Navy
Final Flypast Marks End Of Royal Navy Search & Rescue In Scotland
HMS Gannet's search and rescue helicopters are making a final farewell flypast around Scotland.
The famous red and grey helicopters are currently flying over the scenes of many past rescues.
The crews stationed at HMS Gannet in Prestwick have come to the aid of thousands of people since the unit was first established 44 years ago.
The flypast started from Prestwick at 10am and is due to finish over Troon at 2:30pm.
The crew of HMS Gannet are flying over their old patrol areas to say a final goodbye
Private company Bristow is taking over search and rescue on behalf of the coastguard. It won the £1.6 billion contract to run SAR for the next decade.
Lt Cdr Charlie Fuller, CO of HMS Gannet said on the eve of the handover:
"A lot of the crews are ex-military, a lot of the crew here at Prestwick taking over are ex-Gannet personnel so the coastguard are employing some top quality people.
"They’ve got a very good aircraft and some very good equipment to go with it so fingers crossed they will take over in a relatively seemless transition".
The team at HMS Gannet were busy right up until the handover to Bristow. On New Year’s Eve they were called to help 12 people trapped in flood water on a bus in South Ayrshire.
Lt Richard Lightfoot said:
"We were on scene winching for approximately 1.5 hours. We managed to get ten of the passengers off including two small children.
"We had to put our winchman out 11 times into the water to get him into the bus to effect the rescue".
Hundreds of people are expected to turn out to see today’s flypast.
More from Forces TV: Search And Rescue: Swansong
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