Pilot Flying Fears?

Education is the best way to deal with safety concerns — especially if you’re a pilot.

I recently took part in a forum discussion that revolved around safety issues. The person who started the discussion, a helicopter pilot training to be a CFI, was concerned about the possibility of flight schools emphasizing the fun part of flying without adequately addressing the dangers. It wasn’t a failure to teach emergency procedures that bothered him. It was the attitude of flight schools and CFIs. He worried that flight schools, in an attempt to keep enrollment high, were failing to make students understand just how dangerous flying helicopters can be.

While I’ll agree that flying helicopters is dangerous, I also agree that driving a car or or crossing the street is dangerous. In fact, you stand a far more likely chance of being injured or killed in a motor vehicle than in an aircraft. The pilot who started this discussion knows this, but he still wonders whether flight schools should be making student pilots more cognizant of the dangers, especially early on in training.

I understood his point of view, but I really don’t know firsthand how much his flight school is downplaying the dangers. The general feeling I came away from after reading his comments was that he had a fear of flying. (This turned out not to be the case.) While it’s always good for a pilot to be afraid of what could happen, there comes a point where the level of fear becomes unhealthy. Yes, it’s true that pilots need to be mentally prepared to react to an emergency within seconds. But no, we don’t need to spend every moment of every flight actively thinking about all the emergencies that could ruin our day — or end our life.

Experiences Teach

I flew with a 300-hour pilot a few years ago. He’d gone through training and was a CFI looking for a job. (I have flown with quite a few CFIs looking for jobs, but that’s another story.) We were on a cross-country, time-building flight in my R44. I would eventually fly a total of 20 hours with him.

Early on in our first flight, I learned that his CFI, who was the flight school’s Chief Flight Instructor, had been killed in a rather disturbing fiery crash. Although she had over 2,000 hours of flight time, she had only 24 hours in the helicopter make and model. On that fateful day, the NTSB concluded that the accident was caused by:

The pilot’s improper planning/decision in attempting a downwind takeoff under high density altitude conditions that resulted in a loss of control and impact with terrain. Contributing to the accident were the helicopter’s gross weight in excess of the maximum hover out of ground effect limit, a high density altitude, and the gusty tailwind.

(I don’t really want to discuss this accident here; I think deserves a discussion of its own elsewhere in this blog and hope to address it in the months to come.)

Near GormanIt soon became apparent to me that the pilot was unusually fearful of flying in the mountains. Our route required us to fly west from Wickenburg, AZ to the California coast near San Luis Obispo. He started fretting about the mountains ahead of us while we were still in the flat deserts of Southern California. The mountains he was worried about showed elevations of 5,000 to 8,000 feet on the chart; we’d be flying over a road that ran in a relatively straight and wide canyon. That part of the flight turned out to be uneventful and he seemed genuinely relieved when it was finished.

Monterey BayOddly, later in the flight, when the Monterey tower instructed us to cut across Monterey Bay at an altitude of only 700 feet, I was pretty freaked out. Here we were, in a single-engine helicopter flying far from gliding distance of land, without pop-out floats or personal floatation devices. My companion, on the other hand, was perfectly at ease. In fact, I think he thought me cowardly when I asked Monterey tower for clearance to fly closer to shore.

This is a great example of how experience teaches. My companion was a “sea level pilot,” who did all of his training — and flying — in the watery areas around Seattle. He was comfortable with water and low-lying lands, but he was fearful of the conditions that had taken the life of someone he knew very well. I was a desert pilot with most of my experience flying over dry land, much it in high density altitude situations, including more than 350 hours flying tours over the Grand Canyon at 7500 feet or higher. I was comfortable flying over most kinds of terrain at just about any altitude but very fearful of flying over water.

(Nowadays, I wear a PFD when doing any extended flying over water and require my passengers to do the same.)

Learn from Other People’s Mistakes

Back in the forum, I began wondering if the pilot who had started the thread was concerned because he’d lost someone close to him in a crash — much like my cross-country companion had. (That turned out not to be the case.) I said:

If a person thinks too much about the danger of ANYTHING, they won’t be comfortable doing it. I admit that I don’t concern myself with it. I do everything I can to fly safely and maintain a safe aircraft. I’m confident in my abilities and never push the envelope of comfort more than I absolutely need to. I don’t fly around thinking that at any moment, something bad could happen. If I did, I’d hate flying and I’d likely be a horrible pilot.

Later, in the same post, I said:

You might also consider reading NTSB reports for helicopter accidents. What you’ll find is that most accidents are caused by pilot errors. REALLY. Reading those reports will help you learn what mistakes others have made so you’ll avoid them in the future.

He saw these two comments as conflicting and replied that I couldn’t really say that I wasn’t concerned with danger if I was reading accident reports.

My response was:

You need to understand that it’s BECAUSE I read the NTSB reports that I’m NOT overly concerned with the dangers of flying. The NTSB reports educate me about what can happen when you do something dumb: fly too heavy for your type of operation, perform maneuvers beyond the capabilities of your aircraft, fly into clouds or wires, etc. Each time I read a report and understand the chain of events that caused the accident, I file that info into my head and know to avoid the same situation.

I went on to say a lot more about what I’ve learned from NTSB reports. I read them for helicopter accidents at least once a month. Another pilot in the forum said he does the same thing — in fact, he even has a browser bookmark that’ll pull up the reports by month! I cannot say enough about the usefulness of these accident reports for training and awareness.

Unanswered Questions Can Fuel Fear

As I look back now on the flights I took with that mountain-fearful CFI — with the forum discussion in mind — I’m wondering whether the flight school had properly debriefed its students after the loss of the Chief Flight Instructor.

What had the flight school told him and the other pilots? Had they told him what caused the crash? I know that back then, before the NTSB report was issued, the flight school was in denial about the aircraft being overweight for the operation. Had they told their students anything at all? Were my companion and the other pilots and student pilots at that flight school left to wonder how such a great, experienced pilot could have been involved in a crash in the mountains?

Were his unanswered questions fueling his fear?

Another thing I suggested in the forum is that flight schools might want to conduct monthly seminars that students are required to attend as part of ground school training. Get all the students and CFIs into a classroom or meeting room with a few knowledgable, experienced pilots at the front of the room. Pick 3 to 5 recent helicopter accidents for which the cause is known. Talk them out. Explain what went wrong and what could have prevented the accident. Don’t point fingers; present facts.

Why don’t flight schools do this? Could it be because of what this forum pilot originally said: flight schools don’t want to scare off students by discussing dangers? If so, they’re doing their students — and the rest of the aviation community — a serious disservice.

Education and Experience are the Answers

Nowadays, if you want a job as a pilot carrying passengers for hire, you’ll need at least 1,000 hours of experience as a pilot in command. (Yes, I know some companies will take less, but those are few and far between.) There’s a reason for this: they want pilots who have experience flying. Experience leads to skills, knowledge, and confidence.

Some people think 1,000 hours is an arbitrary number and frankly, I have to agree. My first 500 hours were very different from the average CFI’s first 500 hours — in some respects, my experiences are “better,” while in other respects, a CFI’s experiences are “better.” But I also can’t see any other easy way to gauge a job applicant’s level of experience.

But it isn’t just experience that makes a pilot a good pilot. It’s also knowledge and attitude. Both of these things could be the end product of a flight school’s training program.

Many flight schools seem satisfied getting students and putting them through a “program” with just enough skills and knowledge to pass a check ride. Many students, who don’t know any better, are more interested in the cheapest way to get their ratings than the quality of the training.

I believe that with better quality training and better quality experience, less hours of experience should be necessary to have and prove good piloting skills. I also believe that pilots with better quality training and experience will have a better, safer attitude toward their responsibilities as a pilot.

It’s not a matter of teaching new pilots to be fearful of what could happen by stressing the dangers of flying. It’s a matter of educating about dangers — and how to avoid them.

What do you think?

About the Cherry Drying Posts

And why they’re were password protected.

Drying CherriesA few weeks ago, it came to my attention that this blog was the primary source of information about cherry drying by helicopter. Every day, pilots who wanted to learn more about cherry drying were stopping in to read up.

Normally, I’d be pleased. But I also began to realize that these same pilots were using the information I provided to compete with me for cherry drying work.

That would simply not do.

The truth of the matter is, there simply isn’t enough work to go around. Every year, I struggle to get my contracts together and signed and then struggle some more to get my standby pay. Other pilots I know who have been doing this work far longer than I have go through the same process. None of us can afford to have competition for what little work is out there.

In my case, it’s particularly tough. I travel from Arizona to Washington and back at considerable cost. This year, I made the trip with only one contract signed. If I hadn’t been able to secure other work, I would have taken a heavy loss.

In this tough economy, I depend on this work to keep my business afloat. Without it, I’d likely have to sell the helicopter. Right now, there simply isn’t enough tour and charter work out there to cover the cost of my fixed expenses, such as insurance, annual maintenance, and hangaring.

So I’ve password-protected the posts, making them inaccessible to most visitors. I’ll likely remove the password once my friends and I stop doing this work.

August 2013 Update: Since writing this blog post, I’ve moved to Washington state. I’m very secure in my cherry drying work with great clients that I serve faithfully year after year. Indeed, I’ve built the kind of relationships with my clients that I’m proud of. I have so much work during the busiest part of the season that I’m actively looking for other helicopter pilots with their own helicopters to work with me. If you’re an owner/operator with an R44 helicopter, at least 500 hours helicopter experience, and a month or so free every summer and you want to get started in this work, visit the Help Wanted page on Flying M Air’s website to learn more about opportunities.

The rest of this post still applies.

Some Important Things to Know about Cherry Drying

I do need to say a few things about cherry drying for the folks looking for information.

  • Cherry drying requires a helicopter. If you don’t have a helicopter, you cannot dry cherries. Any company that has helicopters for this kind of work already has pilots. Inexperienced pilots cannot expect to be hired for this kind of work by a company that already has helicopters and pilots.
  • Cherry drying is not a good way to build time. I got less than 20 hours of drying time this summer. I got around 5 hours each of the previous two years. Do you really want to blow a whole summer sitting around in farm country waiting for it to rain just to get 5 to 20 hours of flight time?
  • Cherry drying is not for low-time pilots. When you work, you’re hovering 5 feet over treetops, sometimes in very windy conditions. That means tailwinds and crosswinds and LTE. There’s a lot of dancing on the pedals. There’s a real need to know the helicopter you’re flying.
  • Cherry drying is dangerous. All operations are inside the deadman’s curve. If you have an engine problem, you will crash. Read these accident reports to get a better idea of what can happen: SEA05CA122, SEA04LA102, LAX02LA169, SEA00LA101, SEA00LA103, WPR09LA371, and WPR11CA146

I know a lot of helicopter pilots — especially low-time helicopter pilots — out there are desperate for work. If you’re one of them, I can assure you that cherry drying isn’t the solution you’re looking for.

Two Close Calls

One, another pilot’s; the other, mine.

I flew up to Chelan, WA to visit a friend on Wednesday. The weather here in central Washington State has been too good to force a cherry drying pilot to sit around and wait for rain. I’m sure my clients didn’t even miss me. (Heck, I could have been back in Quincy in 30 minutes if they needed me.)

I flew direct to Chelan, enjoying some low-flying over the wheat fields of the Waterville Plateau. I know where all the wires are up there and I wasn’t that low. But I do admit that I enjoy the rush of flying at 120 miles per hour 100-200 feet off the ground. The flat expanse of the Plateau is perfect for this kind of flying — you can cover the entire north-south distance without flying over a single home or business.

The descent down to Chelan is always a thrill. First I sometimes need to climb a bit to cross over the tops of four or six sets of high tension power lines that run east-west across the north end of the Plateau. Then I’m at the edge of the Plateau and the earth drops away to the Columbia River over a thousand feet below. My two-bladed rotor system makes it dangerous to do a nose-over dive like you might see in the movies. Instead, I have to content myself with lowering the collective almost to the floor and settling into a 1,000 to1,500 foot per minute descent rate. I always descend downriver from Chelan Airport, so I have to bank to the right and follow the river northeast. By the time I get to the airport, I’m only 100 feet above its field elevation, mostly because it sits on a shelf over the river.

I used to do this flight a lot more often when my finances were better and I could afford to fly on my own dime. Things are different now and I’ll likely make this trip only once or twice this whole season. This was my first time this year and I’ve been here nearly two months.

Three R44s Parked at ChelanMy friend met me at the airport. He’s a helicopter pilot too and he’s also in Washington to dry cherries. His helicopter is parked at an orchard. There were two other R44s parked in a field at the airport and I parked with them. But I didn’t bother shutting down. I invited my friend to join me for a flight further up the river to Brewster, where another friend of mine’s old Sikorsky S55T (and that T stands for “turbine”) is recovering from a mishap last season. We flew up the river, pointing out all the orchards we’d dried in the past along the way.

Close Call #1

Back at Chelan, I parked with the R44s again and shut down. The Airport Manager drove up with his dog in his pickup and chatted with us as I locked up. We could hear the sound of a helicopter running on the other side of an old hangar. The airport manager told us about the pilot, a man who had likely been flying helicopters since before I was born. As we chatted, we could hear the engine winding up as the pilot got the helicopter to full RPM. My friend started walking toward the hangar to get a better look at the pilot’s departure; he was out of sight from where we stood.

A sickly bang! sound rung out. It was not the kind of sound I’d ever want to hear anywhere near where my helicopter was spinning. An older helicopter came into view around the front of the hangar, flying erratically. The pilot got it under control easily and continued hover-taxiing to the fuel pumps about 100 feet away. As he set it down, my friend picked up a piece of something and started walking back to us with it.

It was a splintered piece of wood.

Meanwhile, three men in a hangar nearby came out onto the ramp. Together, we watched as the pilot shut down the engine. The blades slowed. They didn’t even come to a full stop before I saw the damage.

The outboard 6 to 8 inches of each of the two main rotor blades had been severed. My friend was holding a piece of one of them; the other one was on the ramp. The blades had struck a steel I-beam that extended out beyond the hangar walls. He’d probably hovered past that spot a thousand times in the past. This time, he cut it a bit too close.

I call this a close call because of what could have happened. The blades could have disintegrated as the pilot hovered. He could have lost control of the helicopter. We could have been dragging his injured or dead body out of the wreckage. Worse yet, the wreckage would likely have flown all over as the helicopter beat itself to death on the ground. My friend could have been struck with flying debris. Heck, I could have been struck, too. And I wasn’t even that close.

Needless to say, the pilot was very angry with himself. We all felt bad for him, but there was nothing else to do but wheel the helicopter back into its hangar until repairs could be made.

Close Call #2

I had a nice day in Chelan with my friend. We had lunch at a downtown cafe where we could sit outside in the shade. Then we went to Blueberry Hills and had some pie. (I had to skip dinner to keep my calorie count down for the day, but it was worth it. I love rhubarb pie.) Finally, at about 6, my friend drove me back up to the airport. We said our goodbyes, I climbed aboard Zero-Mike-Lima, and started up.

A small private jet made a magnificent departure from the short runway just before I was ready to take off. He climbed out as if a rocket were strapped to his back.

Conscious of the wires around three sides of my landing zone, I took off on the fourth side, heading right over the river. I didn’t climb much; once I was over the cliff, I was already at least 500 feet over the river. I flew downriver at that altitude for a while. I wanted to follow the river all the way back, but there was a fire burning near Wenatchee and I’d forgotten to call the FSS to see if there was a TFR. So I figured I’d just go down the river a bit before I climbed back up to the Plateau and made my way back that way.

Powered Paraglider

You can find this photo of a powered paraglider on Wikipedia.

I saw the other paragliders first. There were at least five of them, flying in lazy circles about 200 feet above my altitude, to my left. They were close enough to see their colorful canopies, but not close enough to see whether they were powered. But I didn’t look long. Movement much closer caught my eye and I spotted one at my altitude less than 1/4 mile away.

I swerved to the right, away from him. I then kept scanning the airspace all around me, looking for others. Thankfully, I came up empty.

My onboard video camera caught the action. This is a clip from the flight. The paraglider is in the picture right from the beginning. Look slightly right of center near the top of the frame. His canopy is yellow. I spotted his friends at about the 0:09 mark and banked a bit to the right; I spotted him at 0:15 and made a more aggressive turn.

The quickness of this encounter (or near encounter) is quite evident in the video clip. The video is only 20 seconds long. When you’re moving along at 120-130 miles per hour, things happen fast. It turned out, he was going the same way I was — and I’m pretty sure he was powered — so he probably didn’t even hear me coming up behind him. At his near-stationary speed (when compared to mine), I was upon him only seconds after he came into view.

I am not accustomed to seeing any aircraft other than helicopters at my altitude, so to say that this shook me up a bit is an understatement. Just because you don’t expect to see something doesn’t mean it isn’t possible.

No More Mishaps

The rest of the flight was uneventful.

I climbed up to the Plateau, crossed over the big wires, and settled down for another relatively low flight across the wheat fields. I took a detour later on, following a canyon down into Lower Moses Coulee, over the town of Palisades and out over the Columbia River south of Wenatchee and its fire. I flew low-level along the eastern shore of the river to Crescent Bar, then climbed up to the Babcock Bench to scout out a geocache location up there. From there, I flew out to Quincy Lakes, overflew the Ancient Lakes and their waterfalls, scouted another geocache location, and headed back to the ag strip where I’m based until July 20.

I’d flown a total of about two hours. It was my first time out flying in two weeks. (I sure wish it would rain again soon — if only to wash the dust off the helicopter.)

It was good to get out — and good to get shaken up a bit. I’d seen two instances of complacency rearing its ugly head. Fortunately, no injuries; just lessons learned.

How to Set Up and Share a SPOT Messenger Page

It’s included in the Track Progress service, so why not?

SPOT Personal TrackerI’ve been using a SPOT Personal Tracker for the past two years. It was recommended to me by a helicopter pilot friend. We both fly in remote areas — the kinds of places that if you go down, rescuers are probably not going to find you before it’s too late.

Think I’m kidding? Check out this Cessna, which was not located for 31 months. I was just one of dozens of local area pilots who looked for this plane whenever I was in the area where it disappeared.

And what pilot can forget the disappearance of Steve Fawcett? Millions of dollars and lots of high-tech search techniques were used to try to find his plane. Over a year passed before a hiker found Fawcett’s ID and the wreckage was eventually found.

I didn’t want to end up like either one of these unfortunate flights. Even if I suffered a fatal crash, I wanted to be found as soon as possible. And if I simply went down and needed help, I wanted help to be able to find me without relying on cell phone signals.

The SPOT Service

So I bought a SPOT Personal Tracker and subscribed to two services:

  • Basic Service enables the SOS (AKA 911), Help, and Check-in/OK features of the unit. That requires a button push to send the message. This service costs $100/year and is required to use the device.
  • Track Progress drops “breadcrumbs” of your location every 10 minutes so others can track you. The track progress feature automatically plots your location signals on a map that’s accessible online. You can create a shared page, give the URL to whoever you want, and let them track you. The benefit of this — as far as I’m concerned as a pilot — is that if I go down suddenly and am incapacitated, people tracking me will not only know where I was within the previous 10 minutes of my mishap, but they’ll likely know which way I was going. Plus, if the unit is intact, it will continue to broadcast my location every 10 minutes. This non-moving signal should help them pinpoint my location — even if I’m dead. This extra service costs $50/year. While I have another pilot friend with a SPOT who doesn’t use it, I think every pilot who uses this device should cough up the extra dough for this service. You can’t always press a button when you need help.

I need to stress here that this is not a device designed for aviation. It’s really designed for “adventure activities” or travel — for hikers and campers and mountain climbers and kayakers. For folks who get out in the wilderness. Of course, pilots who fly in remote areas can benefit from the device and there are plenty of stories of how it may have saved aviator lives. Just keep in mind that it is not an approved FAA tracking device and that flight plans should always be filed and opened for remote area flights. And, if you’re an airplane pilot who flies at altitudes where FSS Flight Following is possible, why not use that service? Unfortunately, Flight Following is not usually available at the altitudes at which I fly my helicopter.

Creating a Shared Page

Of course, having a SPOT Personal Tracker with the Track Progress feature means a Share Page (example shown below) is included with your subscription fee. It makes sense to set up this page and share it’s URL with the folks who need to know where you are. You can also share it with the world at large if you’re like me and don’t care who knows where you are when you’re on the go.

Shared Page
Some recent activity; I did 20-minute helicopter rides the other day.

Setting up a SPOT shared page is easy. Assuming you’ve already set up your account on the SPOT Web site and have activated your device, just follow these steps:

  1. Sign into you account at FindMeSpot.com.
  2. Share TabClick the Share tab near the top of the page.
  3. Under SPOT Shared Pages, click the Create Shared Page link.
  4. Create Page SettingsSet the options in the Create Shared Page window that appears. Be sure to enter a Shared Page Name and select your SPOT device. Under Security, you can specify whether the page is Public or requires a Password to access. Personally, I recommend keeping it Public. You can always limit who you give the URL to. It would be terrible if someone needed to access the information and couldn’t remember the password.
  5. Select one of the options at the bottom of the page to determine how you’ll notify the people you want to share the page with about the page’s URL:
    • If you select Send the shared page myself option (recommended), a message appears, telling you that anyone with the link can view your shared page. Click Create Now to complete the process.
    • If you select Have SPOT send the shared page, a form appears for you to enter up to 50 e-mail addresses and create a custom e-mail message. Be sure to keep the Send a copy to you check box turned on so you get the URL, too. Click Send Now to complete the process.
  6. URL CreatedAt the bottom of the page, a very long URL should appear. Triple-click it to select it and chose Edit > Copy (or press Command-C (Mac) or Control-C (Win)) to copy it to the clipboard. We’ll use it in a moment to test the link and create a short URL.

Shared PagesIf, for some reason, you didn’t get the URL or you need to access it again in the future, click the Shared tab (shown above) and then click the Manage Shared Pages link under SPOT Shared pages. You can click the name of the shared page to display it. You can then copy the link for that page from the Web browser’s address bar.

Creating a Short URL

http://share.findmespot.com/shared/faces/viewspots.jsp?glId=0aISLWHRq9KlETLqzcfFGQuD8VboS6R8O is not exactly the kind of URL that’s easy to share with friends. Fortunately, URL shortening services enable you to create a custom URL for any page. Although this step isn’t required, it’s certainly recommended.

Although I originally created my short URL with the TinyURL service, you can use any service you like. Bit.ly makes even shorter URLs, but it requires an account to create a customized one. So in this example, I’ll use TinyURL again.

  1. Point your browser to TinyURL.com.
  2. TinyURLPaste the URL for your shared page in the top text box.
  3. Enter a short word or phrase that’s easy to remember in the bottom text box. In this example, I’ve entered the N-number for my helicopter. My original URL used FindMaria.
  4. New TinyURLClick Make TinyURL!
    A message like the one shown here appears, confirming that the new URL was created. You can now give this much shorter URL to family and friends.

Share Your SPOT Page!

Are you already using a SPOT device? If you’ve got a page set up, share it here. Use the Comments link or form for this post. No need to enter any HTML tags; just enter the complete URL. Once your comment has been approved, your shared page will appear. I’d also love to hear comments about the device — good or bad.

Reacting to Low Rotor RPM

Yeah, I know RPM = life, but think about it, guys!

I did my monthly perusal of the NTSB helicopter accident reports this morning and this one jumped out at me. It’s another instance of a pilot reacting badly to a low rotor RPM situation. (You can read my favorite example of a poor response to low rotor RPM here.)

The report is short and, for some reason, cut off before the end. (NTSB seems to be having trouble with its database lately.) Here’s the story:

The commercial helicopter pilot reported that he was on a Title 14, CFR Part 91 business flight transporting one passenger and seven dogs to a remote camp. He said as he approached the camp, which was at 3,800 feet msl on a snow-covered glacier, flat light conditions made it difficult to discern topographical features on the glacier, so he elected to land at an alternate landing site at 3,200 feet msl to wait for conditions to improve. During the approach to the alternate site, just before touchdown, the pilot said the low rotor annunciator horn sounded, and he lowered the collective to regain rotor rpm. The pilot said he was unable to initiate a go-around, so he brought the helicopter to a hover, but due to the prevailing flat light he was unable to discern his height above the site, and he unintentionally allowed the helicopter’s left skid to touchdown on the uneven, snow-covered terrain. He said that there was an “instantaneous dynamic rollover” as the helicopter rolled to the left, the main rotor blades struck the snow, and the helicopter came to rest inverted. The helicopter sustained substantial damage to the fuselage, tail boom and main rotor drive system.

Glacier Crash with Dogs

Coast Guard photo of crash site. We’re taught to keep the shiny side up. Note dogs.

The two human occupants were not injured. They don’t say anything about the dogs, but since they were likely crammed into the back seat area, they probably cushioned each other and are okay, too. (Seriously, who puts seven dogs in the back seat area of a 4-seat helicopter?)

About Low Rotor RPM

Helicopter pilots have a saying: RPM = life. It means that if your blades are spinning fast enough, you should be able to fly. But if you lose RPM, there’s a chance that you might drop out of the sky (yes, like a brick) and have a very ugly encounter with the ground. Why? Because the spinning of the rotor blades is what gives a helicopter lift. If they stop spinning, they’re not generating lift. If they’re not spinning fast enough, they’re not generating enough lift to keep the helicopter airborne.

Helicopters have low rotor RPM warning systems. In an R44, it consists of a light on the instrument panel and a “horn.” The sound of the horn is very annoying and impossible to miss. (See for yourself here.) Because RPM is so important, the full system — light and horn — are required for flight.

On a Robinson helicopter, the low rotor RPM warning system kicks in at 97% RPM. Since the helicopter is operating at 102% RPM, that’s just 5 units below normal operation. But as they teach in the Robinson Safety Course, the helicopter should be able to fly with RPM of 80% + 1% per 1,000 feet of density altitude. Using this accident altitude as an example and assuming that it wasn’t above the standard day temperature of 15°C at the “snow-covered glacier” landing zone, the helicopter should have been capable of flight with rotor RPM as low as 84% or 85% (see density altitude chart). I use the word should (and italicize it for emphasis) because this is a rule of thumb. I do not recommend flying a helicopter below normal operating RPM. This rule of thumb just helps pilots understand how critical a low rotor RPM situation might be.

What causes low rotor RPM? Engine malfunction is one cause. A bad magneto or stuck value could rob the engine of horsepower, thus preventing it from keeping the rotor RPM where it needs to be. Performance needs beyond what the engine can produce is another. For example, it takes more power to hover than to fly; attempting to hover with a heavy load at high density altitude could result in a loss of rotor RPM. That may have been the situation here; the pilot was in an R44 Raven I (or possibly an Astro) at more than 3,000 feet density altitude at or near max gross weight*.

Emergency!

During flight training, helicopter pilots are trained to react to low-rotor RPM situations. In fact, Robinson helicopter pilots get extra training every two years (per SFAR 73) because of the unusually high number of low RPM accidents in early Robinson helicopters. Although modern-day Robinsons have correlators and governors to help the pilot maintain proper RPM, this special training and endorsement is still required.

Low rotor RPM is treated as an “emergency.” That means it has an emergency procedure associated with it. Helicopter pilots are drilled on the procedure until it becomes second nature.

Page 3-10 (in the “Emergency Procedures” section of the R44 Raven II Pilot’s Operating Handbook) states:

A horn and an illuminated caution light indicate that rotor RPM may be below safe limits. To restore RPM, immediately roll throttle on, lower collective and, in forward flight, apply aft cyclic.

As a result, when we hear that low rotor RPM warning horn — which is directly related to the deterioration of life-giving RPM — we react quickly to recover lost RPM. That means increasing throttle (to add engine power) and lowering the collective (to reduce drag caused by the rotor blades). Pulling back on the cyclic, when moving forward, can also help recover lost RPM by transferring energy in the forward speed to rotor RPM (which is why RPM increases during a cyclic flare in an autorotation).

Lots of folks argue about which is more important and whether you need to do all three. I think rolling on the throttle is most important but will acknowledge that it doesn’t always resolve the problem. Lowering the collective usually helps.

Hold that Collective

While that is all well and good, I’d like to make this radical suggestion: is lowering the collective to recover RPM a good idea when you’re within 10 feet of the ground?

In this accident, the pilot heard the low rotor RPM horn “just before touchdown.” I’ll be generous and take that to mean anywhere within 10 feet of the ground. So he’s coming in for a landing. He’s already got his descent going and he’s either increasing power to bring it into a hover or he’s past that point and is reducing power gently to touch down. Either way, lowering the collective will cause him to descend faster than he already is. (It doesn’t say anything about rolling on the throttle; did he?) He’s less than 10 feet from the ground. The report goes on to state that he was able to bring it into a hover but was apparently lower than he thought (perhaps because of his collective work?) and touched a skid to the snow, causing dynamic rollover.

Low Rotor RPM Might Not Always be an Emergency

I’d like to argue that low rotor RPM is not an emergency situation when you’re very close to the ground.

After all, what’s the worst that can happen? At less than 10 feet, you don’t need the RPM to keep you alive. Even if the RPM dropped to 0 when you were only a few feet off the ground, you’re not going to die. You’ll drop like a brick — a few feet. Spread the skids a little. I don’t even think the belly would touch the ground. If it did, the seats would collapse as designed and (literally) save your ass. We’re talking less than 10 feet here.

Instead of dealing with low rotor RPM when you’re less than 10 feet from the ground, doesn’t it make sense to ignore the horn and just land?

Remember, in an R22 or R44, the horn sounds at 97% RPM. In this example, he could still remain in flight with the RPM all the way down to 85%.

Let’s review. The pilot is at a critical moment of flight: landing, just before touchdown. The low rotor horn goes off, zapping his concentration. Instead of completing the maneuver he was almost done with, a maneuver that would put him safely on the ground, he switches gears to handle the sudden “emergency.” That reaction just puts him closer to the ground with him focused more on the RPM situation than the ground he could very well make contact with. As a result, he botches the landing, possibly distracted by a non-emergency “emergency.”

A side note here: I have witnessed a low-time pilot literally freezing up when the low rotor RPM horn sounded on landing. I was sitting beside him, horn blaring, in a hover 3 feet off the ground at a very high density altitude airport — 10,000 feet. His brain simply shut off. I repeated the words, “Just set it down,” three times before he snapped out of it. There was no danger, but the damn horn sent him into some kind of mental seizure. If that happens in cruise flight, he’s definitely dead.

The horn is scary. We’re trained to react to it. But is low rotor RPM recovery always the answer? I’ll argue that any time you’re very close to the ground, you need to think about the consequences of all of your actions before making them. Don’t react to an emergency that doesn’t exist.


* Doing the math… I don’t have the details of the accident flight’s weight. But if you figure two grown men weighing at least 180 pounds each and seven 50-pound sled dogs in the back, you have 710 pounds for just the cabin occupants. A Raven I with minimal equipment weighs at least 1440 pounds. So that brings a total of 2150 pounds. Add half tanks of fuel for another 150 pounds; that’s a total of 2300 pounds. The max gross weight of a Raven I is only 2400 pounds. So with my guesstimates, he was pretty close to max gross weight.

Now because I know the mentality of the helicopter forum participants who often lurk here (and then share their opinions about me in the forums they troll), I feel compelled to defend my calculations here instead of in the comments thread. (I don’t waste my time in the forums anymore.)

The dogs were “sled dogs,” which you’d expect since that’s the kind of dog most useful at “remote camps” in Alaska. They were later rescued by the Coast Guard, which airlifted them off Godwin Glacier after the crash. I’m estimating 50 pounds each, but they could easily be larger. Here’s a photo of them. (Frankly, I’m having trouble imagining seven 50-pound dogs crammed into the back seat area of a helicopter like mine. I’m also cringing at the thought of vacuuming all the shedded fur out.)

And yes, both the pilot and the passenger could have been Weight Watchers graduates weighing in at 140 pounds or less each. And they could have been wearing shorts and sandals. Or nothing at all. And there might have been only 10 gallons of fuel on board.

But my guesstimates are based on what I’ve experienced in reality. People are fat and like to bring unclaimed baggage, pilots like to take as much fuel as they can for missions in remote areas. It’s far more likely that the passenger was even bigger and had gear with him and the pilot had his tanks much closer to full than empty. But until the FAA releases more info — which is not likely, since there was no fatality in this accident — guesstimates are the best we can do.