Russian firm to train 200 for Zimbabwe’s air ambulance service

Emmanuel Kafe

EXPERTS from Russian company HeliDrive — which supplied Zimbabwe with 18 state-of-the-art helicopters, six of which will be used as air ambulances — are currently training pilots, doctors, nurses and other medical personnel who will be critical for operationalising the national air ambulance service before year-end.

The aircraft will be stationed in Harare, Bulawayo, Mutare and Victoria Falls to provide nationwide coverage.

Before the service can commence, pilots will undergo up to five months of training to obtain the necessary flight hours’ experience and certifications.

In an interview with The Sunday Mail, HeliDrive development director Ms Julia Yatsenko said: “We will be training 40 pilots, 40 doctors, 100 nurses and 10 engineers. At the moment, we have 18 helicopters, with six deployed to the Zimbabwe Republic Police, while some have been set aside for tourism operations.

“The pilots will be trained at Charles Prince Airport, while the doctors and nurses are being trained at Harare Central Hospital (now Sally Mugabe Central Hospital), where we are also creating an emergency medical call centre.

“The second phase of training will be in Bulawayo, Victoria Falls and Mutare.

“We have already started training 16 people and what we need right now is to start finding and training pilots in September.”

Local pilots, she said, do not have the special certification required to fly the specialised helicopters.

“We will require several months — between two to five months — to train them and certify them to fly these helicopters. The pilots are required to have specific flight hours to be able to fly these helicopters . . .

“We are also going to train medical personnel, because the helicopter ambulances are operated by a team of two pilots and two medics — one doctor and one nurse.”

Ms Yatsenko, who described the helicopters as flying intensive care units, said the service will be able to save lives by offering emergency services at a time they are needed the most.

“So, the whole concept is that we don’t bring a patient to hospital, but we take the hospital, put it inside a helicopter and bring it directly to the patient,” she said.

“This significantly improves outcomes in situations where a patient has suffered severe injuries such as internal bleeding, myocardial infractions, heart attacks, strokes, brain damage and stuff like that.

“The helicopters are especially useful in cases where time matters.”

The air ambulances, she said, are particularly critical during the “golden hour”, the initial period after an injury or illness, when immediate medical intervention is vital.

“Right now, we have launched two helicopters, and we want to launch six helicopters by the end of the year,” she added.

“After that, we will decide if we need to add more or not, because six is quite a good number of helicopters to start with for a country the size of Zimbabwe.

“We are going to have two in Harare, two in Bulawayo, one in Victoria Falls and one in Mutare.”