NEST owns three Sikorsky S-76 emergency rescue helicopters and are the only service in New Zealand using this model of emergency helicopters providing world-class capabilities and pilots to fly them. The choppers are crewed by qualified St John paramedic crew who are experienced pre-hospital emergency clinicians and provide medical care and treatment. They also serve as the winch operators on search and rescue missions and they are an essential service.

The B&H teams in Singapore and New Zealand sprang into action to source the required part which was located in Indonesia, put onto a next-flight-out service into SIN and then on the first flight to Auckland. B&H then organised a dedicated time-critical vehicle to transport the mission critical spare parts the last 160km by road to Whangarei where delivery was made the same day.

“With the tremendous stresses on the global supply chain at the moment, sourcing urgent parts to keep machines like these helicopters operational in locations far away from forward stocking locations can be extremely challenging,” says B&H Worldwide’s New Zealand Branch Manager, Lee Hedges. “But our teams’ skills and global knowledge meant we were able to come to NEST’s rescue in just two days”.