And what will happen when that source has been exhausted as there won't be any mil SAR to acquire your ready trained, competent and experienced crews from? An increased training burden and escalation of contract price?

Latest on this from the BBC.......

BBC News - Bristow Group to take over UK search and rescue from RAF

Ping

There are actually 22 helicopters in the contract, one spare for each type. Each unit will have two of which one is the standbye. The second will be available for scheduled maintenance but on a 4 mans hours servicing to 1 hour's flying this will be very infrequent. When a major servicing event comes up then the spare will fill in. The spare will also normally be available to proceed to an outstation if there is a protracted heavy workload.

It is normal in the civilian world for a helicopter to be detached for long periods with just the crew and two engineers.

Winco,

CSAR has never been the remit of UK based SAR units. This has always been covered by other deployed units.

Winco,

To go one further - and has been touched on already in this thread, JPR/CSAR has essentially been danced around for as long as anyone can remember, with various communities (Merlin, SK-4) working to establish an initial capability that then either got axed, lost in the noise, missing in the wash or gathered sufficient dust to be removed from the corporate consciousness.

I tried to personally write some JPR SOPs for our CVS work once and St Mawgan practically bit my hand off to help - for at last someone was taking their great work forward. (Work in draft at SDSR - now used successfully in the Junior Rates head as auxiliary wiping material.)

However I am not convinced that this has anything to do with peacetime SAR really.

FWIW I think having mil SAR by way of second line tours for front line aircrew has its value. I am not personally convinced we need mil SAR communities other than that. And if I ever end up on the wrong end of a Martin Baker let down I really couldn't care less what brand of professional turns up in what colour helo...so long as someone does!

Whilst that 'almost' lets you away with it, that's a bit disengenious. The number of civillian SAR crews in the Uk has always been much less than military, so the law of averages means that Mil crews are more likely to receive awards. However, a quick search finds:

Newsroom - Press Releases

Coastguard receives bravery award - Fishing Related Media Coverage - TrawlerPictures.net

The award is named after a Civillian winchman who lost his life - and was awarded the George Medal - on a rescue.

We should think about privatising the House of Commons and House of Lords, may not save much, but may get a few less idiots.

Quote Orca And if I ever end up on the wrong end of a Martin Baker let down I really couldn't care less what brand of professional turns up in what colour helo...so long as someone does! :rolleyes: All pilots in my time preferred someone, dispatched from 60 ft wearing fins, once deposited in the oggin;) you know it makes sense.

Stop/Start...Suitably named?


And I almost envy Stuffy's Lead-line Cellar with 2 years food and a Well.

Having just spent 30yrs military work and moved back to braunton i thought at least i would not be totally away from RAF community!!, now it seems chivenor for 22 sqn is to be no more:\. Had my first flight in the RAF as an aircadet at the age of 14yrs (same helicopter is in Hendon) with the whirlwind guys there(flt lt Smokey Furness?), my whole basis of joining RAF. Will be very quiet around here, i know that it is a sad day for all the locals to lose the helicopters and crews.

Coastguard Awards
 

Civilian SAR crews are out in the same conditions, unfortunatley for them they are not backed up by a ruthlessly professional PR dept. - especially the RAF. If the Coastguard PR was any where near as good as the Military's, the clanking of medals would be just as loud at Coastguard bases.

Under the Civil Continguencies Act of 2004, the SAR Force were the odd ones out as the only military asset acting as a Category 1 Responder. Seeing, as all other emergency services are provided by civvies then I see no reason why SAR shouldn't follow - fire engines, police, ambulances all have primacy in the UK on the MOD estate or of it.

As for using bright yellow helicopters in times of war collecting downed aircrew - now that really has made me chuckle...:ok:

Well done SAR-boys. You have done a 1st class job over the years. Now it is time to bow out gracefully...

LJ

One obvious question.....are 20 aircraft enough?
Take for example the Boscastle flood. Something like seven Sea Kings used at the same time. Or the Fastnet race incident. How many were used there - something like 15 combined from Navy and RAF??
If you assume the usual degree of downtime for servicing, is there enough depth to cope with a major incident? At present the services have available reserve aircraft from the training squadrons (as happened with the Fastnet rescues) but presumably with the new regime they won't be available as backup.
How many aircraft were involved in rescues during last weeks snow? Or still are for that matter? It seems to me that it wouldn't take much to overwhelm 20 airframes, especially if requested to support hill farms / cutoff villages

If memory serves me right....a one aircraft, two pilot, one crew member, two Engineers, one Rampy and a part-time admin type did the job of three aircraft and 31 Military Personnel.

Yes....Civvies can do the job.

It takes a good support base that can respond quickly if the Aircraft goes AOG to make it happen. Scheduled maintenance with the use of a spare taken from the rest of the fleet works fine.

At last! An anachronistic branch of the Services which did little to advance its capabilities outside picking up the aforesaid flip flop wearers. I do not belittle the quality of the crews, their training and achievements, merely endorse the view that they have nothing military about them. Then again a former flight commander of mine did say that "military aircrew" was itself an oxymoron!

Contractorise civilian search and rescue - what a good idea - the Coast Guard have been doing it for some time.

But what about military search and rescue which is why SAR was created, in the first place.

At first the idea was to pull our guys out of the North Sea/English Channel when they needed it and it wasn't just airborne rescue - it was mostly the Marine Branch. Then with the development of helos it became a worldwide commitment to pick up Brit military aircrews wherever they had gone down.

Then gradually parts of it became a national 999 service. The point is that SAR is/was for the military - the RAF and RN civilian rescue service, fantastic though it is, was a spin off.

So Bristow is now going to go into dangerous operational theatres to rescue our boys and girls. Great, if they can do it. I hope they can.

Rgds SOS

Don't forget there are about 100 RN Helos available to back up the civ SAR if required, all with SAR qualified crews. I accept that on any given day this number is not around but 10s could easily be generated at a reasonable notice for a major event.

"Mayday, mayday, this is trawler Orkney Lass going down at the head!"

"Orkney Lass, Orkney Lass, this is SAR. What is your credit card number? American Express will do nicely!"

A genuine question rather than an attempt to wind up anyone: will the Bristows crews be using NVGs for night rescue or will their ac have FLIR? Are civvie crews allowed to use NVGs (even if ex-mil)?

SOSL - the world wide CSAR cover has been looked at here already and is subject to totally different provisions. My understanding is the SAR force in the UK was not part of those arrangements.

As for cover to UK mil, touchwood, but the number of incidents involving UK mil ditching are vastly lower now than at any time in the past. It is the case that something like 97-99% of all call outs are civilian related.

The bravery of the SAR crews has been beyond question, but ultimately SAR has become an emergency service like the other blue light responders. Frankly at a time when money is tight, I'd rather MOD money was spent on equipment used on ops and not providing an emergency service that can be done, and has been done, with equal effectivness and courage by civilians for over 30 years.