THE FIRST AIR-NAVAL INTEGRATED SEARCH AND RESCUE SERVICE in ROMANIA
The first professional integrated (air and naval) search and rescue service in Romania – organized as a partnership between a public body and a private operator – was concluded and released these days at Tuzla Airport.
It is also the first Romanian service that meets international standards of ICAO ANNEX 12 ICAO and ICAO – Doc. 7030, but also the OGP standards.
Regional Air Services and ARSVOM (Romanian Agency for Saving Lives at Sea) completed the refresher training related to rescue operations at sea HHO (helicopter hoist operator) / SAR under the exacting evaluation of the prestigious German company Heli Rescue Consult – an organization with an important tradition in training specialized personnel and with an impressive international portfolio.
The two instructors are Greipll Werner – a record holder of rescues in difficult conditions, both on land and at sea, with more than 5,000 lifting cycles and Herbert Graser – former Airbus test pilot.
During recurrent final trainings for more than two weeks, there have been various exercises with different degrees of difficulty, from rescues and backups on large vessels such as those on ALCOR – a vessel belonging to a private operator and contracted by Petrom for this purpose, to smaller boats and rafts for a single person or saving the floating victims wearing just a lifejacket from the water.
The reform of the search and rescue service is one of the necessary steps in the near future to guarantee citizens rights and for providing a safe climate in the Romanian economical area – especially offshore – where there are lots of large operators – as PETROM – that require this kind of services. Meanwhile, SAR has a strategic importance for attracting investments in potentially risk areas, investors that bring this kind of requirements for choosing their work area.