An offshore worker from Angus has told how he and his colleagues braced themselves as their helicopter ditched in the North Sea.
James Foreman recounted the dramatic “textbook” ditching of the copter which saw 14 men escape with their lives off the coast of Aberdeen on Thursday.
After the Bond Aviation aircraft, with 12 passengers and two crew, sparked a major rescue operation after reporting difficulties on a trip to two rigs, James Foreman said the skill of the pilots and the efforts of rescuers deserved the highest praise.
He was speaking shortly after the ditched helicopter had been recovered and returned to Peterhead.
Mr Foreman is now recovering at his Montrose home after the events of early Thursday afternoon which are now the subject of an in-depth probe centred on the EC225 Super Puma.
The 46-year-old father-of-two has been given the all clear by doctors and told The Courier that his survival, and that of everyone on board, was testament to the skill of the helicopter crew.
Mr Foreman had been travelling to the Ensco 102 rig, where he works as a barge engineer, when the mid-air alarm was sparked. Some of the 12 passengers in the helicopter were also being transported to the Maersk Resilient rig.
The Angus man was not able to speak in detail about the drama due to company protocols, but said once it became apparent the aircraft had encountered problems the ditching procedure that followed was straight out of a training manual.
He said the incident took place around half-an-hour into what would normally be a 75-minute flight and the passengers received the alert to brace themselves from the Super Puma crew.
“Everyone on board’s training kicked into place. It is what you are trained for when you go through your brief and are told to brace,” Mr Foreman said.
“It was textbook. From what I’ve seen on the news, the pilots that carried out the ditching aren’t getting enough credit.”
Photo RAF