Developments in Norwegian Offshore Helicopter Safety Final
Developments in Norwegian Offshore Helicopter Safety Knut Lande Former Project Pilot and Chief Technical Pilot in Helikopter Service AS www.landavia.no Experience Aircraft Technician, RNoAF Mechanical Engineer, KTI/Sweden Fighter Pilot, RNoAF Aeronautical Engineer, CIT/RNoAF Test Pilot, USAF/RNoAF (Fighters, Transports, Helicopters) Chief Ops Department, Rygge Air Base Project Pilot New Helicopters/Chief Technical Pilot, Helikopter Service AS (1981-2000) Inspector of Accidents/Air Safety Investigator, AIBN (2000-2009) General Manager/Flight Safety Advisor, LandAvia Ltd (2009- ) Lecturer, Flight Mechanics, University of Agder/Grimstad (UiA) (2014- ) Sola Conference Safety Award/Solakonferansens Sikkerhetspris 2009 Introduction On Friday 23rd of August 2013 an AS332L2 crashed during a non-precision instrument approach to Sumburgh Airport, Shetland. The crash initiated panic within UK Oil and Gas industry, demanding grounding of the Super Puma fleet of helicopters. Four people died when the CHC Super Puma crashed on approach to Sumburgh Airport on 23 August 2013. 1 All Super Puma helicopter passenger flights to UK oil installations were suspended after a crash off Shetland claimed the lives of four people. The Helicopter Safety Steering Group (HSSG) had advised grounding all variants of the helicopter. The HSSG, which is made up of oil industry representatives, advised that all models of the Super Puma series including: AS332 L, L1, L2 and EC225 should be grounded for "all Super Puma commercial passenger flights to and from offshore oil and gas installations within the UK." The Norwegian civil aviation authority had earlier rejected appeals from its unions to ground all its Super Pumas – which operate in the North Sea in very similar weather conditions to the UK fleet – insisting that Friday's crash was an isolated incident.
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