Eurocopter AS-350 AStar (N905CF)

My most sincere Thanks to Mike for the invitation, photo opportunity, and tremendously informative tour.

Gary - I used to see an A-Star fairly often equipped for over water flights with emergency flotation packages installed... as flying to and from offshore drilling rigs!

Cliff - At the present time, our area medical transport agency (CareFlight) has five of these. Four are positioned at strategic locations to the east, south, west, and north of Reno. However, right now, two of them are being upgraded so CareFlight is flying two "loaners" from AMRG Guardian Flight (Utah). The one seen in my pic above is normally CareFlight's "spare" but it has been in regular service for a few weeks now. When the primary four are all returned to this area and are back in service, the two Guardian "loaners" will go back home and this one will then be upgraded (ex: this one has three seats in the back - the center one gets in the way - it will be removed, etc.) and then this will be a spare again. I have a snap of one of the Guardian Flight "loaners" that I took at an Open House last weekend; I'll post it now.

Gary - quoting your post... "Four are positioned at strategic locations to the east, south, west, and north of Reno."

This sounds like a good plan to me. How large a geographical area are each of those four (4) med-evac A-Stars covering?

(I'm thinking it would be a wide area given the distances involved in Nevada... with Reno being perhaps an exception. Typically where I reside east of the Mississippi River, that many helicopters might not be needed nor such an wide area of dispersal and pre-positioning... considering general distances involved and typical population density considered. :-) )

That said, about two years ago one of my neighbors down the road in this largely rural area suffered a heart attack one evening. A med-evac helicopter from one of the largest hospitals in the State (affiliated with our University Medical School) flew approximately 50 miles and landed in his front yard to transport him for cardiac emergency care!!!

Good morning, Cliff. You are correct in your thoughts regarding the very long distances between cities being the primary reason for the medical aircraft positioning. For instance, the one shown here is based at a hospital in Fallon, which is 55 miles east of Reno. A typical coverage area for it would be 50 miles farther east to Lovelock or 65 miles south to Hawthorne. (BTW, I'm using "air miles," not "car miles" which are always longer distances. Even though the legal speed limit here in Nevada is 80 MPH on Interstate 80 and either 70 or 75 MPH on other rural highways, the driving times are much longer than the "air mile" times.) On occasion, the helo based here at Fallon has flown to Elko - 185 air miles one way - and then back. Usually, if such a long flight is needed, CareFlight uses its Pilatus PC-12 (based in Reno) to make the 232 mile one-way flight to Elko; however, the A-Stars have made such trips also. There is another A-Star based south of Reno in Gardnerville. A typical "longest-range" flight for it would be to Mammoth Lakes (CA), a distance of 99 air miles one way. Naturally, all areas closer than Mammoth Lakes are more routine trips for it. Another CareFlight copter is based in Truckee (CA) on the northern end of Lake Tahoe in the Sierra Nevada. There is a CALSTAR med copter based in South Lake Tahoe (southern end of Lake Tahoe) and another CALSTAR copter in Auburn, CA. All of these provide fast access to areas in the mountains of the Sierra which would normally take hours to get to by car / ambulance, etc. These A-Stars are vital to getting seriously ill or injured people to the major hospitals in Reno, Carson City, Fallon, etc, from smaller outlying cities. I'm sure the same can be said all over the country -- and, for that matter, in other countries. The incident that happened to your neighbor is one prime example of how crucial these medical helicopter services are to everyone no matter where they live.

Gary - thanks again for the good words!!! That emergency care helicopter flight surely saved my neighbor's life and contributed to his successful recovery. Certainly a credit to the priceless value of this service for any community!

We see many AS350 Ecureuil/AStar helicopters because they are safe, reliable and reasonably efficient to operate. I would trust my life to one either as a pilot or a passenger. Now known as the Airbus H-125.