Flight Following

[Mars]

Most authorities specify that operations be conducted with Flight Following; my understanding is that such systems are intended to provide the operator with the ability to monitor aircraft in flight.

If my understanding is correct then what does the following report imply?

NTSB Identification: ANC12FA006
Nonscheduled 14 CFR Part 135: Air Taxi & Commuter
Accident occurred Saturday, October 29, 2011 in Iliamna, AK
Aircraft: EUROCOPTER AS 350 B2, registration: N165EH
Injuries: 1 Fatal.

This is preliminary information, subject to change, and may contain errors. Any errors in this report will be corrected when the final report has been completed.

On October 29, 2011, about 2009 Alaska daylight time (ADT), a Eurocopter AS350-B2 helicopter, N165EH, sustained substantial damage during a collision with tundra-covered terrain about 6 miles southwest of Iliamna, Alaska. The pilot, the only occupant, died at the scene. The helicopter was operated by ERA Helicopters LLC, Anchorage, Alaska, as a 14 CFR Part 135 visual flight rules (VFR) on-demand charter flight when the accident occurred. Dark night, visual meteorological conditions (VMC) prevailed at the Iliamna Airport. The flight originated in Nome, Alaska, about 1343, en route to Iliamna, with fuel stops at Unalakleet and Bethel, Alaska. Company flight following procedures were in effect.

During an interview with the National Transportation Safety Board (NTSB) investigator-in-charge (IIC), on October 30, the operator's general manager reported that the accident helicopter was under contract to Fugro Airborne Surveys to support an aerial seismic survey project near Nome. He said that the survey crew had completed their survey, and the two survey crew members returned to Anchorage on October 25. The pilot planed to rendezvous with the crew in Anchorage, to remove the helicopter's specialized survey equipment. However, continuous poor weather conditions delayed the pilot's departure from Nome until the afternoon of October 29.

The accident helicopter was equipped with a Sky Connect onboard satellite tracking system, which provides flight dispatchers with real-time position reports about every minute, as well as providing satellite phone communication with the pilot. The operator provided the NTSB with archived Sky Connect flight track data, which shows that after refueling in Bethel, the helicopter departed about 1753 en route to Iliamna. As the flight progressed along a westerly heading toward Iliamna, and eventually along the northern shore of Iliamna Lake, the Sky Connect system signal was lost at 2008, about 8 miles southwest of Iliamna.

When the helicopter failed to arrive in Iliamna, company personnel initiated a telephone and satellite phone search to see if the helicopter had diverted to another village. Unable to locate the helicopter, company management personnel contacted the Air Force Rescue Coordination Center, Anchorage, to report the missing helicopter.

Rescue personnel aboard an Air National Guard C-130 airplane, aided by high intensity luminescent flares, searched the area throughout the night, but were unable to locate the helicopter. No emergency locator transmitter (ELT) signal was detected.

The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) issued an alert notice (ALNOT) on October 30, at 0615 Alaska daylight time.

The following morning, the crew of a company helicopter discovered the fragmented wreckage about 6 miles southwest of Iliamna, in an area of marshy, tundra-covered terrain.

The closest weather reporting facility was the Iliamna Airport, 6 miles northeast of the accident site. About 11 minutes before the accident, at 1953, an Aviation Routine Weather Report (METAR) was reporting, in part: Wind, 280 degrees (true) at 6 knots; visibility, 5 statute miles with light snow; clouds and sky condition, 3,100 feet overcast; temperature, 36 degrees F; dew point, 27 degrees F; altimeter, 29.28 inches Hg.

At 2020, about 11 minutes after the accident, a special weather observation at the Iliamna Airport was reporting, in part: Wind, 300 degrees at 9 knots, visibility, 1.5 statute miles; clouds and sky condition, 2000 feet broken, 3,100 feet overcast; temperature, 34 degrees F; dew point, 27 degrees F; altimeter, 29.31 inHg.

During telephone conversations with an NTSB investigator on October 31, the fuel vendors in Unalakleet and Bethel consistently noted that the pilot seemed rushed, and both reported him mentioning that he was trying to get to Iliamna before dark.

Sunset on the day of the accident was 1833; the end of civil twilight was 1917.

Really - what is the point!

[Geoffersincornwall]

Why no mention of the flight following reaction at 2008 when the signal was lost??

G

[squib66]

It could be a poor description by the NTSB. Contact was lost 8 miles from the destination, so the gap between loss of signal and failure to arrive would have been short anyway.

However, two questions are:
1) how was the flight following actually being conducted (dedicated personnel or just a computer screen displaying Sky Connect in the background) - the NTSB just say "Company flight following procedures were in effect."
2) when did ERA actually initiate their response?

Noting this was a night flight I doubt ERA had many other flights to monitor that night. Odd that the pilot was reported as rushed, wanting to arrive before dark, but actually was flying several hours after sunset.

The NTSB text strongly hints at pressure (commercial or self imposed) to reach Anchorage to remove the survey equipment after several days of weather delays.

The lack of ELT signal (yet again) is also disturbing.

[FH1100 Pilot]

In the U.S., operations under FAR Part 135 are not quite the same thing as flying an airliner. It is true that all aircraft operating under Part-135 must be on a flight plan. But if a regular ol' FAA flight plan is not used for each flight, then the company must have "flight-following" procedures in place which include all of the information on an FAA flight plan, plus a method of notification of overdue aircraft. In other words, the FAA allows operators to flight-follow their own aircraft without the requirement to file individual FAA flight plans. (But this does not preclude the company from having pilots file FAA flight plans either.)

I think that some people must incorrectly interpret the FAA's requirement that all aircraft operating under FAR Part-135 must be on a flight plan to mean that there has to be takeoff-to-touchdown monitoring of every flight. Typically this does not exist. Typically, dispatchers *don't* sit at a screen monitoring the movement of every helicopter that's in the air like an air traffic controller. It's nice to fantasize that this happens, but usually it's not the case.

The FAA is pretty airplane-centric. Mandating that "135" flights be on a flight plan only means that someone will care if you don't arrive at the destination. And then if you don't arrive, it could be up to 30 minutes before anyone starts looking for you. In my career, I've taken many charter flights that began after the operations "dispatcher" had gone home. To meet the requirements, I filed a flight plan with the FAA.

Some operators with big fleets do go beyond what the FAA requires. But some don't. Depends on how the Ops Specs are written and what they allow.

I don't know Era's specific company policy, but I'd imagine that they monitor their aircraft pretty closely and start looking for an aircraft within 5 minutes or so of his planned ETA. In this case, the ship was 8 miles from the destination, so he was pretty close. From the NTSB report, it seems to me that a search was initiated fairly quickly. I see no indictment of the operator's procedures. Sadly, as happens so often in the helicopter world, even if an all-out search had been initiated immediately at the point of lost contact, it would not have mattered for the pilot.

Why did the pilot appear rushed? In Alaska? Pushing sunset? Yeah, I would have probably appeared rushed too; I don't like flying at night.

[Gomer Pylot]

The report says a search was initiated "When the helicopter failed to arrive in Iliamna", and the arrival time would have been 3 or 4 minutes after the crash, since the crash site was 6 miles from there. It doesn't say what time the search was initiated, but it may well have been within that time after the crash. What else would the company provide other than archived data? There would be no real-time data available after the crash. I think some people here are jumping far too high and far too fast to rather questionable conclusions.

But FH1100 is right, the requirement for flight following is only that it meet the FAA standards, which are that someone start asking questions 30 minutes after the ETA in the flight plan. Some operators simply use FAA flight plans, without doing any monitoring themselves, and that's legal. Larger operators have dedicated full-time dispatch centers, staffed 24/7, with someone actually monitoring all flights. There is a wide range of methods, and probably all are legal, even those with no monitoring at all, as long as an FAA plan is filed.

[zalt]

Yeah, I would have probably appeared rushed too; I don't like flying at night.

So why did a 66 year old pilot depart from Bethel, 40 minutes before sunset and in deteriorating weather, with 2 1/4 hours single pilot flying still to go on an area with little ground lighting?

The answer is probably:pressure (commercial or self imposed)

Era Helicopters Pilot Killed in Crash Near Iliamna - ktuu.com (http://www.ktuu.com/news/era-aviation-helicopter-wreckage-found-near-iliamna-103011,0,1569480.story)

[squib66]

Another AS350, another accident and another ELT failure (connection between box and antenna broken when tailboom seperated):
http://www.atsb.gov.au/media/2514320/ao2011110_prelim.pdf

Better flight following though.

[Mars]

Perhaps somewhat unrealistically, this is what I expected from a flight following system!

The operator of the helicopter had also installed a flight monitoring system that used satellite and web-based communication systems to allow the operator to receive accurate information on the location of company aircraft every 10 minutes while they were in flight. An alert and the location of the helicopter was also provided in the event of an emergency. As such, it supplemented the other methods of search and rescue (SAR) alerting.

In an emergency, the flight monitoring system stopped transmitting to the website, immediately generating distress messages that were sent by text and email to the operator’s nominated personnel. Those messages contained an affected aircraft’s last recorded position, speed, altitude and direction of flight.

The operator reported that on the day, the system alerted the operations manager to an emergency and that the operations manager then called the pilot’s mobile phone. When that call was diverted to message bank, the manager had contacted emergency services.

(Extract from the report cited by squibb66.)

[RVDT]

Mars,

That being said............................

It is one thing to know that you have an issue with the aircraft.

It is something else to be able to actually do something about it.

In this case it was dark and possibly snowing with 1.5 mile vis.

Having worked in remote areas you need to realise the risks and ask yourself and/or be aware of the capabilities of services available to you.

In the old days of "full reporting" in Australia it used to be 30 minutes scheduled calls and/or 60 miles.

On one contract we had to make 3 different calls over 3 different HF frequencies to Flight Service the closest of which was 350 miles away.

The question was always asked as to exactly what type of response there would be. The answer was "slightly better than nothing". Even in this case what resources where available to respond when it is -

a) Dark
b) Snowing
c) in marshy tundra

Check out the position of Iliamna on Google Earth.

Would better "flight following" have changed the outcome? I doubt it.

[Mars]

RVDT,

You are quite correct - there is no way we can prevent this accident.

However, each accident should be seen as an opportunity to reconsider the way we operate and learn relevant lessons. My view is/was that, in spite of the aircraft being equipped for flight following, there didn't appear to be a system in place to make best use of the equipment.

Clearly, and as seen from the Australian quote, systems are available to provide a warning whenever the signal is not transmitted. This need not be a closely monitored system (although that would be preferable), it could be an automated system that notifies - by text and email - the responsible person/authority.

Without a human in the loop, such monitoring systems are merely eye-candy.

[Helinut]

Isn't the whole point/purpose of flight-following to get another human being involved and provide some information to start the subsequent SAR?