Royal Air Force rescue helicopter makes "emergency" landing on a beach. To buy four Magnum ice creams!

May 22, 2012 Helicopters

David Cenciotti

Do you remember the French Tiger helicopter that landed on a beach near Tripoli to pick up a Free Libya flag from a young girl?

Something similar (although much less dangerous) has happened in the UK recently.

The Sun has published some interesting pictures showing a RAF rescue Sea King helicopter landing on a beach during a training sortie to give a crew member the opportunity to buy ice creams.

A screenshot of The Sun website

The episode took place on the sand at Winterton-on-Sea, Norfolk, to the east of Norwich and, if you wondered, they bought three Magnum Classics and one white chocolate Magnum.

SAR (Search And Rescue) choppers are often required to land on beaches during real operations. That’s why they train emergency landing on sand.

In this case, rear crew (not pilots as some media reported) took the chance to disembark to obtain refreshment: although it’s not a standard practice, they did not breach any regulation.

Dramatic rescue operation after Puma helicopter ditches in North Sea with 14 people on board (theaviationist.com)

About David Cenciotti

David Cenciotti is a journalist based in Rome, Italy. He is the Founder and Editor of “The Aviationist”, one of the world’s most famous and read military aviation blogs. Since 1996, he has written for major worldwide magazines, including Air Forces Monthly, Combat Aircraft, and many others, covering aviation, defense, war, industry, intelligence, crime and cyberwar. He has reported from the U.S., Europe, Australia and Syria, and flown several combat planes with different air forces. He is a former 2nd Lt. of the Italian Air Force, a private pilot and a graduate in Computer Engineering. He has written five books and contributed to many more ones.