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Displaying items by tag: Helicopters

#Coastguard - The Sligo-based Irish Coast Guard helicopter will have completed more than 300 search and rescue missions in 2015 by the end of this month, setting a new record.

And as Helicopter Investor reports, Rescue 118 and the rest of the Sikorsky S-92 fleet based at Shannon, Dublin and Waterford will have completed at least 877 missions between them by year's end.

"We have invested heavily in our four bases in Ireland so that we can offer a safe, reliable service with the highest levels of availability,” said Chris Hodson of CHC Helicopter, contracted to provide coastguard SAR services in Ireland since 2010.

Published in Coastguard

#Coastguard - Shannon-based Rescue 115's "milestone" year has been highlighted by the operator of Ireland's coastguard helicopter fleet.

In an interview with Aviation Today, CHC general operations manager Chris Hodson said 2014's "significant number of missions" was down to the introduction of state-of-the-art, long-range Sikorsky S92 helicopters across Ireland's four bases.

And in particular, the 310 missions flown by the Shannon chopper for the Irish Coast Guard were "quite an accomplishment for the crew".

Hodson said it was "a real milestone to have one aircraft on one base complete so many missions out into the North Atlantic."

This year, meanwhile, the focus is on providing the helicopters in Shannon, Dublin, Waterford and Sligo with night vision capabilities to enhance rescue efforts under cover of darkness.

Aviation Today has more on the story HERE.

Published in Coastguard

The Irish Cruiser Racing Association (ICRA) Information

The creation of the Irish Cruiser Racing Association (ICRA) began in a very low key way in the autumn of 2002 with an exploratory meeting between Denis Kiely, Jim Donegan and Fintan Cairns in the Granville Hotel in Waterford, and the first conference was held in February 2003 in Kilkenny.

While numbers of cruiser-racers were large, their specific locations were widespread, but there was simply no denying the numerical strength and majority power of the Cork-Dublin axis. To get what was then a very novel concept up and running, this strength of numbers had to be acknowledged, and the first National Championship in 2003 reflected this, as it was staged in Howth.

ICRA was run by a dedicated group of volunteers each of whom brought their special talents to the organisation. Jim Donegan, the elder statesman, was so much more interested in the wellbeing of the new organisation than in personal advancement that he insisted on Fintan Cairns being the first Commodore, while the distinguished Cork sailor was more than content to be Vice Commodore.

ICRA National Championships

Initially, the highlight of the ICRA season was the National Championship, which is essentially self-limiting, as it is restricted to boats which have or would be eligible for an IRC Rating. Boats not actually rated but eligible were catered for by ICRA’s ace number-cruncher Denis Kiely, who took Ireland’s long-established native rating system ECHO to new heights, thereby providing for extra entries which brought fleet numbers at most annual national championships to comfortably above the hundred mark, particularly at the height of the boom years. 

ICRA Boat of the Year (Winners 2004-2019)