Tag Archives: helicopters

Cross-Country Helicopter Flight from Malaga to McMinnville, Part 3

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Another cockpit POV video from the FlyingMAir YouTube channel.

Join me for the third part of my cross-country flight from my summer base in Malaga, WA to McMinnville, OR. In this video, I cruise from near White Pass in the Cascade Mountains southwest past Mt. St. Helens toward the Columbia River, dodging low clouds that force me to wander off my desired course and even getting into a tiny bit of scud running. Along the way, you’ll see remote forest with lots of logging activity, mountain lakes and rivers, rocky cliffs, snow-covered ridges, and even Mt. St. Helens. Along the way, I tell you about other flights, flying at the Grand Canyon, and what’s going through my mind as I try to get through the weather in front of me. I also bitch about my radar altimeter. Eventually, weather conditions get so bad in the direction I want to fly that I make a precautionary landing at a tiny airport I almost couldn’t find. I had three cameras rigged up for this video and I switch from cockpit cam to nose cam with occasional inset views of me looking at the camera. Audio is from direct connection to the intercom so you can hear me narrate the flight and make radio calls, plus dialed down volume of the helicopter’s engine/rotor noise.

You can see all of the videos for this flight here:
Part 1: https://youtu.be/pgKDciGP4eA
Part 2: https://youtu.be/CmupuFDXa4Q
Part 3: https://youtu.be/vyveMEm_MhQ (this video)
Pups in a Helicopter: https://youtu.be/eEVq9sRlJK8
Part 4: https://youtu.be/3KXR_D3SliA
Part 5: https://youtu.be/eghRyzhPigg

I should mention here that “cross-country” in the world of aviation is any long flight. For airplanes, it’s 50 miles or more; for helicopters, it’s 25 miles or more. This is only part of a 178 nautical mile trip.

Pups in a Helicopter

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A FlyingMAir YouTube channel “extra” featuring 7-month-old Lily & Rosie.

Here’s a little extra video featuring my two seven-month-old puppies, Rosie and Lily. They flew with me on a long cross country flight from Malaga, WA to McMinnville, OR and we made a precautionary landing due to weather at this minuscule airport in Woodland, WA. I shut down the helicopter and left them to take a pee; they realize they’re alone and start getting worried about it before they settle down. Happy ending, of course. This was their second time in a helicopter.

You can see all of the videos for this flight here:
Part 1: https://youtu.be/pgKDciGP4eA
Part 2: https://youtu.be/CmupuFDXa4Q
Part 3: https://youtu.be/vyveMEm_MhQ
Pups in a Helicopter: https://youtu.be/eEVq9sRlJK8 (this video)
Part 4: https://youtu.be/3KXR_D3SliA
Part 5: https://youtu.be/eghRyzhPigg

Cross-Country Helicopter Flight from Malaga to McMinnville, Part 2

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Another cockpit POV video from the FlyingMAir YouTube channel.

Join me for the second 20 or so minutes of my cross-country flight from my summer base in Malaga, WA to McMinnville, OR. In this flight, I cruise from Ellensburg, WA over the Cascade Mountains near White Pass, dodging low clouds that force me to wander off my desired course. Along the way, you’ll see remote forest and grasslands, rocky cliffs, snow-covered ridges, and even Mount Rainier, off in the distance. I had three cameras rigged up for this video and I switch from cockpit cam to nose cam with occasional inset views of me looking at the camera. Audio is from direct connection to the intercom so you can hear me talk — no radio calls in this video — plus dialed down volume of the helicopter’s engine/rotor noise.

Important Note: This video is being released as a Premiere on Sunday, August 9, 2020 at 7:30 AM Pacific time. That means you can’t see it until after that time. If you tune in for the Premiere, you’ll be able to join a live chat with other viewers (and me) to comment on the video and ask/answer questions. It’s actually a lot of fun. If you view anytime after that, you’ll just see the video, although I believe the premiere chat comments might be visible on the Web.

You can see all of the videos for this flight here:
Part 1: https://youtu.be/pgKDciGP4eA
Part 2: https://youtu.be/CmupuFDXa4Q (this video)
Part 3: https://youtu.be/vyveMEm_MhQ
Pups in a Helicopter: https://youtu.be/eEVq9sRlJK8
Part 4: https://youtu.be/3KXR_D3SliA
Part 5: https://youtu.be/eghRyzhPigg

I should mention here that “cross-country” in the world of aviation is any long flight. For airplanes, it’s 50 miles or more; for helicopters, it’s 25 miles or more. This is only part of a 178 nautical mile trip.

Huey Helicopter Brownout Landing

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A very short, sweet-sounding video from the Flying M Air YouTube channel.

Join me at the “Huey Camp” landing zone while one of the three Hueys on cherry drying contract lands at its base after a short maintenance flight, stirring up a ton of dust. Love helicopter sound? Turn the audio way up for this one!

And no, he wasn’t nearly as close to that fuel truck as he looks in the video.

Hiller Helicopter Flight

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Another cockpit POV video from the Flying M Air YouTube channel.

Join me and my friend Captain Michael Tragarz for a flight in his Hiller Helicopter. We lift off from his home at a Phoenix area airpark, head north west, and then turn to the south for a flight around part of South Mountain. I narrate part of the flight but most of it is just the sound of this classic helicopter as it flies low level over the Arizona desert.