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CHC Helicopter has signed a 21-month contract to provide the Australian Army with aeromedical evacuation (AME) and crash response support for deployments throughout Australia.
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Commencing on October 1 2016, CHC currently provides search and rescue (SAR) services to the RAAF and will use that fleet of Sikorsky S-76s and Bell 412s to provide AME services to Army.
“We are honoured that Australian Army has chosen CHC to provide their AME and crash response support while their soldiers are on training deployment,” said CHC Regional Director Asia Pacific Nick Mair.
“CHC has long provided search and rescue support to RAAF and we are delighted to extend our services to the Australian Army. Our highly trained and experienced SAR/AME pilots, aircrew, engineers and ground operations team are looking forward to supporting Army over the coming months.”
The medical team for the contract, including a dedicated doctor and paramedic, will be provided by Medical Rescue Air Ambulance (MRAA), a current provider of CHC.
CHC provides its helicopters for SAR and aeromedical retrieval operations in New South Wales, Victoria, Western Australia, Queensland, Northern Territory and Australian Capital Territory.
Fabian
says:Cool, contracted helicopters for the defence force.
walter
says:Does this contract have a ‘home base'(s) to work out of ?
Andrew
says:This has been a contracted service for a number of years, with a different provider. It frees up ADF crews and aircraft for primary tasking.
Matt
says:It will be interesting to see how CHC handle this. They are not exactly configured for this type of adhoc programming but I guess they have spare aircraft and crew.
Allan
says:Wouldn`t it be better for the ADF to hold their own AME/SAR services. In the event (god forbid) of an accident, the first responders are going to be aircraft from the same formation/unit, And waiting for a civilian organisation takes up valuable time the victims may not have.
Hayden Roberts
says:and an mrh-90/black hawk/sea hawk/H135 should be available.
Randal McFarlane
says:This adds to the number of helicopters available to Defence leaving the Army to do what it does best with its fleet.
CHC has been providing SAR for the RAAF across Australia and on local deployments for many years.
Anthony
says:Aren’t they still in chapter 11?
Ben68
says:I partly understand this move. But the ADF needs to ensure that both Army and Navy are able to conduct exactly the same role. We have an Amphibious capability built partly on disaster response. Recently the RAN had medical staff complete paramedic training through the University of Tasmania. Seems strategy and operational capabilities are at odds again. Good on CHC though.