We were lucky last Wednesday night to visit the Rescue Helicopters control base and hanger at Taieri Aerodrome.
Our group were told firsthand from the Operations manager on duty (Shane) about this vital regional helicopter rescue service.
The emergency rescue service from Dunedin operates 5 modern helicopters equipped with state of the art navigational technology enabling flights in cloud or at night, high tech emergency medical equipment and a team of professionals including the pilot, highly trained medics and if needed, a skilled winch operator. The 24/7 service provided by the Otago Southland Rescue Helicopter team is second to none in New Zealand. The team have the capability to provide rapid responses (be on their way in as little as 5 mins from call out) to medical emergencies. They also operate search and rescue missions, maritime rescues (these take longer to plan due to the distances and hazards involved) and carry out vital inter-hospital patient transfers. Our group heard about some interesting recent missions including picking up a cruise ship passenger at Milford Sound and some extraordinary missions such as rescuing people from vessels in the deep Southern Oceans. We were able to look closely at the helicoptors parked in the hangers and get a behind the scenes view of the workshop and engineering facilities. All aircraft fit outs and maintenance are carried out in house. When responding to medical emergencies the operation is co-ordinated following a call from the St John Air Desk and communication is made with ICU medical specialists at the hospitals to where the patient will likely be transported to. The lifesaving medical equipment on board includes a cardiac monitor/defibralltor device and Ultrasound. The service is a multi-million dollar operation now getting nearly 2000 call outs per year. The number of call outs per year has been growing. The service is predominantly government funded, but local fundraising support of around $1.2 million per year is essential to provide such high standard levels of life saving rescue services to the community. All local fundraising is used for the local service. A current local fundraiser for the Otago Southland Helicopter Trust is organised by the Phantom Riders 'In Memory of Mike' 2400Km NZ bike ride starting on March 2nd. To help out visit https://givealittle.co.nz/fundraiser/nz-tour-in-memory-of-mike
Many thanks to Otago Southland Rescue Helicopter Trust for allowing us to visit, to Shane and to our speaker scheduler John Drummond for organizing this fascinating visit.
