Audit seen as threat to medevac overhaul

Critical review could keep state from OK'ing funds

As for the maintenance issues - such as helicopters sidelined for months while waiting for repairs or inspections - Shipley said those are largely a function of an aging fleet and competing military demands for similar aircraft maintenance in recent years.

The Department of State Police Aviation Command is the state's primary provider of emergency medical transport of patients to hospitals, and also conducts various other missions, such as search-and-rescue and damage assessment. It operates 12 American Eurocopter Dauphin helicopters - most purchased in 1989 and 1990 - and two airplanes out of eight bases around the state.

Over the past five years, the program has flown more than 40,000 missions, including 24,500 medevac missions. There have been no major accidents, injuries or fatalities associated with the helicopter fleet since 1989, a track record that is better than national statistics kept by the National Transportation Safety Board, the auditors noted.

Shipley said the survival rate of critically injured patients transported by air to Maryland Shock Trauma Center has consistently been above 90 percent.

In its written response to the audit, the Aviation Command accepted most of the auditors' recommendations, such as the need to implement better data-tracking and maintenance systems. It disputed auditors' findings of high staff turnover but agreed to study employee retention trends and, if necessary, take steps to increase salaries. Shipley noted that helicopter maintenance technicians and supervisors received a pay increase in July 2007.

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