19 February
St. Gallen has been visited already in the first edition, but this was in pouring rain. Also this year the helicopter was still parked inside, but at least it was dry. After a couple of pictures, we continued our trip.
Liechtenstein has only one aviation related location, the heliport of Swiss Helicopter, situated directly near the border of Switzerland, only divided by the river Rhine. Outside we found the Kaman K1200 K-Max making engine runs. Without doubt one of the most ugliest helicopters with two contra rotating rotors next to each other. There are only 2 helicopters of this type in Europe. The 2nd machine was in maintenance.
Another rare helicopter type was the Guimbal Cabri G2
Within the hangar we found an ex Austrian AF Bell 206 (3C-JE), with a Swiss registration, but a Liechtenstein flag.
The next location, Rega 5 in Untervaz is situated at the end of an industrial road. At the moment of our arrival, the A109 was just about to leave for the next mission. We were just on time to capture her at departure.
We continued the journey towards the south east part of Switzerland. Samedan is the highest airport within Europe at 1700 meter, although it doesn’t have any scheduled flights.
The accessibility of the airport is very good, so nice pictures can easily be being made from outside.
The based helicopters of Air Bernina and Rega are situated alongside the public road.
Alongside the entire northern part, you can find a langlauf loipe and also from the public parking place nice pictures can be taken. The whole airport is surrounded by a low fence as they are used to be in Switzerland…..
20 February
This was the last weekend of the famous White Turf horse races; a very mondain and prestigious horse race on the frozen lake of St. Moritz. It attracts usually various VIP jets, as also mentioned on the Scramble Travel guide.
As Samedan airport can be reached under VFR rules, various VIP jets attempt to reach Samedan only with nice weahter. In case it is not possible, they divert to Zurich or Altenrhein.
The bigger aircraft are often relocated to one of the above fields, as the parking positions are very limited available and also expensive.
The highlight on Sunday was the B737-7 BBJ of Russian Standard Wodka. From a distance you may think it is not a very special color scheme. But the Russian billionaire Roustan Tariko instructed to paint his aircraft entirely in an extreme color scheme.
In this case entirely includes the bottom and both sides of the wings. All three (!) passengers were picked up in style by a Rolls Royce from the taxiway.
As there is not enough capacity of parking positions, the smaller jets are parked on the snow. A rare and nice sight.
Via the only Swiss National Park, we drove towards northern Italy.
21 February
In the autonomic region of Sud Tirol three languages are spoken (German, Ladin and Italian). Each language has its own emergency services.
We started in in Brixen, where the BK117 has been replaced last year by a EC145T2 (H145). The callsign is “Pelikan 2”.
We continued towards Pontives in Val Gardena. In this valley they speak the language Ladin. The operator is a privately owned company and they are also depending on sponsored gifts. The red EC135 is entirely covered with sponsor labels of their sponsors. They own one of the first EC135T3’s. they operate in winter and summer season.
Bozen is the 2nd location of HELI Flugrettung Südtirol
After Bozen we continued southbound to Trento, the Italian speaking part of Alto Adige. In 2015 they replaced one AS365’s with two AW139’s. A very good deal. In addition, they still own one AS365 and one AS350.
On this Sunday afternoon it was very busy and we were forced to wait a long while before the AW139 finally returned. A couple of missions were flown continuously, but eventually they were forced to return back to base for refueling. During the waiting time we received interesting information regarding equipment to create pro-actively avalanches to avoid casualties.
Finally, we continued south towards Verona. We arrived just before sunset.
22 February
Next stop was at Padova Airport Gino Allegri. The A109’s registration is also the name of the operator, INAER.
We rushed towards Venezia. The base of the Vigili del Fuoco is at the airside at Marco Polo. This unit exists of one Bell412 and two A109’s.
Meanwhile we made contact with our Austrian hosts and the weather forecast was not looking very promising for the next coming days. Therefore, we were forced to change our travel schedule and we continued to Treviso. They also operate with the A109. In addition to the hoist, this is the only Inaer HEMS helicopter who is equipped with a long line of 100 meters length. The reason is the very steep mountains and difficult environment in her operational area.
Pieve di Cadore is again situated in a beautiful area of the Dolomites. The A109 has been replaced in 2015 by the EC145T2. This helicopter has the same registrations as it’s local medical organization, SUEM.
It was getting late and we rushed towards Austria. We crossed two mountain passes with a bit of luck, as we didn’t know up front if they were accessible. Again within a perfect scenery we continued towards the northern parts of the Alps.
23 February
We drove towards Austria to watch an exercise of the Bundesheer. As Wednesday would be a non-flying day, due to the weather conditions, we only had one opportunity. The day started very grey with fog and low clouds. During the final part of our journey, the weather slightly cleared up. As a big surprise, the S70 left already an hour before our arrival. We were just in time to catch the departure of the last Alouette’s.
The heliport was nicely covered with snow. The participants included also one OH58 and three Alouette III’s. The Germans were present with two EC135’s. Because of the humid weather, the vortex was very good visible during the departure of the EC135’s.
After waiting 2 hours in sunny weather, the first helicopters returned just after the first clouds arrived.
In any case, we were still lucky they were flying anyway
In the afternoon it became obvious that weather conditions were not sufficient to continue flying and the afternoon mission was cancelled. Driving home, we paid a short visit to Waidring. The based Heli 1 was an EC135 sold to Air Glaciers, but rented back temporarily. Fortunately, the friendly staff moved the helicopters outside, as photography inside was extremely difficult.
Later the day, the weather became worse and we didn’t stop any more. Although the trip was slightly reduced, we visited again interesting various new locations and nice conditions within the Alps.
Regards,
Michiel
