The Irish Coast Guard has implemented a contingency plan to cover the north-west coast, pending resolution of serious industrial difficulties within the Air Corps search-and-rescue detachment.
The Defence Forces were forced to curtail search-and-rescue operations late last month. The helicopter rescue cover was restricted to island relief, air ambulance, air search-and-rescue reconnaissance, disaster relief and any other operations not requiring winching, when Air Corps winch crews reported in sick on a series of weekends from mid-September.
Capt Liam Kirwan, director of the Irish Coast Guard, said the plan involved using existing helicopter resources at Shannon and Dublin, the Royal Navy helicopter squadron at Prestwick, Scotland, and the British Maritime and Coastguard Agency base at Stornoway in Scotland.
RNLI lifeboat resources were also in place in Donegal, Sligo and Mayo, backed up by Irish Coast Guard inshore vessels in Donegal and Mayo, Capt Kirwan said. "This plan was already in place to an extent as the Air Corps Sikorsky at Sligo has been on daytime duty, pending upgrade to 24-hour cover when crew training was completed.
"What will help us," he added, "is early notification of an accident on board a vessel or sickness, to allow for redeployment of helicopters with no loss of time."
Much of the north-west coast is within the British rescue area of responsibility, given that it is based on flight traffic zones which limit the Irish area of responsibility to a grid extending from six miles north of Donegal to about 20 miles west of Belmullet. However, the north-west base run by the Air Corps over the past decade at Finner camp - and latterly at Sligo airport - has always been available as a back- up to British units.
The military authorities responded to the winch crew action on October 10th by assigning the entire detachment of 15 winch crew to other duties at Baldonnel.
The Defence Forces press office said this was done because the Air Corps could not continue to provide the full service for which an agreement had been signed with the Irish Coast Guard. It was training up replacement winch crews and there were no plans to reassign the crews back to rescue duties.
That development represented a considerable morale blow to a defence wing which has undergone a series of changes since the death of four Air Corps crew in the Dauphin helicopter crash in Tramore, Co Waterford, in July 1999. Following cancellation of the Government contract for new helicopters to replace the Dauphin fleet, a Sikorsky S-61 medium-range craft was leased for the defence wing.
Eight pilots have been training in Norway and the helicopter, based at Sligo rather than Finner camp, was due to convert to 24-hour duty this month.
PDFORRA, the organisation representing the winch crews, said yesterday it would prefer to see efforts made to resolve the issue and return experienced winch crews to their jobs, while stating that it also understood that "extra people" would have to be trained. However, it also said inter-personal relations were now at the heart of the dispute.
PDFORRA said it was perturbed about claims of bullying and harassment against individual members who had raised safety concerns and said its members were not taking industrial action when they reported in sick.
PDFORRA spokesman Mr Gerry Rooney told The Irish Times that the safety issues had "largely" been addressed and it had participated in drawing up a safety report with the military authorities. However, PDFORRA disputed a claim by the military authorities that pay was at the heart of the row, given that the winch crews had a pay claim lodged with the Department of Defence. The union confirmed yesterday it did not support the decision by winch crew representatives last month to withdraw the claim.
The union and military authorities are expected to meet next week. In the meantime, the Irish Coast Guard has no plans to assign a temporary helicopter to the area, as it believes that this would exacerbate tensions within the Air Corps.
