Originally Posted by
comingup
Pretty much everything you do in a helicopter besides flying from A to B. How about you telll me all the skills you learned out there in the real world that I didn't at the airport besides a confined area. We did have to travel a little bit to find one.
I'm going to state this bluntly.
The leading causes of helicopter accidents are rooted in human error, poor judgement, deficient ADM, weather, unintended IMC, loss of control, low-altitude operations in in the wire environment, confined areas, etc., and none of these can be adequately addressed in a traffic pattern.
See:
https://ushst.org/
Rarely are the motor-skills of flying the cause of an accident. The skills needed to fly an aircraft are acquired early in ones’ career. By the FAA, a commercial rating can be obtained in as little as 150 hours of total flight time, including only 50 hours in helicopters (I think I got that right). And these privileges can then be exercised indefinity by just repeating biennial reviews (no traffic pattern work required). Major operators/insurers require or desire thousands of hours of experience, and if all of that time was simply acquired in a traffic pattern it probably wouldn’t be acceptable for employment consideration.
Your misconception of the value and purpose of traffic-pattern training is typical of an inexperienced pilot or naïve individual. The traffic pattern is primarily useful for obtaining the basic FAA ratings, type qualification and recurrency. The rubber meets the road outside of the traffic pattern.
And I have given thousands of hours of instruction.
I'm sure you've heard the old adage that, "a great pilot uses his superior judgement to keep him out of situations requing superior skill."