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Phoenix Heli-Flight, Inc., a charter helicopter company based in Fort McMurray, Alta., announced a fleet upgrade to the Outerlink IRIS system. Most recently, the company utilized Outerlink’s tracking software and data recorders, but upgrading to the IRIS system gives them the additional features such as push-to-talk radio, constant and reliable communication, live alerts and warnings, and robust tracking that is backfilled to the second, including live fuel loads.
IRIS is a combined voice, video and flight data monitoring system that has been fully integrated into a satellite communications platform, designed to adapt to industry changes. The solution provides worldwide coverage, allowing immediate air-to-ground, ground-to-air or air-to-air communication, with push-to-talk voice over IP (VOIP) radio.
“Choosing to upgrade our helicopters with IRIS was a complex decision but the reasons we did are easy to define,” said Paul Spring, Heli-Flight president. “IRIS provides multiple quality assurance technologies in a single system and Outerlink has demonstrated the ability to continuously evolve the software and hardware that is so essential to provide the data we need to keep our flight and maintenance operations safe and efficient. IRIS provides instantaneous two-way satellite communication that keeps our flight operations agile, the instantaneous aircraft parameter alerts that enhance our safety, and the flight oversight data we use to save over $100,000 each year on incident investigations and insurance premiums.”
The Heli-Flight fleet consists of 10 Airbus aircraft, both single and twin-turbine engine, light helicopters. The charter company services a wide variety of industries including exploration, wildfire suppression, utilities, oil and gas, forestry, construction, infrastructure maintenance, corporate transport and more.
The Outerlink IRIS system has supplemental type certification (STC) for many airframes in the Canada, the U.S., and Europe.
