Who has the most!

[patcarty2]

Would anyone have any idea who the top five largest UK companies are in relation to the number of rotary aircraft they operate?
TIA
Pat

[Bravo73]

I reckon that the order will be something along the lines of:

CHC
Bristow
Bond (On and Offshore)
PDG
PremiAir

[patcarty2]

Thanks Bravo,
I searched the CAA and found the following:
CHC = 40
Bristow: 55
Bond: 21
PDG, Dollar,PLM= 16
Premiair= 2

Would that seem correct?
Pat

[Bravo73]

I'm not sure about the CHC & Bristows numbers. They seem a little low.

Bond will also probably be a little higher. I think that they've got 6-7 332L2s at Aberdeen and 20-30 EC135s & Bo105s.

PremiAir is closer to 30. 15ish AOC aircraft, a handful of managed aircraft and the Police EC135s. Maybe that would put PremiAir into 4th place.


But thinking about it, Cabair and HeliAir probably also operate quite a few Robinsons each for training. I'm not sure what the numbers might be though. Did you want to include training providers?

[bolkow]

numbers

I'd look at the (G-INFO aircraft database) site, just put in the name of the operator and it should list what they currently have.

[SilsoeSid]

Would you class the Police as a company operater in this?
"Police" on G-INFO brings up a few, also the 7 from PAS.

UK Police = 29
PAS = 7

p.s.
I thought the met had 145s!
It says 145 on the tin, but 117 on the register

[md 600 driver]

ginfo would only show aircraft registered in uk not the n reg ,ha reg vp reg irish reg or even the m reg.

[Brilliant Stuff]

I think it's more like Bristow, CHC and Bond own the most aircraft but people like PremiAir and Starspeed operate a good number of aircraft on behalf of their owners.

[Thud_and_Blunder]

SSid,

Re your , perhaps that's cos although the Met have three you can only See Two...

[Helinut]

Although marketed as an EC145, in certification terms I think you will find the 145 is actually a BK117C2. Smoke and mirrors and no certification costs for a complete new airframe...........

[SilsoeSid]

One and the same according to G-INFO

Manufacturer: EUROCOPTER DEUTSCHLAND GMBH
Type: MBB-BK 117 C-2

Popular Name: EC145
Generic Name: BK117


Certification COSTS!! How did the CAA miss that one?

[patcarty2]

BrilliantStuff,
Re Premiair and StarSpeed, are we saying then that there is no way of knowing their fleet size then? So, they could be much larger than what is shown on G-INFO?i

[JimBall]

G-INFO only shows the registered owners. The figures are misleading in 2 ways.

1 Leaseback is the currency of light helicopters. So PremiAir may be managing double the amount of machines they own. Or triple. And not all of those would be on the AOC. Only PremiAir could tell you.

2 The CAA requires that all new imported helis are first registered with the dealer before being certified and registered in the owner's name. So - for sometimes several months - a machine can be seen to be "owned" by HeliAir - although paid for by another. Then there's the fact that a middleman may have purchased the helicopter through the distributor. And HeliAir also do leaseback - see above.

[patcarty2]

Thanks JimBall,
I thought it would be too easy to get an answer, but I now have a better understanding thanks to you guys.
Pat