Future
In 2006, the government announced controversial plans to effectively privatise provision of search and rescue helicopters in order to replace the aging Sea Kings currently in use, although they have suggested that crews may, at least partially, still be made up of military personnel.
Lee-on-Solent St Athan Inverness Maston Stornoway Airport Sumburgh Airport Newquay Caernarfon Humberside Planned operational locations of aeronautical search and rescue cover in the United Kingdom from 2017. The colour of the location mark indicates the type of helicopter at each location (blue: AgustaWestland AW189, red: Sikorsky S92).In February 2010, Soteria SAR was announced as the preferred bidder for the UK SAR programme. On 8 February 2011, days before the contract was due to be signed, the UK Government halted the process after Soteria admitted that it had unauthorised access to commercially sensitive information regarding the programme.
While this contract is being renegotiated, a "Gap" contract was tendered for the existing Maritime and Coastguard Agency (MCA) bases and in February 2012 it was announced that Bristow Helicopters would take over the running of Stornoway and Sumburgh using Sikorsky S-92s and that Portland and Lee on Solent would be retained by CHC Helicopter using AgustaWestland AW139s.
In March 2013 the Department for Transport announced that it had a signed a contract with Bristow Helicopters Ltd to provide search and rescue helicopter services in the UK with operations will commencing progressively from 2015. The new service is expected to be fully operational across the United Kingdom by summer 2017 and will utilize AgustaWestland AW189 and Sikorsky S-92 based in ten locations around the UK (as shown on the map).
Read more about this topic: RAF Search And Rescue Force
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