Inaugural ceremony held Thursday; upgraded craft hailed as 'flying ICU'
South Chungcheong Province's doctor helicopter, which has saved more than 1,400 lives over the past decade, has gotten bigger and more capable.
South Chungcheong Province held an inaugural ceremony Thursday at the main auditorium of Dankook University Hospital to mark the launch of its new medium-class emergency medical helicopter, formally introducing the upgraded aircraft and wishing it safe operations.
The ceremony was attended by about 200 people, including Gov. Park Soo-hyun, provincial assembly Speaker Jo Cheol-gi and Dankook University Foundation Chairman Jang Ho-seong. It featured a progress report, remarks by Park, and a ribbon-cutting followed by a facility tour.
The new helicopter is an AW-169EMS (registration HL9682), a medium-class aircraft manufactured by Italy's Leonardo. It shares the same maker as the previous doctor helicopter — a smaller AW-109EMS (HL9615) that entered service in January 2016.
The new aircraft measures 14.6 meters in length and has a maximum takeoff weight of 4,800 kilograms, making it larger and more powerful than its predecessor, which measured 12.96 meters and weighed 3,175 kilograms. With more than double the fuel capacity, its maximum airborne time has extended from two hours and 30 minutes to four hours and 20 minutes.
The greater size and endurance allow medical crews to perform CPR and other emergency procedures more stably during flight.
The maximum passenger capacity increases by one over the previous model, allowing the helicopter to transport up to two patients per flight instead of one. Its cruising speed, however, has dropped slightly from 285 kilometers per hour to 268 kilometers per hour as a result of the larger airframe.
The aircraft carries 24 types of medical equipment totaling 242 items — including a ventilator, a portable ultrasound device and an automated chest compression system — the same loadout as before. An ECMO machine and a neonatal incubator can be added depending on the patient's condition.
At the ceremony, Gov. Park said crews had "turned miracles into reality at life-or-death scenes through their determination to arrive even one second faster." He expressed hope that the medium-class emergency helicopter, which "spreads its sturdy wings" Thursday, would become "a powerful guardian protecting the lives of provincial residents."
kwonhl@heraldcorp.com
