I think you boys need to calm down. The Pilots job is to fly the helicopter not service or maintain it. With a large rotorcraft, quite apart from the risks of falling off it from a height out on the apron, there is more risk associated with a pilot leaving catches insecure than benefit to be gained from climbing all over it.
If you worry about looking under the cowling why not check torque each bolt to make sure the engineers have not made a mistake. Why not confirm every piece of wire locking? Why not check the correct oil has been used. The list is endless and far surpasses what the pilot can see during his tactile acceptance.
Bottom line, if you trust your engineers there should be very little to worry about.if you don't trust the.............reach the the torque wrench.
Trust doesn't mean you can't double check. Engineers (and pilots) have bad days, difficult mornings and whatnot. Even on larger aircraft: why not just have a look? We're not talking about redoing the engineers' job, just making sure you're safe!
I work on a medium twin on aerial work ops and somehow the only pilots that have problems on the job are those who don't do a walk around of the AC. When they come back from the fire/sling job whatever they always blame the engineers and it always turn out that if they had had a look instead of just sitting their asses in the aircraft (not even checking oil levels, you don't need to climb anywhere for these), they'd have been alright.
It's only 5 to 15 minutes of your time, isn't it worth it? Double check the cowlings on the way down.
Hopefully lack of preflight won't be the issue here, I just read they've found the flight recorders so I guess it's just a matter of time before a report gets out.
My thoughts to those concerned, it's always a tragedy.