Survival Kits
 

Can anyone advise the name of a supplier of approved (FAA, CAA or other) survival kits for light helicopters?

I am beginning to doubt that there is such a thing!

Thank you!

I don't think such a supplier exists, but RFD (the liferaft people) may be worth a call. They are in Belfast. Tel +44(0)2890 301531.
or www.rfd.co.uk.

Good luck

VH

Try these

Brilliant Service

Quite Frankly, I carry my own. Usualy a "factory" kit does not tailor the thing to your needs. I fly over water a lot and use the adage that what your not wearing may not be recoverable. I carry a mirror, strobe and a spyderco on me. Usually an ICOM in a plastic bag in my pocket. Wish I could convince the company on a Satelite phone.....but they are more expensive to replace than I am.
Think about where you are and what you may need, then build your own. You can find all kinds of goodies with a little imagination and the internet. Companies Like www.pelican.com and many others that folks here will tell you, supply items.
As to your own resourcefulness take a few old CDs and throw them in, they make cheap signal mirrors.

Re: Survival Kits
 

HA,
For what its worth I carry one of these around with me (and have added a button compass) ... http://www.armyrations.co.uk/shop/it...id=22&catid=19.
It's about the size of a tobacco tin so fits in my top pocket and is waterproof so also floats.
Ok, so its not CAA / FAA etc approved but at about £30 neither does it have an "aviation" price tag and does exactly what it says on the tin.
Hope it helps.
FO

Re: Survival Kits
 

Ha Ha.
When your butt is in the Ocean or stuck in some remote spot like Alaska or Africa. Does one really give a hoot......

Re: Survival Kits
 

Bert,

Down there in the clear blue water where you fly....I would think an American Express card, a pack of condoms, and bottle of medicinal rum would be the cats meow for a survival kit.

Re: Survival Kits
 

Hi B.S.,

Let’s not confuse aviation with reality.

Does one really give a hoot…unfortunately ‘yes’ otherwise I probably wouldn’t be wasting my time on such a wild goose chase.

Who cares? The civil aviation regulators, and the predatory aviation lawyer’s who feed on such matters when there is an accident. As they care, it is my job to care too.

The regulators in my area want us to carry, under certain conditions, such things as Marine Type Pyrotechnic Flares and Toffee Glucose Tablets; and it would appear that they must be of a type that is approved by that regulatory authority. As is often the case the simplest way to meet this requirement is to get another authority’s approval “rubber stamped”.

I can find these items as part of a complete survival kit that has been approved – for an Airbus A320 etc, but so far not the individual items I need. Despite some helpful advice from members of this forum my search continues.

The volume of my requirement, half a dozen flares and a kilo of toffee glucose, obviously doesn’t have the salesmen of these products jumping on the next flight to see us, or even answering my e-mails.

In the meantime we, like you, carry enough equipment (that doesn’t require regulatory authority approval) for us to survive in the jungle, in extreme discomfort for up to a week. Seven days would appear to be enough time for the SAR guys in my part of the world to find you, if they are ever going to! After that I guess you become the subject of a book or perhaps a reality TV show.

HA

Re: Survival Kits
 

HA,

Where are you flying.....you mentioned jungle which covers several different areas of the world.

shelter, water, signalling devices, and first aid items seem to be the areas of concern I would want to cover.

Retaining body heat or avoiding becoming over heated is important. Light weight space blankets help in that regard.

A good knife....is a key item.

One cannot have too many signaling devices....mirror, smoke, flare, orange panel, flashlight, radio, fire making equipment.

I joked about condoms but they make a good water bottle if placed inside a sock or similar container.....but having a means of gathering and saving water is important. One can use the space blanket in conjunction with a good water bottle.

Sun protection...in the form of clothing, hats...etc are important.

As Bert said....in a true emergency...usually what is attached to your hide is what you will have to use....nice fancy kits get left inside the burning wreckage it seems.

Having an unwritten agreement about your boss looking for the black smoke column after the third day works too...helicopters make very nice signal fires. Granted there is not left to overhaul or sale if done right.

Re: Survival Kits
 

I can confirm what JIMGRIFF says on his link. Efficient, cheap, professional. Annual helmet servicing for 14 helmets and headsets all done on the same day. A lot better than some of the competion.

Re: Survival Kits
 

Any good?

http://www.survivalsuppliesltd.com/akit.html

Re: Survival Kits
 

Hi SASless,

Thanks for your comments. Your list almost echoes the kit we carry..with the exception of the condoms and the AmEx card.

When I used to fly in a green uniform we too carried condoms. Their advertised use was not only as 5-gallon water carriers but also to prevent the leeches from crawling up the old urethrae in swampy terrain. (In the high northern latitudes I believe they could still be used for some protection from that old ‘whore frost’)

I wonder what the current view is regarding the inclusion of condoms in a survival kit now that we are in the PC age of the female heli-pilot.

As to our knife, well I suspect even you would be impressed!

Jimgriff, marco & oldbeefer,

Thanks for your advice too which I am following up.

HA

Re: Survival Kits
 

Five Gallon sized condom....ah....I see you are using the American Medium size. Now if you carried a Magnum sized thing......which most helicopter pilots would think restrictive....you could only use that as a stationary water storage device as it would be to unwieldy to use.

Re: Survival Kits
 

One of the best things to have if you are operating in a remote area is a Sat-phone. I once flew a very long medivac (200 NM) in the middle of the Indian Ocean, where the use of an Iridium Sat-phone saved a very badly injured boatman.
Whlie working charters in the Australian outback, it became standard to carry a handheld Sat-phone with us.

Re: Survival Kits
 

HA
The point was that if your out in some remote spot, who really cares if its approved by some pencil pusher. If it saves your butt, it should have YOUR approval.
I hate it when I hear that some desk driving moron says that to comply with blah blah blah etc you must have Mil 23699 approved chapstick in weather over 50. C while the wind is out of the northwest.......etc
IF your company does not provide equipment as many dont, then its pretty much up to you to put together some kind of a plan.
When I am planning on going to a strange enviornment, besides gathering all I think may be necessary, I try and recycle the brains of those who have been there and done that in hopes they may have some suggestions based on their experience.
So far I have been lucky although I do recall ferrying a B206 from Nairobbery to Pretoria as it continued to pump about a quart of engine oil every couple hours through the N2 GB seals..........
"Homemade" Survival Kit was a little reassurance.

Re: Survival Kits
 

HA,
I believe the inclusion of condoms in the PC world of female flight crew should now be mandatory! It can be very boring waiting for evac, & one must find a way of keeping ones spirits up!!

Re: Survival Kits
 

Try here:
http://www.hsrsaviation.ca/content.htm

Re: Survival Kits
 

tee-hee

good one Sassy !:D

Re: Survival Kits
 

Happy Rat
Sasless is always right and American Express works good down there. Good Dark Rum is about $4.50 a Bottle and condoms are necessary if your sober enough to know why they are in your pocket.....(Condoms in a survival kit can be used to protect wounds on the hand also and for water storage providing you dont get the Lubricated, taste great style with your favorite Girl in mind)
By the way , the Bacardi Factory in San Juan Puerto Rico, should be on your tour list. You can also visit the Cruzan Rum factory on St Croix.........
You can never have enough rum in the Caribbean..........

Survival Pack for Light Aircraft
 

Hidden Agenda

Just noticed in this months Flynytt which is the Norwegian Aero Club's publication http://www.flynytt.no that they are advirtising an "Emergency Pack", about the size of a small backpack.

It contains the usual stuff; First Aid Kit (Made by the Norwegian Air Ambulance), emergency rations, Instruction on how to survive (For novices i guess), compass, knife, lightsticks, flares (Mini-flare) and survival blankets, sunglasses..etc..etc

It can be found http://www.luftfartstilsynet.no/allm...article778.ece here. It costs around 1500 NOK (Divide by 11.4 for GBP) There is a phone number and an email adress for ordering direct from the Norwegian CAA.

Hope it helps

If you need a translation just PM me

Regards

MD :ok:

Dont forget the logbooks. They burn very good and are usually necessary to be destroyed, to take care of making up all the flight time and ADs, Discrepanciese etc that were on the machine. Gonna burn the Boss' toys, make sure you burn the books........Ha Ha

Sat-phones are now quite affordable, see here: http://www.satellitephonestore.com/i...lite-phone.php

Check this. Thuraya seems to be quite cheeper. But coverage is limited.

http://store.ustronics.us/bthursatphon.html

Survival Equipment
 

Hi all,

I am interest to know what kind of survival/emergency equipment do you have and in what kind of missions do you transport it?

Best regards to all.

Currently moving drills in N.Ontario with B2. It is at the moment -36C with wind chill of -47C Brrrrrrrrrrrrrr!!. :rolleyes: I never leave camp for shift changes, drill moves, without full survival gear on aircraft. This includes standard 6 man, 5 day survival kit with all usual goodies, plus snowshoes, axe, saw etra food, ie granola bars and stuff that wont freeze and most importantlly far as i;m concerned, sleeping bags. and a couple of good quality lighters I also carry my Snowgoose winter coat (although too bulky to fly in) a good pair of gloves and personal pack with a change of clothes and small luxeries, ie spare couple packs of smokes. Even if shift change is only a 10 minute flight I carry everything. Once spent 6 hours on the ice with a broken machine in the Artic at -50, no fun but survival kit made it bearable and was a real moral booster (even the chicken noodle soup was starting to look good) :D

Chaps,
Surprised no one mentioned this so far, the basics of any survival are:

Protection
Location
Water
Food

So much of what you take depends on what you are doing, where, when, how much space in helicopter have you got, who's side you are on etc. Always pack for that unscheduled landing.

In another life I remember being distinctly happier with 20 heavily armed soldiers down the back, that covered the first two quite nicely. Nowadays don't think you can go too far wrong with a company credit card and a mobile phone.

:ok:

Here's Doug Ritter's Equipped To Survive, Aviation Survival webpages.

Well worth reading. Thoroughly!

ETS also reviews and tests lots of aviation survival equipment.

Doug Ritter is also a pilot whom designs, builds and uses the ETS survival kits.

Best Glide, here, also specialize in aviation survival kits.

If over water, perhaps consider this.

Hope this helps.

Anyone have first hand experience with the Doug Ritter Ultimate Aviator Survival Pak? Its priced at about $2300 U.S., or 10X the most expensive Best Glide kit. No doubt if you need it its worth every penny, but is it 10X better than the rest?

You could also contact member 'hihover' who is getting into the lightweight survival kit game

Survival kit

a couple of quid for the bus
and an english yam-yam/yam yam-english dictionary for if I stray too far west!!

Survival Kits
 

Anyone who wants more info on my 3 or 5 person kits, please feel free to contact me.

Tam

created an own kit
 

When talking about survival kits, IMO what you put together yourself may actually be superior to what you could buy. Mostly because you can tailor it to your locale. But it does need to be small and light enough for you to carry it on your person. If you need it, it is quite likely that you will have to leave in a hurry. One of the most important things to carry is a good knife. It doesn't need to be a Crocodile Dundee type of knife, but it does need to be sharp. Plus you need to wear practical clothing. Way too often you see guys wearing just shorts, a T shirt and flip flops. In a survival situation this type of clothing will degrade your chances of survival. Sturdy pants or jeans, good practical footware and strudy shirt will help increase your survival chances.