Accredited official statistics

Search and rescue helicopter annual statistics: year ending March 2023

Civilian search and rescue helicopter activity statistics in the United Kingdom, Year ending March 2023.

Documents

Search and rescue helicopter statistics: year ending March 2023 tables

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Details

Statistics on civilian search and rescue helicopter (SARH) activity in the United Kingdom, based on details of taskings recorded by the Aeronautical Rescue Coordination Centre (ARCC).

For the year ending March 2023:

  • there were 2,580 civilian SARH taskings

  • Prestwick base was the busiest of the 10 bases, responding to 396 taskings

  • there were 1,466 people rescued and 527 people assisted across all taskings

There was a 6% decrease in taskings compared to the year ending March 2022. The majority of taskings were classified as rescue or recovery (1,316), followed by support (570), search (412) and pre-arranged transfers (282).

Notes and guidance

Notes and definitions and a report about the quality of these statistics is available.

Interactive dashboard

Explore the data via our interactive search and rescue helicopter statistics dashboard covering SARH taskings from April 2015 onwards.

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Search and rescue helicopter statistics

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Updates to this page

Published 20 June 2023

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