Originally Posted by
B772
Looking at the canopy damage and possible damage to the controls is hard to believe Michael James was able to retain control of the copter...
Those are my sentiments as well. Looking at the fairly high resolution photo posted by logansi (post #69) at first I thought those grey tubes hanging out the front were related to the tail rotor controls. But then I realised that just wouldn't be possible to still have had a safe landing. The pedal linkages would be somewhat back from the front edge of the forward end of the cabin floor, per attached photo from www of an EC130B4 cabin, and in any case concentrated to the left side. So are those tubes simply support braces for the forward end of the cabin? Something grey just visible on RHS forward in image below.
Also, in the audio of footage of VH-XH9 landing, there also seems to be an unusual rotor noise, perhaps of the order of once per revolution of the main rotor. I thought that may be due to damage to the main rotor but that isn't obvious in photos I have seen. So it it perhaps just airflow noise over the shattered cockpit which wouldn't exist on an intact EC130? Or am I reading too much into what I hear?
