Medevac Question

[Galaxy]

Why Are block altitudes sometimes requested by medevac flights?

[PostmasterGeneral]

On the King Air 200, FL180 equates to about a 1500' cabin altitude (depending on how old and shitty your plane is of course.) low cabin altitudes are often required for patient stability and comfort, depending on the ailment. You don't want someone with a brain bleed to be experiencing cabin pressure changes.

If the altimeters are too low, ATC can't assign you FL180 because of loss of separation from anyone at 190. Because of this, the only way to actually fly at 18,000' is to get a block altitude (17,000-FL190) to ensure proper separation. Hope that answers your question.

[adster1989]

Could also be that they are riding just at tops of clouds and picking up icing, or getting into turbulence....sometimes only need that extra couple hundred feet. Its helpful rather than climbing another 2000 ft to next alt

[Cessna driver]

Could also be that they are riding just at tops of clouds and picking up icing, or getting into turbulence....sometimes only need that extra couple hundred feet. Its helpful rather than climbing another 2000 ft to next alt

Gotta love cloud surfing on empty legs

[Galaxy]

Thank you for the answers.

[SuperchargedRS]

On the King Air 200, FL180 equates to about a 1500' cabin altitude (depending on how old and shitty your plane is of course.) low cabin altitudes are often required for patient stability and comfort, depending on the ailment. You don't want someone with a brain bleed to be experiencing cabin pressure changes.

That.

[adster1989]

Could also be that they are riding just at tops of clouds and picking up icing, or getting into turbulence....sometimes only need that extra couple hundred feet. Its helpful rather than climbing another 2000 ft to next alt

Gotta love cloud surfing on empty legs

never gets old!

[co-joe]

Not just brain bleeds, but blood O2 saturation levels of the patient are always continuously monitored throughout the flight so small changes can be critical for a patient that isn't breathing on their own.

It's neat to see on dead legs to put the o2 sat meter thing on your finger and then climb to altitude and see the change. Bandaid might have more knowledge but I think we hover around 97%, as your cabin altitude climbs you drop to even 95% which can be a big deal. Then throw the supplementary O2 mask on and watch it climb again. Just a fun human physiology thing you can play with.


Also in the above example, if 180 was you'rdesired altitude, the request would be; "wrong way 17000 blocking wriong way 190". ATC must love medevacs.