying to do it 'on the cheap' - by using modified general purpose machines - then maybe the magnitude of investment would stop the cavalier chopping and changing of contracts for 'convenience' purposes and the industry might make some serious progress when it comes to flight safety.
You rarely hear of companies using 'compromised' installation designs - each installation specialises in a specific task; be it exploration, production, storage, pumping etc
What has been alluded too is that this will not change until the client's cost of a life is significantly increased.
That is one of the reasons why I am grateful that my exposure to the O&G mentality was relatively short-lived!
Last edited by EESDL; 25th May 2016 at 18:03.