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Old 29th September 2003 | 15:57
  #25 (permalink)  
Whirlybird

The Original Whirly
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Joined: Feb 1999
: CPL
Posts: 4,327
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From: Belper, Derbyshire, UK
I did them for my PPL(H). I was told it was an advanced exercise to learn control of the helicopter, and to understand what was happening, NOT something that I should do. I think this is essential.

Maybe you should consider the following story. As a fairly low hours PPL(H), I flew into a friends large-ish field. There was very little wind, but what there was, was a bit gusty and changing direction a lot. He had a windsock in the field, and I approached what appeared to be into wind. He was talking to me on a handheld radio, and as I reached about 200 ft, he said; "Be careful; you've got a tailwind". Well the wind was all of about 6 or 7 knots, so I made sure I had a low rate of descent, and lots of room since my groundspeed would be higher than my airspeed, and it was no problem. Hardly a really difficult situation, I'm sure you'll all agree, even for a low hours pilot. For a TRAINED low hours pilot, that is! But for one with NO training at all as to what the situation meant, and what could happen....
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