Living beside the hospital in Galway, I’ve become accustomed to the sight and sound of the Coastguard helicopters. They are frequent visitors. It’s likely that most of their passengers, when they set out at the start of their day, envisioned it ending differently than being delivered by helicopter to UCHG. What is certain is that their day would have ended a lot more badly if the helicopter didn’t arrive at all. The west coast can be an unforgiving place but irrespective of the weather conditions, or time of the day or night, the Coastguard crews never shirk their duty. Sadly, this morning, the coastguard helicopter based in Dublin (designated Rescue 116) crashed while supporting a rescue mission off the coast of Mayo. So far, one of the crew has been found (but has since died) and the remaining three are missing. Their colleagues in the coastguard are searching for them overnight tonight.