Long Distance Offshore Ops
Joined: Feb 2002
Posts: 317
Likes: 8
From: Escaped from ABZ...
Seem to remember Captain Cardiac (you know who you are!) doing some long range epic from the FI several years ago to pick up a woman with heart problems from a cruise ship. Involved refuelling from one her majesty's grey funnel war canoes and anecdotal evidence suggested that the co-pilot touched the controls for about 15 mins in some 8 odd hours! I don't know the range, perhaps someone with closer knowledge might have an accurate figure....
Joined: Jul 2006
Posts: 40
Likes: 0
From: Ireland
Tut tut, you shouldn't talk about Capt Cardio in that way, I flew with him on many occasions and I must have held the controls once or twice in that time! I did a long ranger from FI, even though it was only 150nm odd, it still seemed a long way as the chinook was u/s and the only other nearest 'friendly' SAR asset was somewhere in south america! Boy does the south atlantic look big when you can't see land in any direction. 
Joined: Jul 2006
Posts: 1,196
Likes: 1
From: Among these dark Satanic mills
78 Sqn Sea Kings have done both rescues and pick-ups of compassionate cases from South Georgia, starting from MPA, which is about 900nm each way, though in fairness a large part of that was spent on the back of a Grey Funnel.
From what I know, that would be 15 mins +0/-15! I heard an amusing tale from a D Flt RadOp who arrived there under a bit of a cloud while the by-now Major Cardiac was in command...the RadOp said that MC blanked him for the entire first shift they did together, and even when they got a job the RadOp wasn't allowed to speak - he says that, when they arrived on scene, MC did all the briefs including the recce and method brief, and the first thing the RadOp managed to say on the sortie was "Winching Out"!
Seem to remember Captain Cardiac (you know who you are!) doing some long range epic from the FI several years ago to pick up a woman with heart problems from a cruise ship. Involved refuelling from one her majesty's grey funnel war canoes and anecdotal evidence suggested that the co-pilot touched the controls for about 15 mins in some 8 odd hours! I don't know the range, perhaps someone with closer knowledge might have an accurate figure....
Joined: Oct 2006
Posts: 5,174
Likes: 7
From: UK
Offshore alternates
I remember when I first started on the North Sea with the old AS330 Puma that had an offshore alternate facility. It was essential at Teeside for the Ekofisk otherwise there was no other way you could get there. One day at Aberdeen the whole of Scotland was socked in but I departed because I could find the runway and I had nominated the Claymore as my take-off diversion. It must have been legal because my chief pilot told me to do it
