Air ambulance had to be pressed into duty due to shortage of available aircraft to assist mission
The operation and the skills of the Defence Forces personnel have been widely praised by Government officials. However, multiple defence sources have described several equipment shortcomings that could have compromised the mission.
Furthermore, complex operations such as the one involving the MV Matthew normally require two helicopters. Standard procedure is that one helicopter inserts the boarding party, while sharpshooters in the second aircraft provide cover.A second helicopter is also required to provide rescue capability should the first helicopter crew get into difficultly.
However, severe manpower shortages meant only the Yeats was available for this operation. Last month it emerged that“This was an incredibly impressive operation by the Defence Forces but the complete lack of any contingency or failsafes can’t be ignored. If one thing had gone wrong, it could have been disastrous,” said a military source.
He said: “There tends to be a tendency to reach for the negative within an hour of what was by any standards a very effectively conducted mission by all of the agencies involved.
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