My first thought when I heard about the SkyCopter was "oh god, car chases", and I wouldn't be at all surprised if this is what they do with it a lot of the time. I can also see them having a naff animation that they play before going to pictures from the chopper, like that stupid flashing newswall graphic they used at first.
Still, at least they're not calling it "SkyCopter 1" even though there's only one helicopter in the first place...
I think you're being a little unfair to say "oh, it's only going to be used for car chases, grumble grumble grumble".
For a start, there aren't all that many car chases to follow over here - consider the enourmous size of America, and the fact that just about every local station has a helicopter and that perhaps you will get one or two car chases a month that Fox will show... really, that's not a lot.
I suppose they could sit and listen to the police radios 24/7, and doubtless car chases will occur, but I think you're dismissing it as "gimmiky" to be honest.
For starters, it is a very advanced piece of technology. TVS used to use a helicopter to feed video into Southampton from across the south coast because it was easier than relaying through regular means. It acts as a sort of mirror for signals to bounce off from satellite trucks to HQ - sure noggin can offer a more technical explanation. So, from that perspective it is very useful.
When a boat sinks or a plane crashes in the sea (given that we are an island, living next to one of the most heavily freighted channels in the world, it is frankly shocking how poorly equipped news networks are to cover disasters at sea) the helicopters can get out there quickly. When there are motorway accidents (witness the other week on near Manchester) and it takes literally hours (Manchester happened at 6am ish and pictures came in at about 11am) for pictures to arrive... they could be quite useful for that. Events like may day, when they normally have to hire helicopters.
The ITN helicopter is next to useless, because it is either hired out to pay for its running or just not used at all. The only time it was ever used properly was when the IRA bombed the cabinet in the early 90s; ITN happened to be flying over the area at the time, shot some pictures and gave them to CNN (no ITN/ITV News Channel back then).
The OJ car chase - surely one of the best live events covered on TV? CNN, I think, were in the middle of Larry King Live and had helicopters from K-ABC/NBC/CBS/TTV flying over OJ's motor - it was fantastic stuff to watch, especially when he put a gun to his head.
When TWA Flight 800 crashed off Long Island - very shortly after MSNBC launched, I think in MSNBC's first week - WNBC sent out their helicopter and boat and managed to get pictures exclusively on MSNBC hours before CNN. Well into the night CNN were just stuck with maps and a "X" where the plane crashed.
September 11 - like I have said before, had it happened in the UK, you would not have seen the second plane hit because the broadcasters would have been too slow off the mark.
They are increadibly important, and to dismiss them as gimmicks with no real purpose is frankly very naive.
Except you would if they were anywhere else other than Sky News
Oh, give it a rest, you boring little turd.
Does it matter to you that much what it's called?
You're the sort of t0sser who'd rather sit and watch the BBC broadcasting maps of central London, rather than Sky's helicopter pictures, for fear of Murdoch having some sort of influence over a train crash/bomb/fire.
Just do everyone here a favour - never go into broadcasting, because I had hoped that the backward looking clan of pr-cks you belong to, which still pollutes some corridors of the BBC, had successfullly been eradicated. The industry doesn't need them back again.
Look they could say our Helicopter is at the seen, but they come up with a short name that will become recognised.
They used to say Sky Newswall, now its known as the Newswall. What if they had said, "Lets go over to our collection of 32 Screens..." It dosent have a ring to it.
Or what about the Skystrator... "Lets highlight this with the On Screen Highlighting Device"
)
didnt see that. never mind 
Well timed shot as well, talking to Michael Wilson 