Lincs & Notts Air Ambulance able to attend more night emergencies after training with military spec equipment

Crew members of the Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire Air Ambulance have been trained in the use of military spec night vision goggles – to ensure they will be able to attend more emergencies in the night.

Pilots, doctors and paramedics undertook capability training which means they can provide a full 19-hour service from 7am to 2am, making them the only air ambulance operating in the East Midlands region in the hours of darkness.

“Night flying is a separate skill that has to be continually practised,” explained Chief Pilot Capt Llewis Ingamells.

“Lots of helicopter pilots will go through their entire career hardly ever flying at night and most will never use night vision goggles.

“It is generally only in the last decade that air ambulances in the UK have undertaken night HEMS (Helicopter Emergency Medical Service).

“Each pilot must maintain a legal minimum currency to fly in the dark and each are individually flight tested and checked by an examiner once per year, all flown in the dark. It’s definitely the most challenging flying we undertake in HEMS.”

The clinical crews remain operational 24/7 using the critical care cars when the helicopter is unavailable.

For night missions, crew complete a short flight planning phase before boarding the aircraft.

“This is where we determine primary and secondary landing sites,” Capt Ingamells added.

“We need a 4D area to land which is four times the length of the helicopter and twice the width. For perspective, this is just over half a football pitch.

“The equivalent for this during the day is 2D which is around one and a half tennis courts. At night, due to the pre-planning needed, it takes around 15 minutes from call to take off, whereas during the day it’s typically up to five minutes.”

To aid missions, the Operations Room at HQ includes some advanced flight planning software and technology including the service’s own weather station and lighting level forecasting programs.

The crew use state-of-the-art military spec night vision goggles which look like a small pair of binoculars that attach to a flight helmet with special mounts.

They work by using two image intensifying tubes which collect the surrounding light and amplify and project it onto two small screens inside the goggles which are viewed by the wearer.

“Our NVGs are modern generation with white phosphorus imagery, so rather than the older black and green image some people will think of with NVG’s, ours are black and white imagery which work exactly the same but show a greater contrast,” said Capt Ingamells.

The NVGs cost over £12,300 per set and all of the crew onboard train and fly with them, including the medical team.

A Trakkabeam searchlight is also attached to the helicopter which projects a 22-million candle power beam of light for surveying the site before landing.

“Night HEMS is a far more specialist task than that of daylight HEMS. Even with fantastic NVG’s, search lights, planning tools and training - obstacles and hazards just aren’t as visible as they are by day,” said Capt Ingamells.

“We counter this hazard with pre-planned larger landing areas but it still remains a higher risk flight.

“At night it is very hard to see poor weather and avoid it. The NVGs can in fact see through some poor weather but this can be a risk in itself as much as it can also be a benefit. Operating on scene in the dark is also extremely different for the medical team treating the patients.

“Even loading and unloading the patient into the aircraft is much more challenging and complex. For this, we have LED head torches, scene lights and aircraft loading lights.”

LNAA crews are on call 24 hours of the day, 365 days of the year.

The clinical crews remain operational 24/7 using the critical care cars when the helicopter is unavailable.

The Lincolnshire and Nottinghamshire Air Ambulance receives no regular direct funding from the Government and needs to raise £8 million this year to deliver its life-saving service every hour of the day.

For more details on how to support, visit www.ambucopter.org.uk