Originally Posted by
gulliBell
Why would it appear in the Operator S92 flight documents as a VFR approach/departure procedure if the S92 is too big to operate from Blackrock helipad? It might be a weird depiction of an IMC let-down procedure, depends on what the accompanying notes on page 2 says.
It doesn't look like it is designed for the purpose of landing at Blackrock. Merely that Blackrock is the start/end point for the procedure.
Whether the procedure the crew elected to fly was appropriate will be assessed in the full report. Likewise, the genesis of such a procedure will be analysed.
Tragic though this incident was I believe this an opportunity to take a holistic view of the way SAR Ops are tasked and conducted. For a long time the status quo has been for an 'RCC' (or equivalent) to receive a request for assistance and task an asset accordingly. In my opinion this can sometimes be an overly simplistic process with tasking decisions often being made by non-aviators. Clearly, the aircraft captain has a veto on any tasking but human nature makes it very hard to say no; all rescue organisations by their very nature are 'can do'. The methodology of SAR tasking has not changed in decades. It is rooted in an era when 'jobs' were generally more simplistic in their nature (range, weather conditions etc.). In this case a crew on the East coast of Ireland were woken in the early hours of the morning to top-cover a rescue in the Atlantic via a let-down to an austere refuel site in poor conditions.
If this hadn't been a scramble I wander how much time the average crew would have put in to planning and briefing a similar profile? My point is that a lot is expected of SAR crews and this is an opportunity (in Eire at least) to improve safety margins.