My Beach

Surf Life Saving WA’s Westpac Life Saver Rescue Helicopter Service will return to the sky tomorrow, watching over West Australian beachgoers through until April 2023.

Surf Life Saving WA General Manager Lifesaving Chris Peck, said the Service continues to play a central role in helping keep WA beachgoers safe.

“While we have several on-beach Lifeguard Services currently operational, our volunteer lifesaver patrols do not commence until October, so the helicopters have an even more important role to play in the interim as we see the weather starting to warm up and people heading back to the beach,” said Mr Peck.

Based out of the Busselton Margaret River Airport and North Fremantle, a busy 2021/22 season saw the Service’s two helicopters carry out 724 patrols, 24 search and rescue missions, and instigate more than 80 beach closures across nearly 1,000 hours of flying time.

“Last season, we saw an 11% increase in the number of shark sightings across WA beaches, as well as a 140% increase in taskings for search and rescue missions”, said Mr Peck.

“Our helicopters provide unrivalled ability to cover large areas of our extensive coastline in minimum time, warning 10’s of thousands of beach-goers of potential dangers each season, and assisting other search and rescue agencies in vital emergency response activity.”

“These outcomes demonstrate the important role our helicopters play in helping make our WA coastline a safer place to recreate”.

“As more than 1.6 million West Australians visit the WA coast each year, we are proud that the service, supported by the WA Government and Westpac, continues to play an important role in keeping our WA coastline safe.”

Initial patrols will see the Perth metropolitan and south west helicopters operate on weekends, switching daily for the coming September school holidays.

In 2021/22, Surf Life Saving WA’s volunteer Surf Lifesaver and Lifeguard patrols performed 132,628 patrol hours, 58,862 preventative actions and 545 rescues at more than 30 beaches across WA.