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Bristows to take over SAR from 2015

Sky news reporting that Bristows are taking over from 2015. Very sad if its true. Official announcement in the morning.
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Announcement at 0700 hrs tomorrow including details of new Agusta Westland and Sikorsky helicopters.

I wonder how cheap this will be once the ready supply of Service trained crews runs out.

Rum, old man Bristow, was very rum.

This is about the removal of the 'Nation State', to be replaced by the private corporation.

You lot on here, really need to find out what is really happening.

Naive or what ?

Brave New World

To understand why these things happen.

Read George Orwell's 1984. Read it 5 times !

It takes that long to be aware how profound this book is.

Then Aldus Huxley's Brave New World.

All your loyalties, and things you hold dear, are being stripped away.

Then you will understand WHY !

Boulmer & Portland to close.
10 x Sikorsky S92 & 10 x AW139 helicopters to replace SAR fleet.
Bristows have it.

Quote:

26 March 2013

GOVERNMENT CONTRACT TO DELIVER FASTER, STATE OF THE ART SEARCH & RESCUE FLEET

A new £1.6bn contract for search and rescue helicopter services will see the UK benefit from improved flying times and better coverage of high-risk areas.

The Department for Transport has today signed a contract with Bristow Helicopters Ltd to provide search and rescue helicopter services in the UK. Helicopters will be able to reach a larger area of the UK search and rescue region within one hour of take off than is currently possible, and based on historic incident data it is estimated that there will be an overall improvement in flying times to incidents of around 20% (from 23 to 19 minutes). Presently, approximately 70% of high and very high risk areas within the UK search and rescue region are reachable by helicopter within 30 minutes. Under the new contract, approximately 85% of the same area would be reached within this timeframe.

Today's announcement represents a major investment by the Government in providing a search and rescue helicopter service using the most up to date helicopters and meeting the highest professional standards.

Transport Secretary Patrick McLoughlin said:

"Our search and rescue helicopter service plays a crucial role, saving lives and providing assistance to people in distress on both land and on sea.

"With 24 years of experience providing search and rescue helicopter services in the UK, the public can have great confidence in Bristow and their ability to deliver a first class service with state of the art helicopters."

Under the new contract, 22 state-of-the-art helicopters will operate from 10 locations around the UK.

· 10 Sikorsky S92s will be based, two per site, at Stornoway and Sumburgh, and at new bases at Newquay, Caernarfon and Humberside airports; and

· 10 AgustaWestland AW189s will operate, two per site, from Lee on Solent and a new hangar at Prestwick airport, and new bases which will be established at St Athan, Inverness and Manston airports.

All bases will be operational 24 hours a day.

Following 70 years of outstanding service from the RAF and RN search and rescue squadrons, military involvement in search and rescue in the UK is to cease, and with the Sea King helicopter nearing its 40th year of operations, the time has come to change the way the service is provided and the aircraft used. Contracted search and rescue services have operated alongside the RAF and RN since 1983 with great success, and contracted search and rescue crews have won numerous awards for their bravery.

The new contract will be managed by the Maritime and Coastguard Agency in the same way as the existing contract that operates the Coastguard helicopter bases on the south coast and on the Western and Shetland Isles. Half of the new fleet will be built in Yeovil and the contract will have a significant impact on the UK supply chain, providing and sustaining jobs and apprenticeships.

Government contract for search & rescue fleet - London Stock Exchange

Quote:

with the Sea King helicopter nearing its 40th year of operations,

Given the Sea King was delivered in 1969, does that mean she didn't operate for 4 years?

Or is the press release the one that was prepared 5 years ago when SAR-H was meant to be delivered?

Or is MoD just stupid?

Quote:

Following 70 years of outstanding service from the RAF and RN search and rescue squadrons, military involvement in search and rescue in the UK is to cease...

Is the RAF MRS also going to go, or is this another case of poor journalism?

I wonder how much they will pay the Duke of Cambridge? I also doubt that they will give him as much time off......

Quote:

I also doubt that they will give him as much time off......

Oh, I think he'll probably scrape by.

CG

"This is about the removal of the 'Nation State', to be replaced by the private corporation." etc, rant, etc

Pass the tin foil :p

StopStart,

That made me chuckle on a miserable Tuesday morning, but Stuffy does have a point. Far far too much of the UK's national and enabling infrastructure has been sold off (given away!) to foreign corporations or is now controlled outside of the UK and it puts us at a serious strategic risk.

One of the few things I remember from an extremely tedious 6 months at IOT were the lectures (can't even remember the name of that bit of the syllabus, so can't have been that memorable). In one of them, they pointed out that whilst SAR spent most of its time rescuing overweight walkers in flip flops from Ben Nevis or teenagers with a Darwin complex stuck on a pedalo in the North Sea, their raison d'etre was the rescue of aircrew during times of war.

Now I'm not saying an invasion and fight for national survival is imminent, but I do wonder whether that key fact was remembered during the contract discussions. I'd hate for there to be a shooting match and we find out that SAR is no longer able to pick up crews because the threat is deemed to be too great and the Board and shareholders simply wouldn't stand for losing an ac. Or they do go out, but only after we pay the equivalent of a year's contract in advance for one mission. I'm sure it's all been considered, just saying ...

Imagine the scene down the line, national emergency, defence of the realm imperative, F-35 ends up in the oggin and driver bobs around for a day and a half whilst risk assessment carried out.

It's amazing how fast you can paint national markings on a helicopter.

Does anyone know how Carrier SAR is going to be staffed and trained? I would assume that a Naval SAR capability is still needed.

Surely The Andrew will need to keep the winch / SAR skills up just for basic safety options when afloat.

I quite agree that farming out SAR to a civvy entity (foreign or otherwise) is possibly a bit foolish and will certainly have the effect of taking yet more of the military out of the public eye but I don't think it'll affect the service offered. It's just a shame there will now be a profit motive and bottom line involved.

I would much rather see military SAR continue but the way things are these days there just isn't the money. It would be nice (fanciful) to see the military continue with in-house development of much smaller but "proper", dedicated CSAR assets to support combat operations as a result though.

At the risk of going off at a massive tangent, the RAF needs to realise that it isn't going to be putting 1000 bomber raids over Dresden or fleets of C-47s over Normandy ever again. It should be specialising a LOT more; smaller, well equipped fleets, doing specialist jobs well. Just look at the USAF SpecOps community and things like their Pedro flights. Everyone bemoans the shrinking Air Force -it's a fact of life that we/they are stuck with. The "thinkers" out there should be rationalising and rethinking to produce Force Elements that, although smaller, mange to punch well above their weight, technically and professionally.

The RAF I left a year ago (and still have some involvement with) had become one with a thin veneer of glossy brochures and the odd "C17 delivers thing" news story, covering an actual reality of poor serviceability, patchy training, low morale, navel gazing, delayed projects and a level of bureaucracy that the Indian Railways would envy.

Until someone instigates a proper Defence Review (not the money based horse**** of the last one) then bits of the military infrastructure, like SAR, will chipped away and bodged over, making the edifice creak ever louder.

Told you it was a massive tangent.

And I still think Stuffy is a tinfoil hat wearing conspiracy theorist. :hmm: