Tag Archives: tourism

Not All Helicopter Companies are the Same

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More telemarketers, another rant, and the facts of my business life.

This morning, my phone rang with a call from Nevada. When I answered as I usually do — “Flying M, Maria speaking” — I heard an audible click when the caller hung up.

I called back. When a man’s voice answered with an uncertain “Hello,” I assumed I’d reached someone looking for a helicopter charter who, for some reason, had decided not to complete his call. But I was wrong. When I told him that he’d just called me and hung up, he explained that he thought he’d reached voicemail and then told me he was “with Google street view” and was in the area. He wanted to tell me about some services they offered. Apparently, the services were “virtual tours” that companies like Maverick had added to their Google Places page. They created these videos.

I seriously doubted that he was with Google. I had been called dozens of times in the past by people and recordings claiming they were with Google and promising to perform some service — for a fee, of course — that would put me at the top of the Google search listings and get me more business. These seemed like just another one — one with poorly trained staff, to boot.

I mentioned this to him. He assured me that they had a contract with Google.

“Is there a fee for this service?” I asked.

“Yes,” he admitted.

“I’m not interested,” I told him. “Thanks.” And then I hung up.

I added his phone number to my Telemarketers contact record, which has a silent ringtone. If he called back from the same number, my phone wouldn’t even ring.

The Boss Calls Back

Less than five minutes later, my phone rang again, this time with a different Nevada phone number. I answered the same way. This time, the caller claimed to be the owner of the business that I’d just spoken to, following up on a customer service email. He was apparently upset that I didn’t believe his company was with Google.

What followed was ten minutes of my life wasted by a man who seemed to think it vitally important that I believe his company had a contract with Google to update street view photos and create these virtual tour videos.

Frankly, I don’t know why I talked to him for so long. I had no intention of using his services, so it wasn’t just wasting my time but it was also wasting his. Maybe I felt sorry for him. Maybe I just didn’t want to be rude.

But one thing was clear: he had incorrect preconceived notions about my business.

You see, although he consistently referred to my company as a “helicopter company,” he also kept rattling off the names of big helicopter tour companies based in the Las Vegas area: Maverick, Papillon, etc. He went on and on about the importance of having an up-to-date street view image that would show the front of my building and my branding so people could find me. When I told him that 90% of my revenue came from agricultural work and not tours, he said, “It doesn’t have to be that way.” As if I was somehow missing out by not being primarily a tour operator.

I wanted to educate him, I wanted to explain the reality of my business model and why his services didn’t interest me. But he didn’t seem to care about what my business is. He was trying to cram my business into the small box in this mind where he thought all “helicopter businesses” should be.

So, in the end, I just let him talk himself out. When he’d run out of things to say and I didn’t respond by telling him he was right and that I needed his services, the call just kind of ended. I think I might have said, “Okay, thanks,” or something equally noncommittal. I think he may have said goodbye before hanging up.

Whatever.

The Reality of My Business Model

Flying M Air has been in existence since 2000. It’s been flying commercially since 2001, when I got my commercial helicopter pilot certificate. Back then, most of my business was short tours and photo flights falling under Part 91. In 2005, when I got my R44 helicopter and Part 135 certificate, I expanded to do longer tours, air-taxi flights, day trips, and multi-day excursions. Yes, the vast majority of my business was tour-related.

And my flying business was operating at a perpetual loss, funded by the money I earned as a writer.

In 2008 — not a moment too soon, since my writing income was quickly drying up — I discovered survey work. And cherry drying work. And suddenly my business was operating at a profit.

I still did tours and day trips, but after a while, I stopped really pushing them. I stopped distributing brochures, I stopped visiting hotel concierges, I stopped advertising. Seemed to be a waste of money and effort, especially since I was responsible for doing all the management, marketing, and flying for my company while still trying to do some writing and have a life.

Cherry Drying Business Card
The design for my cherry drying business card comes from something one of my clients once said to me: “The best insurance is a helicopter parked in the orchard.”

In 2011, I wrote “My Epiphany about Clients and Jobs.” In that blog post, I think I finally began to understand that my business model had to concentrate on doing regular work with regular clients and to stop trying to chase down bargain-hunting tourists. Once I understood that, I settled into a routine that consisted of a busy summer season in Washington with springtime survey work and the occasional tour or air charter job that fell into my lap the rest of the year in Arizona. Now that I’m based in Washington, the survey work is out of the picture, but I’ve managed to slip some frost control work into that time slot. And I’ve got the wheels turning to maybe pick up some Washington State contract work for Fish and Game. And I still do rides and tours once in a while, although I don’t really push them anymore — not even on my website.

And that’s the way my business hums along.

Why That’s Enough

You see, I have no desire to build up a huge helicopter services business. I’m a relatively new member of the 50-something club these days and my main goal is to enjoy the rest of my life. That means working hard to earn a good living but, when I’m not working, playing hard and doing the things I want to do with my time: explore hobbies, socialize with friends, travel, etc. Why would I want the headaches of managing a big operation with multiple aircraft and employees and all the baggage that goes with them? Just to make a few extra bucks? Maybe?

There’s simply no reason to build a business beyond what I need. I don’t have kids to leave it to. And, unlike other people, I understand how to live within my means and don’t need to be a slave to possessions bought primarily to impress others. (Think Mercedes sedans, hangar queen airplanes, and poorly chosen real estate “investments.”) Best of all, I don’t have someone sponging off my hard work, forcing me to earn enough to cover the living expenses of two people.

I don’t want to spend all my free time marketing my business to a group of people who are more interested in Groupon-like deals than quality service. Why should I try to sell my services to them when I can earn a lot more per hour of my time working for people who already understand the value of my services?

I get plenty of business word of mouth and through my website. The Google street view features are completely useless to me. I don’t maintain a business office. Why put a logo on a building? Just so it shows up in a picture on Google? I don’t want to pay for that building or for the salary of a person I’d have to hire to sit in it. (And I certainly don’t want to sit in it — or anywhere else, for that matter — all day every day.) I don’t need to.

The same goes for advertising in newspapers, magazines, and other media. Why bother? I’ve tried it in the past and it didn’t work.

So when a company calls and tries to sell me something to promote my business, they’re not likely to get very far. And when they claim to know about my business and then lump me in the same bucket as giant tour operators in Las Vegas, they lose all credibility.

Whether they have “contracts with Google” or not.

Day Trip to New York City

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Cramming in as much of the Big Apple as I can swallow in one day.

At the end of October, I went to the New York Metro area on family visit. You can read about most of the trip here.

On Monday, October 28, my last day in the area, I went into the city, leaving Penny behind again. My sister-in-law dropped me off at the Rahway train station and I took a New Jersey Transit train into Penn Station. It brought back too many memories of my days as a commuter going into New York from Queens and later from New Jersey — especially when I joined the crush of people filing onto the escalators to street level.

Black and White
This public domain image of a black and white cookie by Ben Orwoll is from Wikipedia. The black side is really dark brown (chocolate).

I caught sight of a bakery on the main concourse and detoured into it. I picked up a real cheese danish to eat along the way and a real black and white cookie for later. (You can’t get a good black and white outside of the New York area and this one was like heaven. Have I mentioned how much I miss the food in New York?)

I got back into the crowd and funneled onto the escalator to street level. I stepped outside and paused for a moment to get my bearings. It had been a long time since I stepped through that door — maybe 25 years? I immediately saw the Hotel Pennsylvania (owner of the phone number in the Glenn Miller song, “Pennsylvania 6-5000“). Then the 7th Avenue and West 33rd Street signs. I was at Madison Square Garden.

Not wanting to look like a tourist, I started walking uptown at standard a New Yorker pace — i.e., fast. I had a mission — to sell my engagement and wedding rings — and I wanted to head uptown, possibly to the place the engagement ring had been purchased 29 years before. I figured I’d take Seventh Avenue up to 57th Street and then head east. I’d stop along the way and see the sights I hadn’t seen in a long, long time.

The city looked the same as the last time I’d been there. Well, not exactly the same, of course. But if asked to identify what was new, I probably couldn’t do better than guess. Some parts of New York are ageless.

Morning Walk
I walked just over three miles before hopping on the subway. It felt good.

My route took me past Macy’s and up through the garment district. I’d worked for a few months in the garment district back around 1983 when I audited the Taxi and Limousine Commission for my job with the New York City Comptroller’s Office Bureau of Financial Audit. Other than pedestrians walking to work at 8:30 in the morning, there wasn’t much activity on the streets. In a few hours, however, there would be men pushing racks of clothes up and down the avenue.

Don’t think the streets weren’t crowded — they were. If you’ve never been to New York, you can’t imagine the foot traffic on the sidewalks in midtown Manhattan. Thousands of people, all going somewhere. And tourists, wandering about, looking like tourists.

Tour sales guys prey on them, trying to sell all kinds of city tours and show tickets. I like to think that most of them are legit, but I’m sure there are more than a few con artists making the rounds. One approached the man next to me as we were waiting for a light. I didn’t hear his come on line, but I did hear the man’s indignant response: “I live in New York.” None of them approached me. In my jeans, walking shoes, and flannel jacket I looked like a native. After all, I was a native. (And glad I still looked like one.)

It felt good to walk the streets of New York again. Really good. Not good enough to make me want to move back there, though.

Times Square
Times Square, before the tourists arrive.

I reached Times Square and paused to look around. It was pretty empty; the tourists would arrive later. I snapped a photo to remember the place, then continued on Seventh. At one point, a man stopped me to ask if I’d be willing to answer some questions. I said no even before I saw his companion’s FoxNews microphone. Real New Yorkers don’t get interviewed in Times Square — and I knew I’d be wasting my time giving my opinion to Fox News anyway.

I continued north through the Theater District and turned right on 57th Street. I stopped at a jewelry store to take care of business, then continued on my way. When I reached Fifth Avenue and saw the Apple Store, I realized it would be a great opportunity to descend into the cube (for the first time) and see about getting my phone fixed by a “genius.” (The battery life had gotten very bad.) So I stopped in for a visit. While waiting to schedule an appointment, I helped the guy on line behind me fix his locked up iPhone by simply teaching him how to reset it. Because I couldn’t get an appointment that morning in that store, I made one for 10:30 at Grand Central. Then I climbed back to street level and continued on my way.

I got as far east as Third Avenue. This wasn’t far from where a college boyfriend’s parents had lived — 58th and First. I’d spent a lot of time there in my senior year (1981/1982). Although the place felt the same, I didn’t recognize any landmarks. I turned south. But not liking the neighborhood on Third, I headed west and took Madison south. I made one more stop at a jewelry store on Madison before making my way to Grand Central.

Grand Central Terminal
The main concourse at Grand Central Terminal. The Apple Store is under those big windows.

If you’ve never been to Grand Central Terminal (not Station), the next time you’re in New York, go see it. If your time in the city is limited, skip the touristy sights like Times Square (big deal) and (dare I say it?) the World Trade Center site — Grand Central is a magnificent piece of architecture celebrating its 100th birthday this year. Wander around on the main concourse and in the myriad of tunnels leading to surprising locations. Admire the famous clock. Visit the food court down below. And step into the Apple Store.

This is, by far, the best Apple Store I’ve ever been into. It sprawls along the east end of the upper level of the terminal, in full view of the main concourse. It’s an amazing mix of old architecture and new technology, two different worlds of design with 100 years separating them, melding together in a delight to the mind and senses. Really. It’s pretty cool.

At the Apple Store, I learned that my phone battery is almost bad enough to be replaced. Almost. I have 32 days for it to get worse and be replaced under warranty. (I guess I’ll be driving into Seattle later this month.)

Subway Journey

When I finished up with the Apple Genius, I headed down into the subway system. I bought a Metro Card, which I’d never had before. When I rode the subway, we used tokens. I think it was 75¢ then.

Today's Special
Neighborhood ethnicity is strong in New York. Maybe that’s why I’m not so critical of immigrants — I grew up in a true melting pot.

I took the train to visit some friends in Queens. I hadn’t seen them in a very, very long time, although we’d been in touch by phone and through Facebook. We swapped stories and memories. There was lots of laughing and crying. We walked to lunch at a Korean restaurant where we were the only non-Asians. The food was great. Even the walk was nice — fall colors on quiet streets.

And I got more of the closure I realized I was looking for. It felt good but sad at the same time. Is that what they mean by “bittersweet”? I think so.

All too soon it was time to head back into the city. My friend dropped me off at the subway station, I swiped my Metro Card, and I climbed on board a Manhattan-bound train.

Downtown

Downtown Walking Map
Here’s where I walked downtown. It’s nearly 2 miles.

I changed trains at Grand Central, switching to an old IRT express train heading downtown. A while later, I stepped out on street level in the covered portico at the Municipal Building, where I’d worked in my first job out of college.

The Municipal Building
Built in 1913, the Municipal Building is home to many New York City government offices. My old office window is the one near the top dead center in this photo; the window air conditioner is still there — I hope its a newer one!

The place had changed. The building lobby was empty, with just security guards and metal detectors. The newsstand near the entrance — where I’d bought a copy of the Daily News the day the Space Shuttle Discovery exploded on takeoff in 1986 — was gone. I was at an employee-only entrance and it only took a minute for security to notice me.

I told them I used to work there and that I was just taking a peek. And then I left. I did get a photo outside, though. So weird that so few people were around on a Monday afternoon.

I crossed the street toward City Hall. The entire park was fenced off, supposedly for City Hall renovations. A group of black and hispanic men were entertaining a small crowd with synchronized dancing and acrobatics while hip hop music blared. I watched for a while, then wandered on, remembering the “break dancers” I’d seen performing on pieces of cardboard on sidewalks nearly 30 years before.

I crossed Park Row and turned down Nassau Street. Years ago, I’d often come down that street on my lunch break for banking or shopping or lunch. I recognized very few of the storefronts. Only Wendy’s remained from those days.

Freedom Tower
New towers over old in this shot down a side street in the Financial District of New York.

At one point, I looked west down a side street and saw something that hadn’t been there at all in the 1980s: Freedom Tower. Still under construction, it filled the view, its glass and steel a stark contrast to the much older buildings on the street. When I’d worked in that neighborhood, one of the two Twin Towers — possibly both of them — would have been visible down this street. Even though I didn’t live in New York when the towers fell, I think I’m nearly as scarred by 9/11 as most other New Yorkers. This was my first chance to see the new building and I liked what I saw. It was different. We need different. We need to move forward.

Church Visit

A while later, I turned right and joined back up with Broadway. I turned south toward Wall Street and crossed at Trinity Church, where I bought bought a bag of fresh, hot, honey-roasted peanuts from a street vendor. (Do you know how I feel about food in New York?) On a whim, I went into the church. There were some tourists there, talking in hushed tones. One woman was wandering around the altar — which somehow offended me. (Yes, I’m a non-believer, but I do have respect for places of worship. To me, the alar and everything beyond it was off-limits, restricted to church officials. I guess I’m wrong, but it still bugged me to see that woman wandering around back there.)

Altar of Remembrance
I lit a candle here for my grandmother, godfather, and mother-in-law.

I wanted to light a candle for my grandmother, which I always do when I’m in a church that has an area set aside for that. I know she would have liked it. There was a special place set up — the Altar of Remembrance, it was called — where you could leave notes and photos for people who were gone. There was also a book where you could write down the names of the departed so they’d be mentioned in a Mass on November 4. I wrote three names: Maria Soricelli (my grandmother, who passed away in 2002), Jack DeGaetano (my godfather, who’d passed away the previous Monday), and Julia Chilingerian (my mother-in-law, who passed away during the summer). Then I deposited a dollar into a small box nearby and took a tall, skinny beeswax candle. I lit it from another candle and planted it in the sand in front of the altar. I lingered for a while while my eyes teared up. Then I took a quick picture and hurried out the door.

I continued down Broadway as far as Battery Place. That was also blocked off, although I don’t know why. I could see the damaged sculpture that had stood between the Twin Towers, moved into the park during cleanup years ago. I walked past the fan building for the Battery Tunnel — known to movie fans as the headquarters of Men in Black — and turned up West Street. From there…well, I felt done.

The Path Back

Freedom Tower
Freedom Tower, still under construction, in the late afternoon light. I guess I am a tourist after all.

It was after 4:30 PM and I realized that I was ready to go back to New Jersey. I wanted to hop on the Path Train, but I needed to find it. It used to be in the station under the World Trade Center; I assumed it was still in that area somewhere. So I headed east, crossing back to Trinity Place, and then north. I took a slight detour and found myself among a gaggle of tourists photographing Freedom Tower in the late afternoon light. A security guard stood behind barricades with construction fencing behind him. I asked him where I could find the Path train and he gave me directions: north on Church, west on Vesey, follow the signs.

I walked around the construction site and joined the crowd of commuters heading for the train. I descended into the station, spent some time figuring out which train I needed to take, and bought a ticket. A while later, I was on board, heading for New Jersey.

At Newark’s Penn Station, I got on a New Jersey Transit train to Rahway. It was an express with just one other stop. My brother picked me up at the station at 6 PM.

It had been a great day out with nearly 5 miles of walking. I was tired but satisfied. If I ever do get back to New York, I’ll do something like that again. There’s plenty left for me to revisit.

Wine Tasting by Helicopter

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Let me be your designated driver.

I started doing wine tasting tours by helicopter in North Central Washington’s wine country back in the summer of 2011, but really got into full swing in the summer of 2012. Back then, I offered two-, three-, and four-winery tours. I’d pick passengers up at one winery and fly them to another. Then I’d wait around for them to finish and fly them to the next. Repeat until done.

I soon learned that doing a three- or four-winery tour was a really good way to waste an entire day of my time for very little financial return on that time investment.

And I don’t get me started on the couple from hell, who managed to turn a four-winery tour into a full day that included five wine tastings, forced me to do four deadhead flights, and pushed me over the edge when my nerves and emotions were already frazzled.

Still, it wasn’t until nearly a full week of seemingly nonstop cherry drying in June that I realized I really didn’t want to do wine tasting tours like that. I wanted a quick and easy day where I’d be compensated properly not only for the helicopter’s flight time but for for my time. A full hour of flight time with just one destination.

After doing some research, I realized that the best destination would be Tsillan Cellars Winery at Lake Chelan. I’d do scenic flights there and back with time on the ground for my passengers to enjoy a wine tasting and a meal in their very nice restaurant. The flight was outrageously beautiful and the destination was someplace I really wouldn’t mind spending a few hours of down time. Perfect.

On Sunday, I took three passengers to Tsillan Cellars. They were the same ladies who were supposed to do a four-winery tour late last summer with me. Unfortunately, the destination winemakers had pulled the plug on the scheduled date — for reasons I still can’t comprehend. (That was an eye-opening experience that taught me to be careful about who I partnered with for winery visits. I do not like disappointing my clients and won’t do business with people who disappoint me.) I offered this trip as a long overdue substitute and they agreed. I picked them up at Wenatchee Pangborn Memorial Airport at 11 and we made the flight in beautiful weather.

I had the helicopter’s nosecam set up with my new GoPro Hero 3 Black camera and it was running for the entire flight up there. On Monday, I edited the video down to a 2:45 promo with music and captions. I put it on YouTube. Here it is:

I haven’t finished updating Flying M Air’s website with information about the Tsillan Cellars wine tasting flights, but I hope to do it soon. And I hope to be doing lots of these flights throughout the rest of the summer and into autumn.

Required Reading for Helicopter Tour Pilots

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Two accident reports that clearly demonstrate how “hot dogging” can get you — and your passengers — dead.

November 25, 2013 Update:

The NTSB’s probable cause report for this accident is now available. The pilot was not at fault in this particular accident — it was a maintenance issue. As a pilot, I’m glad that the pilot’s name was cleared of fault but, at the same time, I’m concerned that maintenance shortcomings caused five deaths. The pilot was flying a ticking time bomb and it went off. There was nothing he could do to prevent the crash. And that scares me.

While the points presented in this blog post clearly do not apply to the Boulder City crash mentioned here, they are still important reading material for all pilots. Learn from other people’s mistakes.

On Wednesday, a Sundance Helicopters AS350 with a pilot and four passengers on board, crashed in the mountains near Boulder City, NV. It was on a “twilight tour” of the Hoover Dam and Lake Mead.

At this point, there’s no speculation about how the accident occurred. But, as usual, the media is dragging all the dirt they can out into the limelight to sensationalize the event and give people potential places to point blaming fingers.

One of the things the media has brought up is another Sundance Helicopters crash that occurred back in September 2003. I was unfamiliar with this crash — it must have occurred before my regular reading of NTSB accident reports began. Unsure whether I was confusing it with another crash, I looked it up today. But no, this was yet another instance of stupid pilot tricks becoming deadly pilot tricks.

I thought it was worth reviewing this case and another I’ve covered in the past and urge pilots to read both of the final reports carefully to see how reckless flying can kill. What’s interesting to me is how similar these two cases are — heck, they even took place within 30 miles of each other.

LAX01MA272: AS350, August 10, 2001, Meadview, AZ

I covered this accident briefly in Part 5 of my “So You Want to Be a Helicopter Pilot” series. Here’s the NTSB summary:

On August 10, 2001, about 1428 mountain standard time, a Eurocopter AS350-B2 helicopter, N169PA, operating as Papillon 34, collided with terrain during an uncontrolled descent about 4 miles east of Meadview, Arizona. The helicopter was operated by Papillon Airways, Inc., as an air tour flight under Code of Federal Regulations 14 (CFR) Part 135. The helicopter was destroyed by impact forces and a postcrash fire. The pilot and five passengers were killed, and the remaining passenger sustained serious injuries. The flight originated from the company terminal at the McCarran International Airport (LAS), Las Vegas, Nevada, about 1245 as a tour of the west Grand Canyon area with a planned stop at a landing site in Quartermaster Canyon. The helicopter departed the landing site about 1400 and stopped at a company fueling facility at the Grand Canyon West Airport (GCW). The helicopter departed the fueling facility at 1420 and was en route to LAS when the accident occurred. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed, and a visual flight rules flight plan was filed.

The pilot had a reasonable amount of experience with nearly 3,000 hours of flight time, all of which was in helicopters. He had CFI and instrument ratings.

The pilot, however, also had a reputation for hot-dogging. From the NTSB report‘s interview with previous passengers:

According to the passengers, once the tour started, the pilot was talking all the time. He was very informative, and they felt he knew his history and geography very well. They went over the Hoover Dam and Lake Mead. About 20 minutes into the flight, the pilot turned his head toward the back and was talking to the passengers as the helicopter flew toward a cliff. The people in the back were trying to get the pilot’s attention and point out that he was flying toward a cliff, but he pretended he did not understand what they were saying, as if this was all being done on purpose. All this time, the pilot was turned around and talking to the passengers in the back seat, while the passengers were all pointing up trying to get him to climb. One witness said she finally picked up the microphone and said, “they are really scared…turn around and pull up the helicopter,” and he did. She could not estimate how far they were from the cliff when the pilot terminated the maneuver.

One of the passengers stated that there were particularly exciting episodes during the tour that were frightening to some of the others. As part of the tour, they flew over a site that was used in the commercial motion picture film Thelma and Louise, and the pilot pointed out the cliff. The pilot stopped for fuel before he landed in the canyon for the picnic lunch. After lunch, no more stops were made. During the return to LAS, the pilot asked if they wanted to know what it was like to drive a car off of a cliff. She stated that they all said “no” to this question; however, he proceeded to fly very fast toward the edge of the cliff and then dove the helicopter as it passed the edge. The passenger reported that it was “frightening and thrilling at the same time but it scared the others to death.”

Both of these incidents — heading directly for a cliff and then diving like Thema and Louise over a cliff — were confirmed in a video tape provided by the passenger.

Crash Site
I don’t think the pilot expected to end up like Thema and Louise, too.

Evidence at the crash site indicated that not only was the helicopter’s engine producing power at the time of impact, but the collective was full up. The debris field was compact, indicating very little forward movement when the helicopter hit the ground. There was no evidence of any mechanical failure immediately before the crash. The NTSB ruled out many accident scenarios based on mechanical malfunctions before concluding:

In the absence of any evidence to indicate a preimpact mechanical malfunction, and given the density altitude, helicopter performance considerations, and virtually all of the signatures evident at the IPI and in the wreckage, the investigation revealed that a probable scenario involves the pilot’s decision to maneuver the helicopter in a flight regime, and in a high density altitude environment, which significantly decreased the helicopter’s performance capability, resulting in a high rate of descent from which the pilot was unable to recover prior to ground impact. Additionally, although no evidence was found to indicate that the pilot had intended on performing a hazardous maneuver, the high rate of descent occurred in proximity to precipitous terrain, which effectively limited remedial options available.

In other words, he most likely performed his Thelma and Louise maneuver, dove off the cliff, and because of high density altitude, was unable to arrest the decent rate before hitting the ground.

LAX03MA292: AS350, September 20, 2003, Grand Canyon West, AZ

This case is a lot worse. I’ll let the NTSB describe what happened briefly:

On September 20, 2003, about 1238 mountain standard time, an Aerospatiale AS350BA helicopter, N270SH, operated by Sundance Helicopters, Inc., crashed into a canyon wall while maneuvering through Descent Canyon, about 1.5 nautical miles east of Grand Canyon West Airport (1G4) in Arizona. The pilot and all six passengers on board were killed, and the helicopter was destroyed by impact forces and postcrash fire. The air tour sightseeing flight was operated under the provisions of 14 Code of Federal Regulations Part 135. Visual meteorological conditions prevailed for the flight, which was operated under visual flight rules on a company flight plan. The helicopter was transporting passengers from a helipad at 1G4 (helipad elevation 4,775 feet mean sea level [msl]) near the upper rim of the Grand Canyon to a helipad designated “the Beach” (elevation 1,300 msl) located next to the Colorado River at the floor of the Grand Canyon.

You need to read the NTSB’s full report to fully understand what happened here. You can download it as a PDF (recommended) or read it online.

The pilot was experienced. He was 44 years old with an ATP certificate for multiengine airplanes and for helicopters. He had CFI and instrument ratings for a variety of aircraft. He’d logged nearly 8,000 hours of flight time, nearly 7,000 of which was in helicopters. He had a clean record with the FAA.

But the pilot had also earned the nickname “Kamikaze” because of the way he flew. (And you can bet your ass that the media is having a field day with that in its coverage of Wednesday’s accident.)

99° Bank Angle
55° Pitch Angle
Two images from the NTSB report, calculating angles based on photographs and videos shot during other flights.

With a great deal of supporting evidence from the pilot’s previous passengers that same day and earlier, as well as photographs taken during flights with the pilot, the NTSB concluded that the pilot had a history of risk-taking behavior. Photographic evidence showed him flying at bank angles exceeding 90° with nose-down attitudes exceeding 50°. It’s estimated that he typically reached speeds up to 140 knots and rates of descent of 2,000 feet per minute.

With passengers on board.

For comparison’s sake, Sundance policy limited bank angles to 30° and pitch angles to 10° — both of which are very reasonable. Other pilots typically flew that portion of the flight at 110 to 120 knots, descending at 1,000 feet per minute.

Yet the report cites one passenger story after another of the pilot diving into the canyon and flying close to canyon walls. One former Sundance employee who had flown with him stated he “flew very close to the canyon wall” and “banked off one wall and then turned the other way, almost upside down.” One passenger claimed that his friend’s wife was screaming throughout the entire descent.

Sundance received at least two formal complaints about the pilot. There’s no evidence that anything was done about the first. The pilot was suspended for a week without pay after the second, but since Sundance was short of pilots, the penalty was never enforced and the pilot continued working with pay.

It should come as no real surprise that the pilot ran out of luck. According to the NTSB, on that September day:

The helicopter’s main rotor blade struck a near-vertical canyon wall in flight. The resulting damage to the main rotor system likely rendered the helicopter uncontrollable, and the helicopter subsequently impacted a canyon wall ledge.

There was a fireball when the helicopter exploded on impact. There wasn’t much wreckage. You can see for yourself; there are photos in the report. I wouldn’t even know it was a helicopter if it weren’t for the arrows pointing out parts.

Probable cause placed the blame on the pilot, as well as Sundance and the FAA:

The National Transportation Safety Board determines that the probable cause of this accident was the pilot’s disregard of safe flying procedures and misjudgment of the helicopter’s proximity to terrain, which resulted in an in-flight collision with a canyon wall. Contributing to the accident was the failure of Sundance Helicopters and the Federal Aviation Administration to provide adequate surveillance of Sundance’s air tour operations in Descent Canyon.

Disregard of safe flying procedures. That’s a bit of an understatement, no?

What We Can Take from This

If you don’t get the message I’m trying to convey here, you probably shouldn’t be flying anything — let alone passengers for hire in a helicopter.

It’s a fact: many of us fly a little nutty once in a while. Maybe low and fast over flat desert terrain. Or maybe threading our way though empty canyons at high speed. Or performing some other maneuver that takes all your attention and can easily turn into a disaster.

But when does “a little nutty” turn into pushing the aircraft beyond company or manufacturer limitations?

And who in their right mind would fly so dangerously with passengers on board?

You?

I hope not.

The point is that flying like a stunt pilot can get you killed. And if there are passengers on board, you’ll kill them, too.

Is that something you want to be remembered for? Do you want to be the subject of another pilot’s blog post about flying like an asshole with passengers on board? Do you want a derogatory nickname like “Kamikaze” brought up by the press eight years after your death when another pilot who works for your company is killed in a crash with his passengers?

How do you think the “Kamikaze” pilot’s family feels about his accident being brought up again? And again?

Think about why these pilots flew the way they did. Were they showing off? Or trying to get a rise out of their passengers?

In both instances, passengers made it clear — verbally, during the flight — that they didn’t want the pilot to fly the way he was. Think about the people pointing to a cliff face or the woman screaming throughout the descent. Why did these pilots treat their passengers with such disrespect? Scare them for no reason? Put their lives in danger? Was this fun for them? When is fun an excuse to risk other people’s lives?

Do you do this? If so, why? When will you stop? When your crash makes a big fireball like the ones in these stories?

Do you understand what I’m trying to say?

Read these accident reports. Two pilots are responsible for the deaths of eleven people with a twelfth person permanently disfigured.

Isn’t that enough to convince you not to fly like an asshole?

I only hope that Wednesday’s accident report isn’t another example for this blog post.

And my thoughts go out to the families of the victims of this stupidity.

Farm Stand Fruit Isn’t Always the Best

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Look before you buy.

When I was a kid, when the harvest months rolled around in northern New Jersey and Upstate New York, my family would take Sunday drives to farm stands and apple orchards. The drive was the activity, the destination was the excuse. The destination also had the rewards: fresh-picked apples, fresh local corn, fresh-made donuts, cider, soft-serve ice cream. The smell of apples and cinnamon and donuts brings back memories of those days.

Just a Memory

A regular destination was Tice Farm, which was founded in 1808. It was torn down in the late 1980s so a mall could be built in its place. This article on NorthJersey.com offers a look back at two of the farms we visited when I was a kid.

It’s this fond memory of farm stands that has always remained with me. It’s no wonder I began visiting a handful of farm stands in Washington State where I spent much of the summer. But I soon realized that today’s farm stands cannot be compared to the ones we visited 30+ years ago.

Today’s farm stands are mostly tourist attractions. Sure, they have some produce (more on that in a moment), but they also seem to sell an awful lot of non-food items that can’t easily be connected with a farm. Things like candles and scarves and t-shirts. Things like made-in-China “crafts.” Stocking and selling these items must be more satisfactory for the farm stand owner. After all, they’re cheap to buy, don’t need to be refrigerated, and don’t spoil. Sure, they’re usually the same kind of crap you can buy in any mall — even Tice’s Corner Mall — and probably even in a local Walmart. But tourists don’t care. They come, they buy, the farm stand owners keep them stocked.

Reject Fruit?

It’s the produce that upsets me, though. I visited a farm stand in Quincy, WA several times early this summer, attracted by its handmade signs for whatever “fresh” produce was currently available. What I found was often produce that was bruised or otherwise damaged, days old and, surprisingly, often not local.

I bought my first cherries of the season there and was disappointed to find that nearly half the bag’s contents had to be discarded because of splits and bird pecks. This is the fruit that the packing companies reject.

I suspect that the cherries I’d bought were from orchards in Mattawa that had lost 60% or more of their crop in heavy rains early in the season. (That’s what the helicopters are for, folks — to keep those cherries dry so they don’t split.) When the grower decides not to pick and take a loss for the season, the pickers will sometimes go into business for themselves, picking fruit and selling it directly to farm stands.

Rainier Cherries

These organic Rainier cherries, although ripe and tasty, were flawed for two reasons: they’re slightly bruised by the wind and there’s not enough red on them.

I saw this first hand at one of my client’s orchards this season. He had several acres of Rainier cherries that didn’t get enough color. (50% of a Rainier cherry needs to be red to meet standards.) The fruit was good — I picked at least 15 pounds for my own consumption and they lasted two weeks in my fridge — but the packing companies wouldn’t take it. The grower didn’t pick but the pickers descended on the orchard anyway, taking away a lot more fruit than I did. Was it a coincidence that local Rainier cherries appeared in the supermarket for 99¢ a pound that week? I don’t think so. I’m sure that farm stand got their share, too.

Fresh, Quality, Local Produce? Not Always

And that’s the point: the farm stands don’t always get quality produce. It’s not always local. It’s not always fresh. It’s whatever they can get cheap and sell at premium prices. The tourists don’t know any better. They see farm stands and they think fresh, local, organic. They don’t realize that they’re often buying the produce that the packing houses don’t want.

Is all this produce bad? No. The cherries pictured above were sub-standard for the packing houses, but they were perfectly good to eat. (And it’s good to see that someone was picking them and making them available for consumption — I picked so much primarily because the idea of all those cherries going to waste was very upsetting to me.) Still, a farm stand might charge a premium for them just because they’re Rainiers and just because they’re at a farm stand. It’s the sucker tourist who doesn’t know any better who is paying a premium price at the farm stand when they might get better fruit at the local supermarket.

As for local…well, I’ve never seen an orange grove in Washington State. Lemons, limes, kiwis — these are all produce you might find at a farm stand. If you’re looking for local produce, think of what you’re buying and ask if it really is local.

And fresh? Here’s a secret: apples are picked in the late summer and early autumn. If you buy an apple anywhere in the U.S. in May, it’s either not fresh or it not local. Now I’m not saying you shouldn’t buy apples off season — apples are one of the few fruits that we’re able to preserve for up to a year and maintain in near-fresh condition. I’m just using apples as an example, since apples appear at nearly every farm stand you might visit.

Look before You Buy

My point: don’t automatically think that the best produce can be found at a farm stand. Not all farm stands are created equally. Look before you buy. Ask questions. Don’t buy pre-bagged items — remember my bag of bad cherries? Make sure you get what you’re paying for.

And support the good farm stands — the ones really delivering produce right from the local farms — by visiting them often.