The future of UK SAR, post SAR-H

[Al-bert]

HF

I can still remember that feeling of loneliness as the lights of EIRE disappeared behind one and the RCC controller told you that the Nimrod was just getting airborne as you still had over an hour and a half to the target.

Those were the days for youth and immortality

Ah, what poetry! You haven't been drinking have you?
Anyway, we were lucky - we had Nimrods back in the olden days

[[email protected]]

Jim, that link is exactly how to do it - decide on a capability and then work out how to afford it rather than agree a price and accept what you get from the salesman.

Al-bert - last one I did was with the maritime patrol Cessna out to 250nm W of Ireland - it wasn't as good as a Nimrod but having a friendly voice and another airborne presence that far out was still comforting. Didn't stop us from staring at the fuel gauges and MRGB oil pressure for 4 and a bit hours though.

You didn't have to be coy about your identity though

[Al-bert]

You didn't have to be coy about your identity though

Good Hevens (sp), was I?

[Vie sans frontieres]

AHT Decks

Text book display of AHT decks from the RAF radop on Highland Emergency tonight.

[jimf671]

... on Highland Emergency tonight.

Who's in the right hand seat in the S-92 during the climber rescue at the bottom of the sea cliff? Voice sounds familiar.



(I don't normally watch it, honest. Is it true Highland Emergency is sanskrit for reduced payload?)

[onesquaremetre]

Major error in the accompanying written report (dated a couple of months back) but interesting to listen to this gentleman's take on the supposed non-conflict between private equity and providing rescue services.

BBC News - Today - Avincis CEO: No conflict with for-profit rescue team

[IFR Piglet]

Hmmm.....curious error, does BBC radio 4 know something we’re not supposed to? For those not in the know, Avincis is Bonds parent company.

Understandably to some the concept of a profit making organisation involved in lifesaving will “go against the grain”. I’d like to think the capability and performance of the existing civvie SAR bases has helped to demonstrate good value for money (since around 1982), especially the last 5.5 years where the people in our local communities have enjoyed a 24/7 SAR service with near perfect availability.
Ditto with regards to the AHT rescue....a job well done with some sweet work by the winch op, it demonstrates that even benign conditions provide challenges. In the future one of the improvements for the boys and girls lucky to fly the new machines will be a better winch position i.e. just a few feet aft of the PF instead of a several metres (except when you have backed into a gully with 93.7kts onshore W/V and 2.7m vis). That said the small size of the vessel on last night’s show would probably have dictated a similar-ish response from a shiny new-ish CG machine.

[jimf671]

... since around ...

1st June 1971 at Manston.


WRECK SHIELD
1971/72 Manston Coastguard Rescue Helicopter Unit
1973/74 Orkney Coastguard Rescue Company and British Airways Helicopter Rescue Unit, Aberdeen

HELICOPTER HEROISM AWARD
The Glasgow Herald - Google News Archive Search

[pasptoo]

Perhaps this is the future.........

www.facebook.com/airrescue24

Interesting page popped up this morning. Anyone know anything about this? The machine appears to be the Lincolnshire Air Ambo - not exactly the "North West"

At least it's the right colour

[[email protected]]

Interesting to see who is paying for this.

[leopold bloom]

Air Rescue 24

Some info here: Air Rescue 24

[[email protected]]

So, the answer is joe public are paying for it - despite already paying for Air Ambulances (directly through donations) and SAR aircraft (indirectly through taxes).

Is there really a demonstrable need for this service? It seems to imply that the present emergency services cannot cope and take too long to get to incidents which I don't think is the case.

Or is this just a continuation of some Fire Service senior bods empire building - they wanted their own helicopters from the taxpayer and were told no so this is their reaction perhaps?

If they think they can prove the need for the service and then get HMG to fund it, they should look at how long AAs have been running without HMG support.

[Geoffersincornwall]

At last.....

..... someone demonstrating that the multi-agency approach is the way to go. If you are fed up with the traditional enmity between the Ambulance Service and the Fire Service then these guys and gals are hopefully going to show the way forward.

Integration is the key to improving the outcome and the bottom line and the next step would - hopefully - lead to this embracing SAR at least at the parochial level.

I read the report by the Royal United Services Institute and the lass who wrote it has the right idea. Fewer long range SAR units and more medium/light twins supporting the Blue Light Brigade.

Yes I know the integration of charitable AA units is an anathema to those units and that will undoubtedly be a hard nut to crack but if there is a decent incentive to integrate (use your imagination £££) then the Trustees will find it hard to ignore the operational benefits that derive to those that are donating their hard-earned cash.

G.

[jimf671]

Geoff,

The principal lesson of the RUSI event was that there is no such thing as a universal multi-role blue light air asset.

The second lesson was that there is not nearly enough joined up thinking on this stuff, particularly in the UK, but also in some other territories.

Those were not lessons from the Institute, but from a room full of experienced people from most of the relevant organisations.

[jimf671]

On the DfT website.

https://www.gov.uk/government/public...copter-service
https://www.gov.uk/government/upload...UK-SAR-ITT.ZIP [!!! 5Mb !!!]

Are these the latest ITT docs that are being used this month or are these from an earlier stage?


[Specification at 2.1. Includes aircraft equipment, pilot experience and more.]

[Vie sans frontieres]

Schedule 2.1 2.2.2.2.1

50 hours of training per month works out at about 1 hour 35 per shift. If on average a crewmember works about 84 shifts per year ie 7 shifts per month that's just 11 hours and 5 minutes training per person per month. About 3 hours of a pilot's training allowance will probably go towards instrument flying leaving him just 8 hours or so for SAR role training. About half the time on SAR training sorties is spent transiting to the training location and not always under the hood so that leaves just four hours per month for sits, decks, drums, wets, mountains, homing etc. That doesn't seem enough for experienced SAR operators let alone inexperienced aircrew who may be recruited.

[[email protected]]

Vie - don't talk about training, that is expensive and clearly not required - apparently you can just pitch up to any situation and just cuff it

[jimf671]

Schedule 2.1 2.2.2.2.1
50 hours of training per month works out at about 1 hour 35 per shift. If on average a crewmember works about 84 shifts per year ie 7 shifts per month that's just 11 hours and 5 minutes training per person per month. About 3 hours of a pilot's training alowance will probably go towards instrument flying leaving him just 8 hours or so for SAR role training. About half the time on SAR training sorties is spent transiting to the training location and not always under the hood so that leaves just four hours per month for sits, decks, drums, wets, mountains, homing etc. That doesn't seem enough for experienced SAR operators let alone inexperienced aircrew who may be recruited.

I organise several exercises each year with SAR helicopters from more than one provider. There is reason for me to be concerned about this. If it was just a bit more of the same then it not a drama. Inadequate though the attitude is, there are numerous SAR partners out there who just think, 'Well, helicopters, I know what a Sea King looks like, I trained with one in 1996 and we've done a few ops with them. What's the problem?'

Amongst those, there are Auxiliary Coastguard unit in the north west where helo training is a bit short of adequate, so they can't even look after their own people. What about the rest of us?

In Scottish MR alone, 20 MR teams (several hundred people) will need initial type training in 2015. Add Aux CG, RNLI, other lifeboats, medical teams, ...
Then there's continuation training.

That's thousands of people in SAR partner organisations just for the 4 Scottish bases to reach out to, with all the workload falling on 2 bases in 2015. That's in addition to aircrew SAR training.

Has anyone seen anything about training rear-crew for mountains? Do I need to write to the HSE about this?

[Geoffersincornwall]

You will need to marshal your arguments a little better than this.....

..... if you want to make a case for more training.

As a trainer I'm right out there in the front line saying we can't get enough but there are a couple of things we have to acknowledge otherwise the 'naysayers' will shoot us down in flames.

1. A lot of 'training by doing' is going on out there - at least I hope it is for every callout is a refresher and a rehearsal. The tougher the job the more value the previous 'rehearsals' have been. Every failed search is a refresher for the time when you DO find someone and I am hoping that we are all using DEBRIEFING as a way of making EVERY job a contributor to the overall knowledge and effectiveness of the units involved.

2. The use of simulators in role training and rehearsal is growing and we must protect the 'real aircraft' training against erosion by the misapprehension idea that it can REPLACE the real thing - it can't. What it can do is provide some important development opportunities for newbies, for those promoted to command and for the development of new techniques and ideas. Sim training is easier to programme and plan and very cost effective if the course material is well designed and the lessons well executed.

I suggest you go in to bat with a better thought-out argument than a simple hours count.

G.

[meanttobe]

CHC out of UK SAR bid

Chc have been advised by DfT that they are not to submit a final bid for uk long sar as a competitor has submitted a bid over 20% lower. Step forward mister cheapo mac cheap Bond.