Too Few Aircraft?

[Shamrock145]

According to this evenings RTÉ 6 One news, "The Army heilopter" was in action today to recover the remains of a hill walker from the Blessington area (later in the report they changed it to "an Army helicopter")

The video footage showed one of the 139's.

Perhaps when they're finished they can find room to park it up safely along side "The Garda helicopter" and "The Government jet".

Maybe the Air Corps need to buy more aircraft ... or maybe just better PR!

...145

[Hyper Crispy]

Sorry?!?!? It's easter. The heli is on standby to everyone. It's just a good thing that the mountain rescue teams had the previous experience to call the air corps. I know the coast guard were on standby too, but it was pretty clear that it was a body search. Therefore the 139 was the logical choice.

FYI the Garda helicopter was instrumental in the search during the critical phases when the casualty may have been potentially alive. The 139 was used as it should be used to transport personnel to the mountain quickly. It should be noted that the crew probably volunteered to do this tasking in support of the MRTs rather than being tasked by the CG or others. That may be as seen.

Ultimately, interagency work is only as good as the communication set up.

Shamrock, you need to reevaluate your attitude to the phrase "utility".

[Fouga]

Hyper while i agree with you i also agree with Shamrock's post about "the army helicopter" fair enough the 139 is dull green but she is An Air Corps Aircraft not an Army asset and like Shamrock it indeed annoyed me no end when it was stated in such a way to make it sound like we only had one of the 139's in service and no more.

[Shamrock145]

Hyper

Apologies, there seems to be a misunderstanding regarding the nature of my post.

The point I was making was picked up Fouga. The media constantly refer to Air Corps aircraft in the singular "THE Garda Helicpoter" (GASU currently has 4 aircraft, 3 of which are helicopters, 2 of which are in service), "THE Government jet" (MATS have 2 jets in the fleet) and now "THE Army Helicopter"! I was almost amazed that they didn't manage to say "The Aircorps Plane" when describing the flyby of the Easter Rising service in O'Connell Street (perhaps the small fact that 4 PC-9's went by in formation helped!). It's just shoddy or lazy journalism.

That said, I agree entirely with the general thrust of your post.

...145