Notable Missions
- 11 May 2003 - The boat Time Out capsizes and sinks 14 km (8.7 mi) off the coast near Oamaru, putting five men into the approximately 11 °C (52 °F) water. The boat owner activated an EPIRB 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 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 815 km (506 mi) south of Invercargill. The Otago Daily Times reported the helicopter having a range of about 1,000 km (620 mi), dependent on conditions.
Read more about this topic: Otago Rescue Helicopter Trust
Famous quotes containing the words notable and/or missions:
“Every notable advance in technique or organization has to be paid for, and in most cases the debit is more or less equivalent to the credit. Except of course when it’s more than equivalent, as it has been with universal education, for example, or wireless, or these damned aeroplanes. In which case, of course, your progress is a step backwards and downwards.”
—Aldous Huxley (1894–1963)
“There was only one catch and that was Catch-22, which specified that a concern for one’s own safety in the face of dangers that were real and immediate was the process of a rational mind.... Orr would be crazy to fly more missions and sane if he didn’t, but if he was sane he had to fly them. If he flew them he was crazy and didn’t have to; but if he didn’t want to he was sane and had to.”
—Joseph Heller (b. 1923)