New LifeFlight helicopters ready for takeoff after delays

The province's two new life-savinghelicopters were cleared for takeoffFriday after months of delays.

Theaircraft were also cleared for landing on the roofs of Halifax's hospitals which hasn't beenallowed for18 months.

LifeFlightTango andLifeFlightNovember are equipped with a weather feed, more powerful engines, a cockpit that works with night vision goggles and backup life-saving equipment.

"The ability to land directly at the rooftop and directly at that specialty service will mean multiple minutes in savings of time and of course minutes count when you're talking about the sickest of patients," said Colin Flynn,program manager forEHSLifeFlight, on Wednesday.

Transport Canada changes

The province previously had just one helicopter for the job, but when Transport Canada changed its certification rules in April 2016, the helicopter was no longer allowed to landon helipads atthe Queen Elizabeth II Health Sciences Centre, IWK Health Centre and Digby General Hospital.

After that, the helicopter was forced to land at a certified helipad in Point Pleasant Park and patients were whisked into an ambulance from there.

The province reached a $105-million, 15-year lease agreement for the new helicopters with Canadian Helicopters Ltd. in January.

Four months of delays

The two new SikorskyS-76C+ helicopters were supposed tobe ready inAugust to help answer the 700 to 800 callsEHSLifeFlightresponds to each year.

But the company agreed to make enhancements to the cabinbased on feedback from the LifeFlight team, which meant more time to finish the project,HealthMinister RandyDeloreysaid on Wednesday. That did not cost anything extra, he added.

The helicopters were then scheduled to take off in October. But Delorey said they were forced to wait for Transport Canada to finish its certification process.

"You rely on Transport Canada, when they're available to come in and do their tests and complete their certifications. Throughout that process we've certainly stayed in touch. At no point was there any indication of concerns. It was just, again, the time of the process it took," he said.

SylvainSeguin, vice-president and chief operating officer ofCanadian Helicopters Ltd., said the certification is complete and stays with the aircraft, meaning it won't cause delays in the future.

"Even though the aircraft were physically ready to go, we were waiting on documentation, on paperwork, on certification. So it's a bit of a process."

Seguin said the upgradeand maintenance schedule depends on thepartof the aircraft. Some parts are inspected annually, while others are based on the amount of time the aircraft has been in flight.

New technology

Seguin also said some of the new technology in the helicopters was a first for some of the pilots.

Captain Chris Heusler said the new technology in the cockpit will help make his job easier.

"It's like sitting behind the computer at home, we can see exactly what the weather is doing which makes it a lot safer especially if we fly into Cape Breton at night, you have limited resources in terms of stations on the ground," he said.

"The aircraft has a lot more power so now we can do more things we couldn't do before even going into tight, confined areas, like if we land on the highway, for instance."

Delorey said the old SikorskyS-76A helicopter has been decommissioned.