SuperchargedRS wrote:Hmmm
We fly with a flight medic and nurse, if you're being flown on our plane you're on our stretcher and that is the only place for our pt, meaning we are not a normal pax charter operation, the price of admission on our flights is quite high and I'm not talking money.
If we are inbound to pickup a pt, or inflight with a pt, we are medevac, period.
I do not have a MD after my name, the ATC controller does not have a MD after his name and has ZERO business trying to figure out "how medevac" we are, if I say medevac I expect priority as if the person in the back is a infant on it's last breath, it is not my place as a pilot, their place as a controller, or even my medical crews place to put a diagnosis on the pt, or decide how worthy of priority they are, medevac = priority
Sure, so what if there is another medevac flight arriving at the same time ? Let's say you are first because you arrived 10 sec earlier. The other guy actually has a patient on it's last breath, you are transporting a non critical patient. Would you keep your first spot, or would you talk to the other crew and figure out who is the most critical ?
On a more philosophical note: you as PIC are responsible for the safe operation of the flight and for your passengers. Would that not imply that you would need to know the status of your passenger ? I am aware that it might not make a difference, and that for safety you should think about them as boxes. But think about it for a moment: if a passenger is having a stroke, you would usually divert to a nearby airport and probably declare a mayday (distress that required immediate assitance with the threat of loss of life). Back to the medevac: medevac gives you priority, but not over other medevac flights. If your passenger is dying in the back, would that not require you, legally, to declare a mayday for priority handling ? But before you can do that, you need to be aware of the state your passenger/patient is in.
I am sure there is some sort of regulation that would contradict this, but I couldn't find anything...