[pct-l] Cost of a SAR airlift

[Fred Walters]

When you say "Europe" charges for rescue do not apply everywhere in Europe.
 Not really relevant to PCT (and I'm not being "defensive") but maybe
relevant to debate on who should pay for rescue services.  As an example,
in the UK a lot of rescue at sea (coastal waters) is carried out by the
RNLI (Royal National Lifeboat Institution).  They have lifeboats everywhere
of differing types and are on 24hr call-out.  They will rescue you for free
(from people stranded by tide on beach to yachts in trouble mid Channel).
 They receive no government funding and are paid for only by charitable
donations.  Coastguard rescue (e.g. helicopters) are paid for by government
(operated by military at present but talk of going to private contract -
but don't charge you).  Air ambulances (inland helicopters) generally paid
for as charities by charitable donation/fund-raising).  Mountain search and
rescue - again charities and mostly volunteers.

In the UK it would be very rare to be charged for rescue services.

On Fri, Jun 22, 2012 at 9:51 PM, Brick Robbins <brick at brickrobbins.com>wrote:

> On Fri, Jun 22, 2012 at 11:13 AM,  <abiegen at cox.net> wrote:
> > 1, Air Rescue by CalFire to their Hemet base - $0.00 - They treated it
> as a training mission.
>
> CalFire is a government organization and the taxpayers paid for your
> airlift. It doesn't really matter how they did the accounting
> (Training, whatever). Ron Paul and his crowd would call this
> "socialism."
>
> Should the taxpayers have to pick this up or should we all have rescue
> insurance as they do in Europe?
>
> And those that don't choose to purchase insurance should be left to
> die or rely solely on non governmental good Samaritans, as it was
> their choice by not purchasing insurance?
>
> This is a real question there are forces pushing our government that
> direction, and we should really decide if that is the direction we
> want to go.
>
>
> The medical treatment after the rescue is a different issue.
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