Helicopter Air Ambulance, Commercial Helicopter, and Part 91 Helicopter Operations

These requirements in part 135 are addressed specifically to helicopter air ambulances, often referred to as emergency medical services (EMS), and to on-demand operations including overwater operations. The National Transportation Safety Board recommended several changes following accident investigations. The FAA aims to improve the safety record of helicopter air ambulances through better oversight of their operations. The FAA will use the information it collects and reviews to ensure compliance and adherence with regulations and, if necessary, to take enforcement action on violators of the regulations. Section 44731 of the Modernization and Reform Act of 2012 required the FAA to collect from part 135 certificate holder providing helicopter air ambulance services a report containing the number of helicopters that the certificate holder uses to provide helicopter air ambulance services, the base locations of the helicopters, the number of flights and hours flown by registration number while providing helicopter air ambulance services, the number of flight requests for a helicopter providing air ambulance services that were accepted or declined by the certificate holder and the type of each such flight request (such as scene response, inter-facility transport, organ transport, or ferry or repositioning flight), the number of accidents, if any, involving helicopters operated by the certificate holder while providing air ambulance services and a description of the accidents, the number of flights and hours flown under instrument flight rules by helicopters operated by the certificate holder while providing air ambulance services, the time of day of each flight flown by helicopters operated by the certificate holder while providing air ambulance services, and the number of incidents, if any, in which a helicopter was not directly dispatched and arrived to transport patients but was not utilized for patient transport. Section 314(d) of the FAA Reauthorization Act of 2018 amended these reporting requirements for the report to contain the number of helicopters that the certificate holder uses to provide helicopter air ambulance services and the base locations of the helicopters, the number of hours flown by the helicopters operated by the certificate holder, the number of patients transported and the number of patient transport requests for a helicopter providing air ambulance services that were accepted or declined by the certificate holder and the type of each such flight request (such as scene response, inter-facility transport or organ transport), the number of accidents, if any, involving helicopters operated by the certificate holder while providing air ambulance services and a description of the accidents, the number of hours flown under instrument flight rules by helicopters operated by the certificate holder, the number of hours flown at night by helicopters operated by the certificate holder, the number of incidents, if any, in which a helicopter was not directly dispatched and arrived to transport patients but was not utilized for patient transport. Essentially, this relieved the requirement for reporting of flight time by individual aircraft and by time of day and now only requires the reporting of the total flight hours, in aggregate, flown by the certificate holder and the number of hours flown at night. The amendment added the requirement to report the number of patients flown by the certificate holder. The requirement for reporting is placed upon the certificate holders via Operations Specification paragraph A021, Air Ambulance Operations—Helicopter. A reporting template is provided to the certificate holders by the Air Transportation Division, Operations Group, 135 Air Carrier Operations Section, AFS-220.

The latest form for Helicopter Air Ambulance, Commercial Helicopter, and Part 91 Helicopter Operations expires 2026-04-30 and can be found here.

Radio Altimeters (135.160)

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