The helicopter replacement project will take place in early 2021 and is being planned by Your Local Air Ambulance, a network of air ambulances serving five counties in the Midlands, UK.

As part of the charity’s aircraft replacement project, the team took the opportunity to review its helicopter requirements and decided to replace their current helicopters with two new AgustaWestland 109SP (AW109SP).

Richard Clayton, Director of Operations for Your Local Air Ambulance, said: “As part of our scheduled program we are replacing our two emergency aircraft as they come to the end of their working life. The aircraft replacement programme has provided an opportunity to ensure that our future air ambulances allow us to continue delivering the highest quality of critical care and enable us to evolve our operational capabilities with future clinical developments. Providing leading pre-hospital emergency care to our patients is of the utmost importance and these two new aircraft will continue to enhance our clinical services and facilitate us in extending our flight hours at both bases next year.”

Rich Irwin, Critical Care Paramedic for DLRAA, added: “The new AW109SP aircraft has an integral quick start-up time which is crucial to reaching our patients as quickly as possible and is well suited to our region with large urban areas requiring smaller landing site capabilities, along with great endurance and speed for the more rural areas. They will have a customised medical interior, ergonomically designed to provide the service with better access to vital functions and flexibility to carry additional medical equipment.”