Otago Rescue Helicopter takeoff Dunedin Public Hospital

The Otago Rescue Helicopter trust is an emergency helicopter service covering the lower

South Island The South Island, also officially named , is the larger of the two major islands of New Zealand in surface area, the other being the smaller but more populous North Island. It is bordered to the north by Cook Strait, to the west by the Tasman ...

area of

New Zealand New Zealand ( mi, Aotearoa ) is an island country in the southwestern Pacific Ocean. It consists of two main landmasses—the North Island () and the South Island ()—and over 700 smaller islands. It is the sixth-largest island count ...

, used for accident and medical air ambulance missions, and search and rescue. , the service operates a

MBB/Kawasaki BK 117 The MBB/Kawasaki BK 117 is a twin-engined medium Utility helicopter, utility–transport helicopter. It was jointly developed and manufactured by Messerschmitt-Bölkow-Blohm (MBB) of Germany and Kawasaki Heavy Industries, Kawasaki of Japan. MBB ...

B-2 helicopter, with two other BK 117s as backup to the primary rescue helicopter. It is run by a charitable trust formed in 1998, with major sponsor the

Otago Regional Council Otago Regional Council (ORC) is the regional council for Otago in the South Island of New Zealand. The council's principal office is Regional House on Stafford Street in Dunedin with 250-275 staff, with smaller offices in Queenstown and Alexand ...

. Based at Taieri Aerodrome near

Mosgiel Mosgiel (Māori: ''Te Konika o te Matamata'') is an urban satellite of Dunedin in Otago, New Zealand, fifteen kilometres west of the city's centre. Since the re-organisation of New Zealand local government in 1989 it has been inside the Dunedin ...

, it covers 25 percent of the country's land area. Retrieval missions typically transport patients to

Dunedin Hospital Dunedin Hospital is the main public hospital in Dunedin, New Zealand. It serves as the major base hospital for the Otago and Southland regions with a potential catchment radius of roughly 300 kilometres, and a population of around 300,000. Opera ...

, and the service works in cooperation with New Zealand's main ambulance provider,

St John New Zealand St John New Zealand (also often referred to as St John Ambulance of New Zealand) is a charitable organisation providing healthcare services to the New Zealand public. The organisation provides ambulance services throughout New Zealand, as well a ...

. Around 400 missions and 600 flying hours are undertaken each year.

History

The organisation was set up in August 1997 and formed into a trust in the following years. Co-founders were Michael Coburn and Ross Black, with Black being the chairman of the trust until his retirement in March 2019.

Equipment

From 2001 to the present, the service operates a single Eurocopter EC 145 (ZK-IWD), an Airbus MBB-BK117 D2 ZK-IDH which is brand new as of jan 2019 (AIR 6) and five twin-engine BK 117 B-2 helicopter, registrations ZK-IWG (Air 1), ZK-HUP (Air 2), ZK-IME (Air 3), ZK-HJK (Air 4), ZK-IWL (Air 5) The helicopter can carry two stretcher patients, cruises at , and has a range of or with optional fuel tanks. Some of the BK117 aircraft are fitted with a winch (HUP, sometimes IWG), a 30 million candlepower searchlight, and a neonatal intensive-care incubator. On board the crew has night vision goggles, dual GPS, satellite phone and a range of communications equipment. ZK-IWG, HUP and IWD are all capable of IFR flight.

Notable missions

* 11 May 2003 – The boat ''Time Out'' capsizes and sinks off the coast near

Oamaru Oamaru (; mi, Te Oha-a-Maru) is the largest town in North Otago, in the South Island of New Zealand, it is the main town in the Waitaki District. It is south of Timaru and north of Dunedin on the Pacific coast; State Highway 1 and the railway ...

, putting five men into the approximately water. The boat owner activated an

EPIRB An Emergency Position-Indicating Radio Beacon (EPIRB) is a type of emergency locator beacon for commercial and recreational boats, a portable, battery-powered radio transmitter used in emergencies to locate boaters in distress and in need of i ...

beacon, allowing the helicopter to fly directly to the site using direction-finding equipment. It recovered two survivors suffering hypothermia, and the body of a third man. One of the helicopter crew then radioed a

mayday Mayday is an emergency procedure word used internationally as a distress signal in voice-procedure radio communications. It is used to signal a life-threatening emergency primarily by aviators and mariners, but in some countries local organiza ...

call to shipping for the two other men, who were later presumed drowned. * 25 January 2009 – The Otago Regional Rescue Helicopter together with a Southern Lakes helicopter achieve one of New Zealand's longest-range helicopter rescues, retrieving an injured crewman from the passenger liner MS ''Bremen'' about south of

Invercargill Invercargill ( , mi, Waihōpai is the southernmost and westernmost city in New Zealand, and one of the southernmost cities in the world. It is the commercial centre of the Southland region. The city lies in the heart of the wide expanse of t ...

. The ''

Otago Daily Times The ''Otago Daily Times'' (ODT) is a newspaper published by Allied Press Ltd in Dunedin, New Zealand. The ''ODT'' is one of the country's four main daily newspapers, serving the southern South Island with a circulation of around 26,000 and a c ...

'' reported the helicopter having a range of about , dependent on conditions.

Funding

The Otago Rescue Helicopter Trust was founded in 1998 to meet the cost of running the service, and funded the construction of the helipad on the roof of Dunedin Public Hospital. Operational funding is on a per call basis depending on the nature of the mission – the

Accident Compensation Corporation The Accident Compensation Corporation (ACC) ( mi, Te Kaporeihana Āwhina Hunga Whara) is the New Zealand Crown entity responsible for administering the country's no-fault accidental injury compensation scheme, commonly referred to as the ACC sch ...

for accidents, hospitals for inter-hospital transfers and the

New Zealand Police The New Zealand Police ( mi, Ngā Pirihimana o Aotearoa) is the national police service and principal law enforcement agency of New Zealand, responsible for preventing crime, enhancing public safety, bringing offenders to justice, and maintai ...

for search and rescue. The service needs an additional

NZ$ The New Zealand dollar ( mi, tāra o Aotearoa; sign: $, NZ$; code: NZD) is the official currency and legal tender of New Zealand, the Cook Islands, Niue, the Ross Dependency, Tokelau, and a British territory, the Pitcairn Islands. Within New ...

400,000 – 500,000 annually, since 2008 the Otago Regional Council provides $250,000 per year. From 2002 until April 2008, the Lion Foundation sponsored the service.

References

External links