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Happy 100th birthday to helicopters!
<<Sounds of helicopter noise>>
Narrator Says:
We may not see them every day, but they are certainly a part of our daily lives.
We rely on helicopters for purposes ranging from the mundane like daily traffic, to the life-saving like medical flights.
They also help keep us safe. Local law enforcement can be at the scene of a crime or an emergency within minutes.
In fact it might be hard to imagine our world without these flying machines. After all, we have been using them in one form or another for the past 100 years.
Between August and September in 1907, the first flying machine using rotor blades instead of wings took flight.
A century later that machine is an essential part of how we live.
<<Sounds of helicopter>>
Narrator Says:
Helicopters are also an essential part of operations at King County International Airport.
At the north end of the runway at Classic Helicopters, aspiring pilots learn to fly at an FAA-approved flight school.
Classic Helicopter Vice President Phillip Walling Says:
For those learning how to fly helicopters it's a pretty wonderful place to be b/c it gives you real-life exposure, you really have to know about air traffic, you really have to know about weather, you really have to know about airspace, so the conditions are ideal for those folks that are going to be flying professionally, out there in the real world.
<<Sounds of helicopter>>
Narrator Says:
Classic has been operating at the airport for about 25 years and on top of training new pilots, they also fix and perform maintenance, fight forest fires, offer private charters, and assist with various types of construction and load work, meaning they lift stuff.
Another helicopter company that began operations at Boeing Field in 1982 is Airlift Northwest.
Just as its name suggests, Airlift carries out the medical function of flying helicopters.
It’s a private air medical operation that has 4 helicopter bases in Olympia, Seattle, Arlington, and Bellingham and has recorded 55,000 medical trips in the 25 years it’s been operating.
Airlift Northwest responds mostly to western Washington calls, but does travel to eastern and central Washington, and can transport patients to any hospital that has helicopter access.
Considering how much faster the trip is by helicopter than it is by car, the helicopter has become invaluable in saving lives.
Airlift Northwest Regional Manager Jeff Richey Says:
And they'll call and say we have a call, we need an airlift helicopter to meet us at a landing zone, so what happens is the page goes out to the pilot and the two flight nurses b/c we operate a pediatric specialist and an adult specialist, and what happens is they get the page, the pilot checks the weather, and then we go off.
Our goal is to be off the ground in 10 minutes or less, to get to south King County it's going to be about a 10 minute flight for us, we land there and meet the medics, because that's usually who's calling us or the EMS providers, we meet them, we're on the ground for 10 min. or less, we get back loaded and get back to Harborview, so by the time we get the call, we could be back to the emergency facility in less than 30 minutes.
<<Sounds of helicopter>>
Narrator Says:
For law enforcement, the helicopter is also a crucial tool.
Especially for King County Sheriff Sergeant Sydney Jackson, who works in the Air Support Unit for the Sheriff’s department.
The unit operates 6 helicopters but Guardian One, seen here sees most of the action as it takes to the air for nightly patrols.
The Air Support Unit must be ready to respond to an incident anywhere in King County, all 2,126 square miles of land and 180 square miles of water.
King County Sheriff Sergeant Sydney Jackson Says:
Our primary mission in the air support unit is to support patrol operations, meaning we support everyday routine patrol of the guys on the ground driving the patrol cars, we give an aerial perspective, to many different calls for service.
[It] doesn't necessarily have to be all the hot calls, but the helicopter is particularly useful in pursuits, allowing cars to back off, helicopters can fly in a straight line, and provide the coverage, any perimeter situations, great aerial asset, to be able to help patrol identify where to place the calls on a perimeter, K-9 tracks, when you get the team of a dog and helicopter together it's a pretty good chance we're going to catch the bad guy, search and rescue application as well, is another one of our functions.
Narrator Says:
So whatever the function: medical, law enforcement, educational, or informational, helicopters are something we rely on heavily as the invention’s 100th birthday comes and goes.
And King County International Airport and its helicopter tenants have just about every angle in the industry covered.
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