Originally Posted by
muermel
That is exactly the 1 Mio. USD question everyone here keeps asking. In my company we were briefed about this location, including saving the location of the wires as waypoints into our ipads that we use. I don't know about the other companies and their SOPs. That area is regularly used as a landing area so the wires are a known factor. What pisses me of is that the electric company refueses to put markings on them.
Didn't the FAA conduct a study about wire strike accidents and found out that an astonishingly high number of them included wires that the pilots knew about and their locations?
What surprises me, is that this kind of event doesn't happen more often when flying single pilot for these "private, so called VIPs" customers. You have to deal by your own with too often whimsy, capricious almost bipolar organizers and/or passengers. The induced stress may rise in a matter of minutes all comes together; phone calls,text messages, destination changes, unexpected volume of bags, timing, slots at airport, catering, weather.... Being "private" (NCC) no real operation department to assist you, sometimes with the help of a non qualified "safety pilot" (who can be anyone wearing a white shirt with shoulder stripes)
The workload may quickly become unbearable and make you forget your priorities management. I can't count the times that I've seen experienced pilots texting an ETA or a departure message sms on their one or two of their cellphones when taking-off! This kind of behaving can easily make you forget a power line you already know. When you talk about Class performances and take off profiles, the best you can get is a polite smile.
I've flown many different type of helicopter flights in my career, from crop spraying, long line to offshore ....but "private VIP"(in oppostion to a proper CAT/AOC operator) is without doubt, to me, a "brute job"