hi, just wondering, say someone's in a wreck and needs an airlift. if i recall, if you ride in an ambulance, you get a bill for $50 something like that. what about a helicopter?
does ontario charge money for medical airlifts?
- Thread starter SkyRider
- Start date
Yup $50 same as an ambulance
FriendlyFoe
Well-known member
LoL thats almost asinine, 20 000 dollar helicopter ride and they're going to charge you 50 bucks. Just silly. Anyone know what the 50 bucks is supposed to cover?
how do you know this? is there a link to a site with all the prices? glad it's $50 and not full price lol
Don't mean to threadjack but since the question's been answered I have to ask... I never understood the claims that helicopter rides cost $20K or that a fire engine driving over costs $XX-thousands of dollars per visit. Since I was a kid I always figured it was statistical BS.
$50 sounds reasonable to me--even cheap--since it's mainly the cost of fuel they're consuming right? I mean, putting it simply, whether or not a helicopter gets called a pilot is always working on standby, the flying machine is still being paid off and undergoes regular maintenance, yadda yadda. So the only thing that really changes when they fly your *** to the hospital is the fuel bill (I'm sure there's more overhead to it than that but you get the idea). If there's a legitimate reason I'd love to hear it.
$50 sounds reasonable to me--even cheap--since it's mainly the cost of fuel they're consuming right? I mean, putting it simply, whether or not a helicopter gets called a pilot is always working on standby, the flying machine is still being paid off and undergoes regular maintenance, yadda yadda. So the only thing that really changes when they fly your *** to the hospital is the fuel bill (I'm sure there's more overhead to it than that but you get the idea). If there's a legitimate reason I'd love to hear it.
oilycreek
Banned
The money is for Chris Mazza's girlfriends new shoes.
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FriendlyFoe
Well-known member
Helicopters cost an insane amount of money and since if something fails they fall out of the air like a rock, they have extremely limited service life rated in hours, so what you're paying for is the cost of a replacement helicopter, in addition to horribly expensive jet fuel.
quick google search
"Helicopter Equipment
The Westpac Rescue Helicopter has a replacement cost of $6.2 million, excluding the rescue, medical and avionics equipment it carries. There is well over $1 million of equipment installed in this rescue helicopter."
FYI. The westpac chopper is used by South Wales Fire Service. The FD actually owns its own helicopter for multiple uses.
The choppers up here are strictly for medical transport only.
The choppers up here are strictly for medical transport only.
FriendlyFoe
Well-known member
Oops guess i should have read more, thought 6 mill seemed excessive, but id bet the medical transport ones cost at least half that. Regardless its a pretty easy expense to justify, the police helicopters id have to say slightly less so.
OpenGambit
Banned
the cost isn't there to actually recoup costs, thats what taxes are for. its just so people think twice before calling for it so it doesn't get flown out for some jackass with a paper cut.
Why would it cost at least half that?
I'd say that it'd cost more than your average utility helicopter, considering the base cost of the helicopter itself, then tack on the conversion costs to make it a flying triage unit with all manner of life-saving/sustaining equipment and electronics.
Edit - Ontario bought 12 Augusta Westland helicopters for $144 million for OMGE - thats $12 million per bird. http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/toronto/story/2012/03/05/ornge-helicopter-safety.html
These helicopters are also twin-engined turbine powered. Turbine powered birds are NOT cheap to fuel. Efficient in terms of power, yes.. cheap to fuel, definitely not - especially in terms of fully loaded weight with equipment, supplies, crew, and patient on board.
For every man hour aloft - these helicopters would require a certain number of man-hours to maintain on the ground over top of that.
So yeah, considering just a base equipped emergency ambulance is about $150,000.00 to buy.. a $50.00 fee, by either air or ground is a cheap user fee.
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You can't dial 911 and request a helicopter.
OpenGambit
Banned
its not, you just request transportation, 50 dollars is woefully inadequate regardless of whether its an ambulance or a helicopter, like I said its just a user fee meant to discourage frivioulous use.
To charge a lot more for a helicopter would be stupid, since you don't get to pick if it gets sent out, and would be discriminatory towards people that live in more remote areas, or just really urgent cases.
and can you imagine the press you would get if someone died of a heart attack and didn't call for the helicopter because they thought they couldn't afford it. That would be ridiculous in a single payor system.
Red_Liner740
Well-known member
LOL at the comment that after X amount of hours they scrap the helicopter and buy a new one....Helicopters like fixed wing a/c have "checks" done to them. Daily check, 100 hour, 200 hour, A check, B check and heavy C checks. After an a/c has undergone a C check its basically a new bird. I remember doing heavy mtce checks on Twin Prop commuter planes that AirGeorgian flies and sitting there looking at every single rivet on the plane. God what a boring task that was. A lot of parts are time sensitive. As in, after x number flight hours or y amount of cycles (take off and landing is one cycle) that part is pulled and replaced whether its good or bad. That drive the cost of a/c maintenance through the roof...
$50 buys you approximately 10 min of idle time in Jet A.
$50 buys you approximately 10 min of idle time in Jet A.
The AW139 is expensive to fly, way more then "just the cost of fuel". Considering the hourly flight costs of "cheaper" helicopters (Robinson R44 piston engine approx $650/hr, Bell 206 turbine approx $1200/hr), my first guess is that the Ornge bird is running the taxpayers closer to the $4000/hr mark. Not cheap, but certain equipment is necessary for the tasks it has to perform. Twin engine performance is a must since majority of the calls are hospital pads inside of cities and vertical takeoffs are common for emergency calls. And on a little side note.......a helicopter doesn't fall out of the sky when it's engine fails, I would much rather be in a helicopter with an engine failure then an airplane anyday.
So what I'm hearing is that the real expense is due to "mileage" because of the mandatory service entailed and fuel is a secondary expense? While somewhat artificially inflated, I can understand and respect that because it has to do with flying the heli. My suspicion was that they were including other costs of ownership that exist regardless of whether the bird takes flight (standard maintenance, flight crew, etc)--and maybe this is still the case--but, the service hour schedule that Red Liner mentioned above is enlightening.
I just found it curious that a ~$200 recreational helicopter ride around a city might yield a tourism company some profit while a medical helicopter ride incurs 100X that.
I just found it curious that a ~$200 recreational helicopter ride around a city might yield a tourism company some profit while a medical helicopter ride incurs 100X that.
Don't they use x-ray machine anymore?
Two totally different aircraft with different uses and demands. Niagara Helicopters flies they Bell 407 which is a single engine (the flight path they follow allows them to never be far from a safe landing area in an emergency, away from the city) help which probably costs $2000-2500/hr to operate. Considering they can jam up to 7 people in one for a 15 min flight, you can see why the cost can be low. The weight limits on a heli are very slim and when you start considering the weight requirements for a flying ambulance (medical equipment, 2 pilots, in-flight medic, plus passengers/victim) you can see how the requirement for a larger aircraft is needed. Then add on top of that the performance needed to fly fast in crap conditions (including de icing, which is rare on heli's) as well as perform fully loaded manoeuvres like vertical take offs (as well as operating twin engines which can individually maintain flight in case of an engine failure), you can see how the cost can start escalating to be more then a sightseeing tour company.
FriendlyFoe
Well-known member
I never claimed to be a helicopter expert. Having to replace expensive pieces of the helicopter until its basically a new heli is still basically the same point I was making about helicopters having a limited service life based on hours.
You might be surprised to learn however that a holier then thou attitude doesn't impress anyone other then maybe your mom
