A wise man once said.....
 

“The bitterness of poor quality remains long after the sweetness of low price is forgotten.“

Benjamin Franklin.

I heard that HNZ will start their SAR contract in Australia today, anyone confirm?

And is that AWSAR 24/7 or a lesser service?

Crab

in your language its a lesser service so a dedicated 15 minute LIMSAR and Medivac with AWSAR in Q1 2018 which is the same as brs was giving but brs wasn't on 15 minute sar.

Which part is the LIM in LIMSAR? Is it daylight only, VMC only, no winching or what exactly? Its rather a vague term.

Well things might get easier for HNZ now that Pilots are back on the Skilled Migration List...


https://www.9news.com.au/national/20...ilots-shortage

I'm not so sure about that. The news grab I saw specifically mentioned the visa was only to go to foreign pilots working for Regional Airlines, and only for 2 or 4 years. I guess at the very least it's the thin edge of the wedge to open the door for helicopter pilots to come here. HNZ are paying some of their AW139 line pilots $190k per year plus car, you'd need an armored door to hold back the flood of International applicants keen to get their snouts in that trough.

Oh yes they are, their contract pilots flying Esso AW139 are on that deal.

Nice try Nescafe. I'll look in again next week and see if we are back on topic.

Too true, too true!

Out of curiosity, what percentage of the "not low cost" operator's medevacs launched in the prescribed timeframe before they were replaced.....?

And the copy of the ATSB report into the winching incident is now released.....

http://www.atsb.gov.au/publications/...r/ao-2017-095/

What would cause this equipment to break.

The weak link in a hi-line is designed to do exactly that - break - so that any entanglement or snagging doesn't put an undue load on the hoist cable and snap the wire or damage the housing/drum or even pull the hook off the wire.

The fact that this one recoiled towards the rotor isn't unusual, we had one that did go through the rotor after the hook itself snagged a boat rail and then came free under tension.

This incident would be considered a Normal Operating Hazard for military SAR.

and another time, at band camp....😴

If I could be bothered, I'd link to the DASOR for it but it happened to a Mk3A Sea King from Wattisham about 8 years ago on a routine training sortie. I wasn't involved but was the Sqn Trg Off.

The aircraft was landed safely without any undue vibration apparent and the extent of the damage was only realised on shutdown.

Wouldn't you expect there to be a much lower recoil from a weak-link breaking than a hook snagging and releasing though?

Our navy lost a Wessex while doing a personnel transfer to a destroyer. Seaman clipped the hook to a guard rail with the inevitable break causing the cable to fly up and tangle about the head resulting in a ditching. Ship ran over the aircraft in an attempted recovery.

That's horrendous Megan, poor sods:(

PhilJ - it's probably a compromise, like so many things in life, a weaker weak-link would break too often and make the rescues more difficult not less but I have had hi-lines part several times without such a recoil - just luck of the draw I expect.

Normal operating hazard YES. That much hook rebound from the tension of a 90lds weak link parting NO. I suspect the link did not function correctly hence the buckle breaking instead which must have happened at more than the rated 90lbs.
After all crab most UK mil and Civi weak links are 150lbs breaking strain and even that does not cause the violent rebound seen in this incident.