Tag Archives: helicopters

Desert Run by Helicopter: 100 feet @ 100 knots

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Another video for your consideration and comment.

Every once in a while, I find myself alone in my helicopter with a long stretch of empty desert between where I am and where I need to go. It’s these times that I get down and dirty (so to speak) and hone my high-speed, low-level flight skills.

You might ask why I need to do this. Well, occasionally I get called for video jobs that require me to chase race trucks on off-road tracks out in the desert. I did the Parker 425 three years in a row, and I’m hoping to do it again in February. Practicing with no one else on board is a good way to keep my skills where they should be when I need them — without putting someone else at risk with this relatively dangerous kind of flying.

The most recent time I had this opportunity was about two weeks ago, when I had to fly from Aguila to Phoenix, AZ. There’s a lot of empty desert along the way. To make the situation even better, I was flying late in the afternoon, with the sun mostly behind me. You can bet I didn’t hesitate to hook up my helicopter’s GoPro “nose cam” to capture every moment of this 40-minute flight.

Here’s nearly two minutes of it, set to music, for your enjoyment. If you live in Wickenburg, you’ll probably enjoy seeing my view of Vulture Peak.

Three Tips for Becoming a Better, Safer Pilot

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My take on some advice offered by the FAASTeam.

The Deer Valley Pilot’s Association (DVPA) held its annual membership drive at Deer Valley Airport (DVT) in Phoenix yesterday. I’d joined the group earlier this month, when I discovered that membership entitled me to a $1.10/gallon discount on 100LL fuel at my preferred FBO there, Atlantic Aviation. One top-off was enough savings to pay the cost of a year’s membership.

DVPA EventI was so appreciative that when I heard about the event and the fact that a few aircraft would be on static display, I offered to put my helicopter on display. So yesterday morning, at 8:15 AM, I parked on the ramp in front of the terminal building to give attendees just one more aircraft to look at. I even hung out for a while and let kids climb into my seat.

FAA LogoThere were other organizations on hand, with tables set up under a big shade. The FAA’s Safety Team, which sponsors the WINGS pilot proficiency program, was one of them. They had a table full of informational flyers. Because of my general interest in helicopter accidents — which, by the way, I’m starting to think isn’t exactly healthy — I picked up a flyer titled “Helicopter Training Accidents.” Later, back home, I gave it a quick read.

The pamphlet focused on two areas of training accidents: autorotation and dynamic rollover. It provided a lot of bullet points under headings like “Autorotation — Common Errors” and “Dynamic Rollover Precautions.” It was pretty basic stuff, but good to read just to refresh my memory. I wish I could link to it here for reference, but I simply can’t find it online. I’ve scanned it; you can download it here. And believe me, there’s lots of online reference material available at their Web site.

But the most useful content — especially for new pilots or pilots falling into the complacency trap that can catch you at any experience level — were the bullet points under “Cockpit Resource Management and Personal Readiness.” Three of these points jumped out at me as great topics for discussion in a blog post. Here they are.

Oh, and although I’m a helicopter pilot and use helicopter examples here, most of this applies to airplanes, too.

Know your limits and observe them.

I think that this is one of the biggest causes of accidents — although I’d expand it to read “Know your limits and the limits of your aircraft and observe them.” Many of the accidents I’ve discussed in this blog can be categorized as what I call ‘stupid pilot tricks.” In so many cases, pilots overestimate their own skills or the capabilities of their aircraft either in general or under conditions they’re not accustomed to.

So how do you discover what your limits are? The best way is by experience. If you’ve successfully performed a maneuver consistently over time, that maneuver is probably within your limits — in the conditions in which you’re have successfully performed it. But whenever conditions differ, you need to proceed carefully to test your limits. For example, perhaps you’ve landed quite a few times off-airport on dirt and gravel in light wind conditions. But now you need to land on terrain littered with big rocks. Don’t assume that it’s just as easy as any other off-airport landing. Consider the risks and proceed carefully. Leave yourself an out. Don’t commit to setting down unless you know you can do it safely and then take off again later. The same goes for making an off-airport landing in a strong crosswind or tailwind situation. Or in dusty or snowy conditions. Have you done it successfully before? Multiple times? Consistently? Then it’s probably within your limits. But if the situation is brand new to you, you can’t possibly know for sure whether it’s within your limitations. Proceed with caution!

Advanced training can also help. If you find yourself with a need to perform maneuvers that you’re not sure about, find an experienced CFI and go flying with him. Let him train you, let him give you the additional support you might need to practice it safely. Isn’t it worth a few hundred dollars to get the experience you need to safely expand your personal limits?

As for the limits of your aircraft, that’s pretty easy. Open the Pilot Operating Handbook and look them up. If you fly the same kind of aircraft often, you should have most of the limitations memorized, including a rough estimate of out of ground effect hover capabilities at various weights and density altitudes. And if you find yourself in a situation where you’re not sure if an operation is even possible for your aircraft, reach for that book and look it up to make sure. It’s required to be on the aircraft, so there’s no excuse not to consult it. I’m not ashamed to admit that I’ve done this several times. I even keep a copy of the book in my office to make sure I can handle unusual client requests before booking a flight.

Develop and use good habits (e.g., checklists).

The FAA loves checklists and I’ve been told by a few pilots that they won’t let you pass a check ride unless you use available check lists during the flight. While I agree that checklists are extremely helpful — I actually created my own for preflight, startup, and shutdown when I flew LongRangers at the Grand Canyon back in 2004 — I also feel that if you perform the same series of tasks in the same order without distraction more than 50 or 100 times, a checklist becomes a bit redundant. So if you’re expecting me to wax-poetic about checklists, I’m sorry to disappoint you.

What I will expound on, however, is the idea of developing good habits for all phases of flight. Here are a few examples from my own flying:

  • Always perform a preflight inspection in the same order.
  • When adding oil during preflight, always leave the cowl door open until the oil cap/dipstick is replaced. Do not close that cowl door unless the cap/dipstick is confirmed present and tight.
  • Just before stepping into the aircraft, always do a complete walk-around starting and ending at the pilot door. Use that walk-around to check for open cowling doors and fuel cap tightness one more time.
  • Always perform all parts of the startup procedure, from sitting in the pilot’s seat and fastening my seatbelt to loosening frictions just before bringing RPM to 100%, in the same order.
  • Always check to make sure all doors are secured before lifting up. (I can reach all doors from my seat and all their windows have fingerprints where I push on them before each flight.)
  • Always do a visual scan of the area before lifting up and then again before departing the area.

These things, when done regularly, become routine. I actually feel as if something is wrong if I neglect to perform one of these tasks. I have even gone so far to climb back out of the aircraft before starting up to check fuel caps if I can’t recall doing so.

What’s a bad habit? How about storing papers, pens, or other items in the area beneath the collective? While some aircraft have ample storage space there, many do not. Don’t place anything there that could prevent you from getting the collective down in a hurry if you need to. How about leaving dual controls in when non-rated passengers are on board? Do you really want to worry about some idiot pushing the cyclic, resting his feet on the pedals, or having his fat butt blocking the collective when you’re trying to pull pitch? Pull those controls out if you don’t want the person beside you able to mess with them. Or how about glazing over or skipping your passenger preflight briefing? Do you know how you’d feel if your passenger were trapped in the aircraft after a mishap because you neglect to tell him how to open the door?

Think about the things you do when you fly. What good (or bad) habits have you developed? Get rid of the bad ones — they’re not going to help you become a better or safer pilot. Instead, think about the things you need to do or be aware of when you fly and incorporate them into your workflow or cockpit management.

Be constructively critical of each flight.

This is my favorite of the tips, the one that made me think this was a topic to blog about.

The trouble is, too many pilots are head cases who think they can do no wrong. No matter how well or poorly they fly or complete a mission, they’re too full of themselves and confident in their own capabilities to review what they’ve done and think of how it could have gone better.

The Pick Up/Set Down Challenge

I must have written about this elsewhere, but I can’t find it so here it is.

When I flew at the Grand Canyon in 2004, I averaged 10-14 flights a day. The flying itself was rather tedious, with only two extremely well-defined routes and no room for deviation. There wasn’t any opportunity to make it more interesting — other than the challenges Mother Nature threw in our way — so I decided to focus on the part of the flight where there’s always room for improvement: those 10-14 pickups and set downs.

From nearly day 1, I concentrated on that part of the flight, working hard to make every single pick up or set down as smooth as I could make it. Then, right after each one, I’d give it a score from 1 to 10, with 10 being the kind of pick up or set down where you didn’t even feel the aircraft make or lose contact with the ground. I didn’t have many 10s — I’m a tough scorer — but after a few weeks and months, I didn’t have many below 6 either.

To this day, I do the same thing with pick ups and set downs. The result: I’m pretty sure that few fellow pilots would find much fault in most of my pick ups or set downs. The passengers think they’re great no matter how low I’d score them — but what do passengers know?

Have you ever considered doing something like this for your flying? Challenging yourself for no other reason than to improve yours own skills? If not, why not?

The reality is that anyone can improve at least one aspect of any flight or mission. Just think about everything you did and focus on what wasn’t perfect. Then think about what you could have done to make it perfect — or at least closer to perfect.

Here are some examples:

  • During preflight, did you miss any inspections you should have done because you were distracted? If so, how could you prevent future distractions? (A friend of mine will restart a preflight inspection from the beginning if anyone interrupts him while he’s doing it.)
  • Did startup go smoothly? If not, what could you have done to make it better next time? (I’ve gotten to the point where I usually know how long to prime the engine before starting based on the ambient temperature.)
  • Was your departure smooth and within height-velocity diagram recommendations (if possible)? If not, what could have improved it?
  • Were your radio calls well-timed, concise, and correct? Is there anything you could have done to make them better?
  • Did you choose the best route to your destination? If not, what route might have been better and why?
  • Was your approach to landing suitable? If too steep/shallow, fast/slow, or with a tailwind, what could you have done to make it better or safer?

I can go on and on with examples, but you get the idea. Review each flight or mission and make mental notes about how it could have been better. Then, the next time you fly, act on those mental notes as appropriate. Not only will this make you a better, safer pilot, but it could help you develop some of those good habits I discussed earlier.

The point is, no matter how much experience you have and how great a pilot you think you are, you are not perfect and no flight is perfect. There’s always room for improvement. It takes a good pilot who is genuinely interested in becoming a better pilot to recognize this and work hard to get better. And better. And better.

Only You Can Make Yourself a Better, Safer Pilot

Not only is it within your control and capabilities to make yourself a better and safer pilot, but it’s your responsibility to do so. These three tips are a good place to get started.

What do you think?

Run-On Landing to Avoid Brown-Out?

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Was this really the best decision?

Although I don’t usually comment on accident reports until the Probable Cause is released, this one seems pretty cut-and-dried. It’s also a good discussion topic. And, best of all, no one was hurt — which also leads me to believe that there won’t be many more facts about it published.

Here’s what happened:

The pilot and the border patrol agent had been dispatched to provide aerial support for an on-going border patrol mission. When the pilot realized there would be a delay in time for when they needed to engage in the mission he decided to land in a grass field and sit idle (to conserve fuel) until their assistance was needed. He said he made a run-on landing to avoid creating a brown-out condition. However, as the helicopter touched down and moved forward (approximately 34 feet) it nosed over and the main rotor blades struck the ground. The helicopter subsequently nosed over and traveled another 34 feet before it came to rest on its right side.

I question the decision to do a run-on landing on dirt/grass. (I suspect the pilot is also rethinking that decision right now.) Would it really reduce the amount of dust blown around enough to justify the added risk of forward motion in contact with the ground on a rough surface?

Brown-Out Landing
Military photo by Staff Sgt. Christopher Boitz of a HH-60G Pave Hawk doing a brown-out landing. (A run-on landing would probably be a piece of cake with wheels.)

I’ve landed [too] many times in dusty landing zones. The dust starts to rise about when I get into ground effect. The longer I’m above the ground pulling pitch, the more dust flies — unless it’s just surface dust and not really deep. The key, it seems, is to get the collective full-down as quickly as possible. When you stop pulling pitch, the dust settles.

When I was trained to do run-on landings, I was taught to make a shallow approach at a speed right around ETL and then slowly lower the collective once contact with the ground was made. So not only is pitch pulled during that shallow approach — when you’re close enough to get the dust flying — but it’s not full down for at least a few seconds after making contact. I can’t see how that would reduce the amount of dust on landing. I’ll be the first to admit that I haven’t tested this theory — we always practiced run-on landings on pavement — perhaps a reader can offer some insight from experience?

I’m thinking that a better way to handle this particular landing would be to make a straight in approach to the ground, thus minimizing the amount of time you’re pulling pitch while in ground effect. It would be important to assure that the touchdown spot was appropriate before committing. Then fly it right to the ground and dump the collective as soon as you’re on the ground. This is the way I try to handle my dusty LZ landings, usually to avoid kicking up dust around spectators or taking even more paint off my rotor blades. (Dust is nasty shit; I’ve already had my main rotor blades painted twice in 1,350 hours.) I admit I’ve never landed on dust so thick that true brown-out was possible — although I’ve come pretty close a few times.

What do you think? How would you handle landing at a LZ where brown-out was possible?

Airlines are Still the Best Deal for Point-to-Point Travel

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Seriously; their planes might be bigger and costlier to operate, but there are more people footing the bill.

It happened again this weekend. I got a call from a guy here in Phoenix looking for a charter flight. He started by saying that his dad had died in Salt Lake City and that he couldn’t afford the $600 airfare to get up there.

I replied with two very truthful things:

  • I was sorry that his dad had passed away.
  • The airlines were the best deal for a flight from Phoenix to Salt Lake City.

I gave him some numbers to back up that second fact. I get about $500/hour for charter flights. Salt Lake City is at least a 4 hour flight from Phoenix. I had to be paid for the trip up there and the trip back. So he was looking at at least $4,000 plus any overnight fees to keep me there until he was ready to come back.

Sure beats $600, no?

And I don’t have a beverage service or rest rooms.

He then proceeded to ask me if I knew anything about a charter operator who flew out of Scottsdale to Salt Lake City. I didn’t.

He then told me he figured he could find someone with a small plane, “like a Cessna,” who’d take him up there for $150. I told him that was very unlikely.

It was difficult to extract myself from the conversation without being rude, but I managed.

I get calls like this pretty often. I’ve had calls for flights to Albequerque, Las Vegas, San Francisco, Los Angeles, San Diego, Houston, and even Montreal (which I still can’t believe; do you know how long that flight would take?). People assume that because my aircraft is smaller than an airliner, it would be cheaper to fly with me than with Southwest or United. This is not the case.

The simple truth of the matter is that airlines are the cheapest way to fly point-to-point if you need to go from one airline-serviced city to another. There are several reasons for this, the main reason being that the cost of the flight is covered by the 100+ people on the plane.

Yes, the cost of flying my helicopter between PHX and SLC is lower than the cost of flying a Boeing 737 between PHX and SLC. But I can carry 3 passengers; the B-737 can carry more than 150. So even if it costs me $3,000 and it costs the airline $30,000, $3,000 ÷ 3= $1,000 per person and $30,000÷150 = $200 per person. Doing the math, you can clearly see that the cost per passenger is considerably lower for the larger aircraft.

And that’s not even counting the money the airline is collecting for hauling mail and cargo on the same flight.

So folks, the next time you need a cost-effective way to travel 200 miles or more between two cities serviced by the airlines, just bite the bullet and buy the plane ticket. You won’t be saving any money with me.

Or if you’re that cost conscious and have a car that gets good mileage, just drive.

First Dive, Last Dive

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I watch two skydivers plunge to their death.

It happened on Sunday, during our flight from Wenatchee, WA, to Phoenix, AZ. It was Day 2 and we were right at the end of our leg from Elko, NV, where we’d spent the night, to Mesquite, NV.

Zack was at the controls. Since Mesquite doesn’t have an AWOS or ASOS, he’d planned to overfly the field and check the windsock before coming in for a landing. I didn’t think there was enough wind to worry about it, but he was the pilot-in-command and I didn’t think there was any reason not to check the wind.

Until the jump plane made a radio call. He was at about 10,000 feet and climbing to release jumpers above the airport.

I called back and asked where the jumpers would land. After a second call, he replied that it was on the west side of the taxiway.

If there’s one thing I don’t like, it’s loitering with spinning blades anywhere near where there might be skydivers in the air. I suggested to Zack that we just land on the runway (which turned out to be Runway 19), which would keep us clear of the jumpers. With the runway now in sight, he made his radio call while I scanned the sky.

For the first time ever, I spotted the jump plane high above us. A moment later, three dots appeared. I told Zack I saw them. He looked but couldn’t see them — this didn’t surprise me because they were tiny specks more than two miles above us. They disappeared from view. I kept looking while Zack concentrated on the approach.

We saw two chutes a few moments later. A third appeared high above them.

The two lower jumpers seemed to be heading right for the runway in front of us. One of them was spiraling around and around. I’d seen jumpers do that before so it didn’t alarm me — at first. But when he didn’t stop spiraling or change course a few hundred feet above the runway, I knew something was wrong. His companion peeled off toward the landing zone.

I wasn’t very surprised when the spiraling jumper hit the runway. And didn’t move.

I got right on the radio. “Mesquite Unicom, you have a jumper crashed on the runway.”

Through the corner of my eye, I saw his companion overshoot the landing zone. He appeared to land on the golf course just beyond the airport fence.

I looked up. The third jumper was floating down towards us.

I looked ahead. People were running out to the runway.

Flying at Mesquite, NV

Zack and I looked back toward the crash site as I circled around the south side of the airport. I had my GoPro “cockpit cam” snapping photos every 5 seconds and this is one of the images it captured.

I asked Zack for the controls and he released them to me. I swung hard to the left, away from the runway and taxiway and landing zone. I dipped the nose down, pulled pitch, and got us out of the way fast. (Later, Zack told me I’d probably scared the folks on the golf course on that side of the airport; I honestly didn’t even see them.) Then I circled around to the south and came in from that side of the airport.

The pilot of the jump plane got on the radio. He’d been descending from 13,000 feet and needed to land. “Is there a jumper on the runway?”

“Yes,” I replied. “Don’t land a plane on the runway.”

“I’ll land on the taxiway,” he assured us.

A moment later, we were on the ground in front of the fuel pumps.

I got out of the helicopter and let Zack shut down. There were a lot of people running around and I wanted to make sure no one ran into the tail rotor — not that there was much of a chance of that.

I couldn’t see much of the accident from my position and, frankly, didn’t really want to. All I knew was that no one on the ground was moving. That couldn’t be good.

Over by one of the hangars, there were too many kids. I hoped they hadn’t seen the impact. I hoped it wasn’t their mother or father or other close relative that had gone down.

When the engine shut down, I heard the sirens. Within minutes, there were three police cars and two ambulances there.

We fueled up. Someone who works at the airport helped us. We were all distracted, all wondering about the fate of the jumper.

The facts came to our side of the field slowly, brought by one or two people who had gone over to learn more. They were doing CPR. It had been a tandem jump. The first chute had failed and had been caught up in the emergency chute, causing that to fail as well. The instructor was dead. The woman with him was someone’s grandmother. It had been her first jump.

One of the ambulances left. The police were taking statements.

We were ready to go, but I realized that our unique view of what had happened might be of interest to the police. I asked the airport guy what he thought. He told me to hop into the golf cart and he’d run me over to ask.

It wasn’t until we were nearly there that I saw the body on the pavement. He was lying face up. A woman was kneeling beside him, stroking his face. From my position, he looked as if he were sleeping, wrapped in the colorful fabric of his parachutes.

I turned away. No one wants to come face to face with death on a beautiful Sunday afternoon.

I talked to one of the cops. He told me to wait. I called Zack and told him to come over. I warned him that the victim was still there.

More news while we waited. The older woman was likely dead; they’d brought her to the hospital just in case she could be revived. A man who had tried giving her CPR had gotten blood on his mouth. I knew what that meant: serious internal bleeding.

They were waiting for the coroner before they could remove the other body.

A man and woman came by, obviously in shock. The man was supposed to go on that jump but had let the grandmother go in his place.

Eventually, the police came and gave us forms to fill out. They radioed our IDs to base and it was startling to hear a stranger say my name back over the radio. I wrote a concise report — much shorter than this — and handed it over. Zack handed back his. We walked back to the helicopter and started it up.

We talked a bit about it on the way south. I think Zack was more shook up than I was. But then again, it isn’t as if something like this is completely new to me. I think I’ve seen more than my share of violent death.

Postscript: I’ve always wanted to go skydiving. I joke that I’m waiting for my knees to get very bad first. Then I’ll jump before I get them replaced.

Has this changed my mind about skydiving? No. And it hasn’t changed my mind about waiting, either.