UK Air Ambulance

[Fatigue]

How does the UK Air Ambulance operations compare to the way the US fly?? I know over the pond they fly single pilot day/night VFR and also single pilot day/night IFR....Usually the shift schedules are 7 on, 7 off, 12-14 hour days!!!
Thanks for any info....

[whoateallthepies]

Fatigue
At this unit we work one 10 hour shift daily (0800-1800). I work 6 on/4 off/6 on/3 off. If we had the money and equipment we'd love to work shifts around the clock but we depend on charity from Joe Public. I believe most dedicated HEMS units in UK work to roughly the same system.

For our first year of operation all of our costs were covered by the AA and we worked two 8 hour shifts during the summer, available for the extended daylight hours. That is not an option now, until the finances improve.

Our aircraft is IFR equipped but only a very few of our pilots are Instrument Rated. The nature of the job dictates that it is mainly VFR work anyway.

Night HEMS would be possible with the correct equipment and training, some joint Police/HEMS units attend incidents at night in the UK.
What stops us is the huge extra cost of crews to cover the extra hours!:hmm:

[Helinut]

Fatigue,

The UK rules effectively prevent HEMS at night. You can't land away from "prepared" lit landing sites. Since people don't generally have accidents near heliports, night HEMS is not really an option in the UK. The police CASEVAC option is a very limited exception to this general rule.

[Fatigue]

Thank-you gents for the info. Much appreciated

[whoateallthepies]

Certainly Sussex attend night incidents using the FLIR camera to recce the landing site and the Nightsun to illuminate it. I would hope that the CAA would allow HEMS units who had the same equipment and intensive training to land at night incidents. The only block at the minute is the cost.

[Helinut]

whoateallthepies,

Like other police units Sussex can (in fairly limited circumstances) make use of the CASEVAC provisions to pick up a seriously injured person a take them to hospital, at night. Its all in the PAOM - this is not regarded as HEMS by the CAA, and is not connected with their HEMS approval.

At the moment, a "pure" HEMS would not be able to do that (even if it had FLIR/Nightsun etc.) A pure HEMS is regarded as public transport (CAT under JAR-OPS3).

I too hope the CAA can be persuaded to change their minds. The new generation NVG is probably the best hope - there are some signs that they are enthusiastic about these. However, my bet is that they will look to force it on emergency services operators to "increase the safety margin" not the operational capability of the operation.

[Bearintheair]

Not so Helinut.

We in Sussex do Night HEMS under the terms of our PAOC HEMS Approval.

We carry it out within a specified area (Sussex and the surrounds), with a single pilot and a HEMS Crewmember, with an autopilot equipped aircraft (MD 902) which also has the other equipment required as well as the essential (in our view) role equipment of FLIR and Nightsun. (hopefully soon NVG as well).

As I understand it any air ambulance with a JAR AOC and operating to JAROPS HEMS rules could do night HEMS with the right crew and equipment.

[Helinut]

BearintheAir,

Thanks for the correction. I need to go back to my books on this one!

I suspect that the difference lies in the absence of the autopilot and the single pilot operation that I have flown with.

[whoateallthepies]

Helinut
I used to fly for Sussex so I knew the rules. I just didn't put them across as well as Bear!

It is certainly the long term ambition of the HEMS unit I am now at, to operate 24 hours. (A very, very long term ambition!). We are taking great interest in the NVG certification.

[Thomas coupling]

Sussex are unique in that :
(a) they are one of only three police units that conduct full time (daily) HEMS operations with a HEMS approval.
(b) they are the only unit in england and wales who do single pilot night HEMS officially. (Air ambulance and police units combined). I believe virgin HEMS is two pilot.

The reason the CAA have given Sussex approval to do night HEMS is because:
1. The a/c has a full autopilot suite
2. They carry a dedicated 'HEMS crewmember' in accordance with Jar requirements (and definition).
3. The topography has been assessed for night HEMS and deemed suitable (i.e. mainly urban).

If anyone had these three criteria, then they could do Night HEMS in the UK.

Shortly, another will be joining the 24hr brigade:

The Warwickshire (and I think Notts) Air Ambulance A109.

But that is another story.........

[2bart]

That would be Northamptonshire not notts, Lincs and Notts are in a 902.
Warwickshire and Northants in a A109p, which started at the end of Sept. Expensive and rumour has it a hard job to get funds to keep it in the air.
I thought the 902 had problems with its full SPIFR spec?

[bosher]

People talk about the A109 being too expensive.

I believe with the current exchance rates it is actually the cheapest, compared with the 135 and 902!!!:ok:

[Thomas coupling]

Bosher, how much would a fully equipped, NEW, 109P cost in police spec.
I bet it is well over the £3,000,000 mark.

You watch what happens to this EMS 109P:{

[PANews]

You may well be right TC, but the A109 does have another life, the out-of-hours organ transplant one, and that may just swing things in its favour. On top of that there are a large number of [Sywell] necks on the line and that may well matter in the end.

Their problem is that they can only offer the one type.... no half measures available.

In the end it depends on the quality of the fundraising team. The last users of the same A109 went to the wall because it took time to get their act ogether. They SEEM OK now with a cheaper BO105 and are looking towards new generation again in a year or so. They have changed contractors so it will be an EC135.

Kent AA, the MD900 operator, are now publicly claiming a chronic lack of funds [more likely a poor fundraising performance in recent months] since they 'lost' the previous founding fundraiser Kate Chivers. Still they had cash and assets of £4M 10 months ago so they are not in dire trouble.

[2bart]

whats the engineering per flt hour compared to the others?
Are REGA are dumping their 109's for EC145's.

[PANews]

whats the engineering per flt hour compared to the others?
Are REGA are dumping their 109's for EC145's.

Probably a mite OTT to say that REGA are 'dumping' their 109s...

First they have had them a fair while and they are not 109E Powers [they are the low production 109K and around 10 years old] and all they appear to have done is taken on a handful of 145s to see if they are better or reasonable replacement.

Whether they will reject the 145 [which offers enough additional room to bring along an orchestra if they wish] seems unlikely but the fat lady has not yet placed a full set of orders....

[Thomas coupling]

Here is the latest spotlight on the UK HEMS fraternity..

Some interesting stats for various people:

EMS is 3.5 times more likely to crash than the industry norm.

4 persons need to be saved/year to make it worthwhile.

Night HEMS is particularly dangerous.

One of the major causes for crashing is the conflict between flying in bad weather and getting the patient to hospital.

Some interesting reading:

http://www.shef.ac.uk/uni/academic/R-Z/scharr/mcru/reports.htm

[whoateallthepies]

Yes but the report freely admits that a lot of its statistics come from the US.

There are still cases where the Air Ambulance is the difference between life and death. They can play around with statistics all they like but the helicopter is an efficient tool.

[Letsby Avenue]

The 109 operation that has been set up in Coventry is operating as a charity separate from the NAAS operation and serves Warwickshire and Northants - Interesting to note that all council tax payers in Warwickshire have been levied one pound by the council to help pay for it but not the residents of Northamptonshire!!! I wonder how this affects their charitable status?:confused: