Tag Archives: accident

Flying Under Bridges

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What were we thinking?

Back in the spring of 2004, when I interviewed at Papillon Grand Canyon Helicopters for a tour pilot job, one of the interviewers — there were three of them — asked me what the craziest thing I’d ever done in a helicopter was. I said, “Well, I was sitting in the PIC seat but not manipulating the controls when we flew under a bridge.”

There was a brief moment of silence and then all three men laughed long and hard. I’m not sure if they laughed because they thought what we’d done was funny or if they thought it was funny that I’d actually answered truthfully instead replying with something I thought they’d want to hear, like “I never do crazy things in a helicopter.” (I don’t lie, even when it’s in my best interest to do so.) But it must have been a good enough answer because I got a job offer and I took the job. That summer gave me some of the best flying experience I could get to hone skills, build confidence, and move forward in my career as a helicopter pilot.

In this blog post, I want to talk a little about the events leading up to us flying under the bridge and what happened to the pilot manipulating the controls that day.

The Backstory

It was July 19, 2003. I’d spent the previous day ferrying a brand spanking new R44 Raven II from Torrance, CA to St. George, UT. The helicopter had been purchased by a student pilot we’ll call John who had a heck of a lot more money to burn than I ever will. Not only had he bought the Raven II for cash, but he’d paid the person who’d ordered it for his own operation an extra $40K so he wouldn’t have to wait for his own to be built.

He’d asked his flight instructor — we’ll call him Roy — to pick it up, but Roy didn’t meet Robinson’s very strict ferry pilot requirements. Although he had 2,000 hours in Robinson helicopters, he’d never taken the factory safety course. I’d met Roy the month before when he was rounding up burros out at Alamo Lake in Arizona. He remembered me and the fact that I had R44 experience and guessed (correctly) that I’d taken the safety course. John and Roy arranged for me to fly the helicopter with Roy from Torrance to St. George. Due to Robinson’s rules about ferry passengers, John would stay behind.

It was a mostly uneventful trip. The helicopter was ugly: white with a bright orange stripe and chocolate brown leather interior. But it flew fine and we cruised through the desert, mostly following I-15. We stopped for fuel at Boulder City, NV and then landed again at Mesquite, NV to wait out a thunderstorm in our path. John met us when we landed at St. George. They took me out for dinner, put me in a motel room up at the airport, and made plans to get me home to Wickenburg (near Phoenix) the next day.

The Flight

That brings us to July 19 again. John was eager to go flying in his new helicopter, so they decided to fly me down to Wickenburg. It would be about a 2-1/2 hour flight. Roy put me in the right (PIC) seat while he sat in the left, just like the day before. The duals were still in. John sat in the back. He’d get his chance to fly on the way home. (To this day, I think it was very kind of them to allow me a few more hours of stick time in the R44. I only had about 40 hours in one at that point.)

We headed south over the east end of Lake Mead near Pearce Ferry, past the Grand Wash Cliffs, and down through Lapai Alley to Kingman. That’s where we stopped for fuel. The rest of the flight was very familiar to me — I’d likely flown the route along State Route 93 dozens of times in the R22 I owned back then.

Near Wikieup
Here’s a piece of the Phoenix Sectional Chart that covers the area of Route 93 south of Wickieup. Note the wires.

Sometime just after passing over Wikieup, John asked Roy how he found burros from the air. (Remember, he’d done burro roundup only a month before.) Roy asked for the controls and I let him have them. He dropped down low and explained how he looked for bare patches in the desert where the burros would rub themselves. We looked but although we saw patches like he described, we didn’t see burros.

By that time, we’d reached Kaiser Canyon. Roy dropped down very low and followed it to where it joined up with Burro Creek. That’s when he turned to me and asked, “Have you ever flown under a bridge?”

I admitted that I hadn’t.

“Want to?” he asked.

Burro Creek Satellite
A recent satellite image of Burro Creek Canyon. If you look closely, you can actually see the shadow of the two bridge spans upstream from the bridge. We came from the south, following the creek.

I knew the bridge he was thinking of: the Burro Creek Bridge on Route 93, which spanned the canyon not far ahead. I’m not sure if I answered. Or if John answered. The canyon opened up enough for Roy to drop us into it. We rounded a bend and the bridge came into view.

That’s when John started getting cold feet. “I don’t think we should do this,” he said nervously.

But he was really too late. We were moving at at least 80 knots and the bridge was coming up quickly.

Burro Creek Bridge
The Burro Creek Bridge not long after the second span was completed. Back when we flew under it, there was only one span. Please don’t fly under this or any other bridge. It’s dangerous.

It wasn’t the bridge up ahead that had me worried. It was the two sets of big power lines — we call them “Bonnevilles” here in Washington state — that spanned the canyon on our side of the bridge. They wires actually drooped lower than the bottom of the bridge, which is something I’d never noticed before. But I only felt real fear for a moment. That’s how long it took to pass under them and the bridge beyond.

I can’t remember what happened next. Probably some euphoric whooping by all three of us. And laughter. Roy gave back the controls and I got us back on course. They dropped me off at Wickenburg, fueled up, and headed home.

I lived in that area for another 10 years and owned a helicopter the entire time. Although I passed by the bridge dozens of times — I even did a photo flight while the second span was under construction — I never flew under it again. What the hell were we thinking, anyway?

Afterwards

Time passed. I helped John and Roy out again in August, doing helicopter rides at a country fair in the same R44. (According to my log book, I logged a total of about 20 hours in that helicopter.) I think I visited Roy in St. George once again after that. Then we lost touch.

I don’t know what happened to John and his helicopter.

But I do know what happened to Roy. On April 6, 2014, the helicopter Roy was flying collided with terrain in a canyon near Green River, UT. He and his passenger both died.

I read about it in the news and my heart sank a little — the way it does when someone we know dies in a crash. (If you’re a pilot and it hasn’t happened to you yet, it will.) The investigation is still going on, but the NTSB preliminary report states that there is no evidence of engine failure.

That got me thinking, there are old pilots and bold pilots…

Comments on the Seattle Helicopter Crash

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Just a few words about how heartless and stupid people can be.

KOMO Helicopter
One of KOMO’s helicopters departs the Seattle hellpad on a spring day two years ago.

I was sitting at my desk, writing a blog post about Sunday’s day trip, when a brief news blurb on NPR mentioned a helicopter had crashed at the base of the Space Needle in Seattle. My friend Greg flies KOMO’s helicopter from a rooftop helipad there. My blood ran cold as I got on Facebook to message him and his wife, hoping he wasn’t the pilot involved.

Pam came back quickly. It wasn’t Greg. I felt relief. But did it really matter? Was the accident any less tragic because my friend hadn’t been hurt? Of course not. Someone else’s loved ones had been killed. It was a tragedy no matter who was involved.

Of course, someone posted the breaking news story link from KOMO’s website to the Helicopter Pilot’s forum on Facebook. And people were commenting. Stupid, thoughtless people.

The accident had happened only minutes before — hell, the fire was probably still burning — and guys who are supposedly helicopter pilots were already speculating about the cause and spreading misinformation.

“Settling with power,” one genius proclaimed.

“According to witnesses, he was attempting to land on a roof and rolled off,” another amateur reporter added.

It was pretty obvious to me that neither of these “experts” had read the 150 words in the original version of the story they were commenting on — heck, why bother read before commenting? — which clearly said the helicopter was taking off when the accident occurred. Settling with power isn’t something that is likely on takeoff from a rooftop helipad. And it was an established helipad, not merely “a roof.”

Later, the first genius added another piece of fictitious insight: “Yea originally they said he was landing. Just heard there was a crane put up, and be hit a wire.”

“Just heard”? From where? None of the news stories — even hours later when the stories are more fully developed — say anything about a crane.

Other comments and speculations that were clearly not tactful or fully informed followed. I think some of them may have been deleted, but the responses to them remain. Most of us are agreed that this is no time for speculations — especially when there’s a shortage of facts to support them.

The situation was worse, of course, on KOMO’s website where the article appeared. Some cold-hearted conservatives rejoiced over the death of two liberals — as if they knew the political leanings of the pilot and his passenger and as if that actually mattered. One moron even commented that it was too bad Obama wasn’t on board.

Seriously? Do people actually think like that?

I spent ten minutes flagging obnoxious and offensive comments before finally giving up and getting on with my day.

But come on people, let’s look at the reality of the situation: There was an accident in Seattle that took the lives of two men. Men with lives and families. Men likely doing the work they loved. Men who lived and breathed and loved and dreamed, just like all of us.

Surely they deserve better than some of the uninformed speculation and heartless comments the reports of their death are attracting.

Rest in peace, guys.

Helicopters 101: Hover Charts

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What the hover charts mean, how to read them, and which one to use.

Articles in the Helicopters 101 series:
– Flight Planning
– CG
– Weight
– Hover Charts
– Ground School

The “Performance” section of a helicopter’s Pilot Operating Handbook (POH) includes two charts related to hover power: IGE Hover Ceiling vs. Gross Weight and OGE Hover Ceiling vs. Gross Weight. (The exact names of these charts may differ by helicopter manual; these are the names in the Robinson R44 Raven II manual I have handy.) These are perhaps the most important charts in the book — they help you understand the amount of power a helicopter will have under specific operating conditions.

What the Charts Mean

The hover charts enable you to plot your operating conditions to see whether performance is possible. The operating conditions include altitude, gross weight, and temperature — all of which you should be familiar with prior to flight time. You should consult the charts before every flight using the information that applies for that flight.

There are two charts and they work much the same way, although they do provide different data:

  • The IGE Hover Chart (below, left) indicates expected performance in a ground effect hover. A note near the chart should get more specific than that. In the example here, the chart is for a 2 foot skid height with full throttle and zero wind.
  • The OGE Hover Chart (below, right) indicates expected performance in an out of ground effect hover. Again, a note gets more specific. In this example, the chart is for takeoff power or full throttle with zero wind.

Generally speaking, the IGE chart is for hover operations very close to the ground while the OGE chart is for all other hover operations.

I’ve provided these two charts side by side here, but you can zoom into either one in separate browser window or tab by clicking it.

IGE Hover, R44 II OGE Hover, R44 II

If you fly a different helicopter, you might want to pull out the charts for it and consult them while reading this. No sense in learning about my helicopter if your helicopter’s charts are handy.

How to Use the Charts

In order to use the charts, you need three pieces of information:

  • Altitude of where you’ll be operating. This should be the pressure altitude, but in most instances the elevation above sea level will be close enough.
  • Aircraft weight. This is the weight of the aircraft at the time of the operation.
  • Temperature. This builds density altitude into the chart so you don’t have to calculate it.

The best way to explain how to read the charts is to provide a few examples.

IGE Hover Chart

Suppose your local airport is at 2500 feet MSL. It’s a pretty warm day and forecast for flight time is 35°C. You’ve done your weight and balance and you know that with you (the pilot), fuel, two passengers, and some added equipment, your weight at takeoff will be 2300 pounds. You want to make sure you have enough performance to do a regular takeoff from a hover, so you consult the IGE Hover Chart. The first thing you notice is that the chart starts at 5,000 feet. Since your airport is below that level, you’re done; the chart only addresses higher elevations so you’re good to go.

IGE Landing Example 1
Plotting the altitude and the weight in this example keeps you below and to the left of the temperature line, so you’re okay in these conditions.

Now suppose you’re flying to Flagstaff, AZ, which sits at 7014 feet MSL. It’ll take you an hour to get there and the forecasted temperature there is 30°C for your arrival time. You want to make sure you have enough performance to do a regular landing to a hover and then to the ground, so you consult the IGE Hover Chart. If you burn 16 gallons per hour and each gallon weighs 6 pounds, you’re now nearly 100 pounds lighter or 2200 pounds. You plot the point where the altitude meets the weight. Because you’re still below and to the left of the 30°C temperature line (highlighted in yellow here), you have enough performance. If you follow the 7000 foot line to the 30°C line, you can see that you’d even have enough performance at that temperature and altitude if you were just about max gross weight (2500 pounds).

IGE Takeoff Example 2
In this example you have a problem: the plotted point falls above the temperature line. This means you might not have enough performance to hover in ground effect under these conditions.

Now let’s say that when you get to Flagstaff, you’re picking up another passenger and he’s a big guy. You also have to put on some fuel — enough for you to be at max gross weight for takeoff. In addition, takeoff will be at 3 PM when the forecasted temperature is 35°C. Plotting that indicates a problem — the plotted intersection of altitude and weight is above where the 35°C line would be (as estimated in yellow in this example between 30°C and 40°C). This means that under these conditions, the helicopter may not have the performance you need in a ground effect hover.

What could you do about this? A few things:

  • Lighten up the aircraft. Take on less fuel (if possible) or leave behind a person or some equipment (good luck with that).
  • Wait until the temperature drops. The temperature will likely drop again later in the day. Wait until it drops below 30°C.
  • Perform a running takeoff. But is that possible? Because you need less power to fly at speeds in excess of ETL than to hover, it could be. The only way to know for sure is to try. (A serious question here, though: do you really want to take off if you know you don’t have enough performance to even hover in ground effect? Think long and hard about that before doing it.)

OGE Hover Chart

It’s the next day. A photographer wants you to take him and his client around a marina at the lake so he can get video footage of the new dock and some boat races that will be going on. The lake is near Prescott; it sits at 4900 feet and is surrounded by desert mountains. The forecasted temperature in Prescott for the early morning flight is 25°C. You get the passenger and equipment weights and calculate your fuel load for the flight. The total aircraft weight at the time you’ll be on point to start the shoot will be 2200 pounds.

You’ve worked with this videographer before. He likes you to fly very low and slow — usually less than ETL, sometimes only 100 feet off the ground. (You’ve already warned him of the potential danger of this, being sure not to refer to the height velocity diagram as the “deadman’s curve.” But you’re willing to take the risk and he likes flying with you because you’re the only area pilot who will.)

OGE Hover Example 1
In this example, you’d have enough performance to hover out of ground effect in the plotted conditions.

You pull out the POH and turn to the OGE Hover Chart. Why that chart? Well, you know that you’ll be flying at speeds less than ETL. That’ll likely take at least as much power as hovering out of ground effect. You plot the altitude and weight, as shown here. The resulting point is below and to the left of the temperature line (sketched in yellow). You should be good to go.

OGE Hover Example 1
With the fatty client on board, you simply wouldn’t have enough power to hover out of ground effect.

Now let’s say that the photographer calls an hour before the flight. His client wants to come along, supposedly to provide instructions. You ask how much he weighs and the photographer tells you 240 pounds. A big guy. You recalculate the aircraft weight at the time of the flight adding 250 pounds for the client because you know everyone lies about their weight. Now you’re at 2450 pounds, which is pretty darn close to max gross weight. You plot the points and what do you find? With the client on board, you’d be too heavy to hover out of ground effect.

What can you do? A few things:

  • Lighten up the aircraft. Assuming you can’t leave the client behind, you might be able to operate with less fuel on board.
  • Wait until the temperature drops. Of course, the photographer picked that flight time for a reason and probably won’t take a time change.
  • Don’t drop below ETL when out of ground effect during the flight. If you keep your speed above ETL, you should have plenty of power to fly. But will the photographer accept that?

IGE vs. OGE

In these examples, I used both charts. You might be wondering why I used the OGE chart for a flight that didn’t necessarily require hovering. After all, you reason, if you don’t have to hover, you don’t need a hover chart, right?

Wrong.

As I mentioned earlier, operating at speeds less than ETL — which is about 25 knots in an R44 — requires about as much power as hovering. That’s why you need to consult a hover chart. And since you’ll be 100 feet up or higher, you’re not in ground effect so you need the OGE hover chart.

Let’s look at what could happen in the photography example if you conducted the flight when the OGE hover chart told you hovering wasn’t going to be possible.

You get into position for the photographer to start videoing the new dock. You’re about 100 feet off the lake surface, doing 40 knots. “Slower,” the photographer urges. You drop speed little by little. Finally, you’re at about 15 knots. The helicopter starts to settle. You pull up the collective and either you get a low RPM rotor horn (in a piston helicopter like the R44) or you over-torque or over-temp the engine (in a turbine helicopter). Either way, the settling doesn’t stop. You push the cyclic forward, trying to fly out of the vortex ring state you’ve put yourself into, but you’re now less than 100 feet off the lake. Are you wearing floatation devices? I hope so. You might be going swimming.

Think this doesn’t happen? It does. It even killed people in this accident and this accident — both of which were for aerial photography missions. (And yes, the pilot in the second accident was also impaired.)

Throughout this blog I refer over and over to the OGE hover chart. This is why. It gives you worst case scenario performance for your operating conditions. If the OGE hover chart says you can operate, you can operate at any speed. Indeed, if you consult the OGE hover chart first and it says you’re good to go, you don’t even need to consult the IGE hover chart.

Conclusion

My advice: consult the OGE hover chart before every flight. It gives you a good feeling for the kind of power you’ll have available throughout various phases of a flight, even if airspeed drops below ETL.

This can become vitally important, especially if you’re doing an off-airport takeoff or landing in rough terrain. Think about it. Suppose you’re sitting on the ground near that marina in the last example, with the fatty client on board. Maybe that’s where you picked him up. You pick the helicopter up into a hover; it’s possible but perhaps you need nearly full allowable power to do it. You push the cyclic forward only two or three feet off the ground. What happens as you begin to go through ETL? The helicopter’s nose might dip. If you’re close to the ground, you could hook a skid. Add rising terrain and/or a tailwind and you might find yourself in serious trouble. That’s what happened to a pilot in Easton, WA in 2007 and it killed her and her three passengers.

If the OGE hover chart says you don’t have the performance you’ll need for an OGE hover at your expected flight conditions, at the very least you should consult the IGE hover chart to make sure you can hover in ground effect for takeoff and landing. If you don’t have the performance for that, consider what you can do to increase performance before taking off, even if a run-on takeoff is possible and you’re certain you’ll be able to hover when it’s time to land.

These charts are your true performance guides. Operating when they say you can’t is just plain stupid.