it all appears very quiet here at present, is this the calm before the storm???am i to expect a serious verbal ass whipping by the seasoned old timers??....

every reply so far has simply been a short admission of defeat


come on you bristow professional aviators prove me wrong, tell us all what your elaborate backseat training package for trainee winchmen/ winchops consists of
if you boys are so good, then surely it does consist of more than wets, decks and drums..

I am aware that the ex military guys are still good at what they do...however my point as always is still how physically able are they at late 50s - 60 ??....it certainly doesn't look as though they take part in any physical exercise, how does the fat old geezer on "danger on the beach" get into that double lift harness....do you guys have annual medicals???

luvverboy

So what exactly are you getting at? What's your point?

Luvverboy

I wouldn't expect a storm - whilst you may have introduced a couple of discussion points ( albeit not really anything to do with this thread ), the tone of your postings lets you down.

As with any poor fisherman, the fish will treat the bait with contempt:E

Which one's luvverboy?

http://zogold.net/fraser/art/fishtail.jpg

Luvverboy

"well I know for a fact.......this is for 212man also, ref relevance to jigsaw.....Bristow used selected crewmen to carry out the trials (which involved recovering 21 survivors out of the sea)..the selected crewmen were handpicked due them being the only ten percent of company crewmen who were physically capable. I would like to see the remaining geriatrics carry out that same evolution"

Those hand picked men as you called them all Volunteered for the Jigsaw project Oh and there ages 50 to 57 not bad for "Old Timers."
These and all of the other MCA crews would still come out and pull u out off the water no matter how much u slag them off they wouldn't see you waiting around for a young man to come down the wire to get you if they did you might be in for a long wait.

One other thing remember your going to get old one day (EVEN YOU) then we'll see how you like to be slagged off.

Luverboy,

I have been away since you incarnated yourself on PPrune. Please note it stands for Professional Pilots Rumour Network. Please look up a site like Thomas the Tank engine we're all grown ups here.

Since Luvverboy or whatever alias he is using now cannot answer my question....can anyone else answer it for me?

In the UK SAR system...are the winchmen trained as Rescue Swimmers and do they routinely enter the water free of the winch wire....and swim to the victim to effect a rescue such as all of our SAR crews do?

The training program for a Rescue Swimmer is a very tough course....physically and mentally. I can see physical fitness being a necessary part of that job and doubt just any 50 year old guy could pass the course.

These Swimmers are very brave men in my view....it takes a lot of heart to jump from a helicopter at night into cold stormy waters to go to the aid of someone else.

SASless:

The MCA/Bristows and the Royal Airforce do not use "free divers" in the water. The Royal Navy do. From the Crabs and MCA standpoint, we have never needed or considered it necessary to qualify in this manner. Obviously the RN have different requirements. The only time that the crabs could have used this technique would have been to recover Dave Bullock in an accident with a downed American pilot in the Wash Danger Area back in the 70s. In this instance the parachute inflated with Dave and the pilot still attached. Sadly Dave was drowned due to the fact he could not physically release himself and was dragged through the waves for miles. Eventually an American helo (Jolly Green I think) used the free diver technique to grab Dave as he went past and collapse the chute. Following on from this accident the J Knife was "invented" which would allow a Winchman in Dave's predicament to cut himself free.

Regards
Tuck

PS Yes I agree free divers are brave but then all winchmen are!

I have only ever been involved with one job that needed a surface swimmer. We only decided to use him to recover survivors from a liferaft in a V rough sea state, which was unfortunately empty anyway. After the empty liferaft was sunk, the surface swimmer proved helpful to recover the two bodies that should have been in the liferaft.
I think this also could have been carried out safely, (maybe not as efficiently), just using a winchman connected to the wire though.
This leaves the question of: "do we need divers/swimmers on watch constantly, or just a standby available elsewhere"?

Tuckunder:
With respect, I think you're wrong. Free swimmers or not - it's an ancient debate and I'm fairly certain that an honestly compiled list of people who have died as a result of not carrying a diver would be horrifyingly long.

In 1978 I scrambled (771) to a light civvy fixed wing in the water and sat in the hover watching four people die just ten feet below the surface. It took about fifteen minutes for the air bubble in the canopy to bleed away.

The DAY before this truly horrible event the last of our divers had left the squadron in order to "fall in line" with the crabs. The day AFTER the event, all our divers came back.

In the '79 Fastnet race I can name quite a number of people who owe their lives to the RN carrying free swimmers. They might not have left the end of the winch wire but they sure as hell needed the oxygen bottles!

Now that brought up a good question....


Diver/Free swimmer on call or on the crew.....rocket science at its best.

The SAR aircraft departs without the swimmer....arrives at the scene to discover a swimmer is needed. Now what....

Seems the one case detailed above explains why having that bit of expertise makes sense to me. One would not wear a Tuxedo and go barefoot.

Aged Crewmen/wichmen
 

Very interesting thread!

My Father was on HSU with the RAF in the 80s. He always said that the people wasting the most energy and time were the young guys lacking in experience.

Little did I believe him untill i got a hole at Lec and had a go at being a winchman, safe to say the guy who showed me the error of my ways was an older,bolder winchman.

Regards to all those who do a difficult job

Ralph

Jerry G,

Hey mate if I could have a quid for each time I've been wrong I would be a rich man! However, I did state that the RN had free divers because of their different requirements. In my time of SAR involvement (crab and cg) I am not aware of any "form R" or rescue report where a life has been lost because our winchman were still attached. (the amarican airman in the Wash was already dead). Certainly in our North Sea Ops it has not been necessary. THerefore, why train for it when that training can be better spent? (There is always a financial budget be it the defense or coastguard).

I appreciate that aircraft falling off a deck has a specialist need for crew recovery which would be similar to the sinking civvy fixed wing you mentioned. I also admit I know nothing about "free diver" techniques. (Would love to be educated on this forum). It may well be that Jigsaw, being so "up close and personal" during deck transfers, could require the diver technique. If that is the case why did BP not require it in the trial. I await your response.

Tuckunder / Richard the lionheart
 

you did ask old boy, an insight into to the world of the Senior service's brave boys......



SAR divers are non-commissioned aircrew who have completed tours on Anti-Submarine or Commando Squadrons and are fully qualified ships' divers. To be selected as a SAR diver each candidate must successfully complete a 2 day aptitude test, this is then followed by a demanding SAR specialist course before becoming a full time SAR aircrew member.

The course includes diver-drops from heights of 40 feet from an aircraft both day and night with a complete diving kit on, and the final week is spent at Royal Naval Air Station Yeovilton practising rescuing people from the "Dunker". This is a submersible replica of an interior of a helicopter used to train crews to survive and escape from helicopters that have ditched in the sea and subsequently sunk.

SAR divers have the option to go on and train as paramedics. 771 squadron is fortunate enough to have 3 out of the 4 fully trained Royal Naval paramedic SAR divers.

More often than not the diver will be winched down to the casualty especially in the case of land, cliff and coastline rescues. When rescuing people from lilos, lift rafts, or anything that is affected by the downdraft of a hovering aircraft, the diver will jump into the water and swim to the casualty unweighted, that is, with a buoyancy aid, fins, mask and snorkel.
For sinking vessels, crashed aircraft or searching for casualties drowning under the water, the diver will use breathing apparatus which consists of inverted twin 5litre scuba tanks full of compressed air which weigh 41lbs/20kgs. Two sets of tanks are always carried on the aircraft, each one allowing 50 minutes diving time dependent on the depth of the dive, strength of the tide and difficulty of the task involved.
At the extreme the apparatus allows the diver to dive to a safe depth of 30 metres for a maximum time of 18 minutes. Beyond these parameters the diver would either have to adopt a slow stop-go safe return routine to the water's surface, which in the case of an emergency is not acceptable; or following a rapid ascent to the surface, require his quick passage to the decompression chamber located in Plymouth. SAR divers wear a wetsuit all year round, despite the bitter cold seas in winter around the UK, which unlike a dry suit or warmer diving gear, is more flexible in use and much easier to maintain.

it may add a small amount of extra cost to a units budget, but you must admit it is worth it.....


The diver's protective gear and breathing equipment ensure his advantage at sea over anybody else in a marine life saving operation.

http://www.maydaycornwall.co.uk/Navy/SARandDiver.jpg

Tuckunder:

I'm afraid I don't have any North Sea rig experience or knowledge so I'm really not at all qualified to answer your question. I also have to admit that I haven't read all 22 pages of this thread, just picked up on the last few pages :O

But I would still argue all the way down the line that it's quantifiably better to have a free swimming diver in a rescue chopper than not. It's just not necessarily possible to quantify it from the rescue reports. I'l give you another example:-

In about '80 or '81 another 771 cab went to find Simon Le Bon trapped inside his yacht ("Drum" I think it was called). The free diver went down under the upturned hull, shared his air and dragged the lad out. (Dreams of front row seats disappeared when a Duran Duran tee shirt turned up, as I remember!).

What would have happened if it had been a Crab machine?
(a) somebody else turns up and gets him out because he's lucky that the air has lasted another half hour = report summarises to "rescue was a success"
(b) somebody else turns up and gets the body out half an hour later, in which case the pathologist or coroner is unlikely to have the impetus to look into the comparison between time-of-death and time of helicopter arrival.

My point is that unless one of the helicopter crew has previous experience of working with free divers the report is unlikely to include the phrase ".....and we might have got him out if we'd had a free diver on board". It just doesn't come up on the radar if you've never had the benefit of it.

If anybody currently at 771 has access to the last few years of rescue reports I reckon they would find at least half a dozen lives saved every year in Cornwall alone where you could reasonably conclude that it was a free diver who made the difference. Anybody at 771 watching "Neighbours" right now with half an hour to spare????

P.S. Thanks Angelonawire, nice summary.

Angelonawire/ JerryG

I would not argue for one minute that SAR divers have their place. Yes in an ideal world with unlimited budgets SAR divers would be the gold plated answer. However, practically speaking budgets, be it military, coastguard or BP will have budget holders with accountablity and thus money will be spent thriftilly. I still stand by what I have said there is no rescue where a fatality has occured due to non carriage of a SAR diver that I am aware of. Yes I undersatnd sinking vessels with people trapped inside could benefit but here in the Northern North Sea they do not happen. My only caveat to this is SAR standby for "offshore deck transfers" where I can see a place for a Diver. Sorry Angel it would be a significant extra cost to the budget. I guess NHS budget holders face the same problems of who to treat with the available money.

Happiness is a storm force night hover!

Tuck.

Tuckunder

I've just given you four mate, first hand. Somebody back me up here with some more of your own?

On the other hand, if you're just quoting North Sea, I can believe you. I suppose it's a horses for courses thing - UNTIL it happens, and that's a bit late for the poor test case! :(

But I don't buy the financial argument at all. If you total the cost of a full SAR setup and compare it to the difference between training (and keeping) a wet suit or a dry suit on the end of the wire, what do you get? My guess is that it's considerably less than one percent.

Would one in a hundred rescuees benefit from a free diver? I think they would.

You could of course use the same maths to put a good case for not having SAR.......anywhere........ever, but this is too close to the Gordon Brown school of accountancy for my liking!
:ugh:

Cheers (and good wishes for ALL the boys doing the job in the North Sea, I take my hat off to you, these old bones have moved to Oz!).
JerryG

If SAR Divers are the gold plated solution to SAR, why is it only RN SAR that use them?

Why aren't all RN winchmen SAR divers?

Why don't the RN train all their winchies to be divers, as I know a lot that are just Air Crewmen?

I was under the impression that the RN SAR diver was a minority, not the majority.

Not pointed, just observational!

no vote joe
 

Nobody has said that sar divers are the best option, but free swimmer, or a portion of the SAR diver's skills and most of the kit used apart from maybe the breathing aparatus are of benefit to the SAR operation.

Generally the only time a SAR diver is required to jump with full gear and breathing apparatus is when submerging to get a ditched fast jet jockey out of his cockpit.....however in certain situations, such as upturned vessels or small boats/ dinghys, the rest of his skills and kit such as wet suit, buoyancy aid, fins, mask and snorkel are definately of use. sometimes you cannot get close enough to a small dinghy or liferaft without causing more distress due to the downdraught of the aircraft.

SAR Divers are now a minority in the RN, possibly due to reduced spending etc, however there is usually at least 4 Divers on the squadron and if required for a dedicated diver Job they can usually be called in to assist if not already on shift.

You must have all heard the old joke: - how do you find out if an aircrewman is a SAR Diver? Don't worry he will tell you straight away!!!

The last rescue by a SAR diver on AIR was indeed Simon Le Bon. So in the last 20 odd years they have done ............?

The sooner navy get rid of these ego maniacs the better, and then they can put the saved money into better kit!!

It is only Culdrose that have SAR Divers the other Navy SAR Base at Prestwick which is over 20% busier than Culdrose doesn't seem to need them!!

The history of the SAR diver was to be sat in a helo next to an aircraft-carrier waiting for a fast jet jock to splash in, fast reaction time and all that. Not wishing the worst on anyone but even if a jet went in next to Culdrose there is no way that the pilot will hold his breath for the 6-7minutes at best it would take the cab to flash up and be on scene. Now we can all see why the RAF don't deem it logical to have SAR divers.
:ok: