The thread has polarised into the believers and non believers in the relevance of the wind direction and I'm not going to persue that further as I said. I now have it clear in my own mind.
To throw more into the bubbling pot, refer back to the video. It is conveniently time stamped. As the aircraft enter the turn it climbs and reaches the highest point of the turn at 11.06.12. At this point the aircraft is banked to 90+ degrees and runs out of momentum opposing gravity. Any thrust from the main rotor (probably little) is added to gravity pulling the aircraft earthwards at 10 m/s2.
At best the aircraft begins to accelerate downward as would any object in free fall as there is no thrust vector to oppose gravity. The pilot probably has his left boot to the floor but its not enough to keep the nose up. He has whacked in left cyclic and by 11.08.10 is just getting some response, but still has a bank angle of about 60 deg.There is not enough downthrust to overcome the momentum the aircraft has acquired earthwards. The result is inevitable at 11.08.12.
The aircraft was doomed achieving that angle of bank at that height.
Just 1 second of no force opposing gravity means you will end up descending at approx 10m/s or 1980ft/minute.
I would estimate the windspeed at no more than a few knots by the speed of the smoke and at no point does the aircraft look as though it got anywhere near losing translational lift. He was motoring all the way round. He lost lift 'cos his rotor was pointing in the wrong direction.
Just my interpretation of the video.
Thoughts anyone. I'll get me coat...
EDIT: I'm not testing this in my Enstrom (once was enough) nor my RC model but trying it in a reasonably good RC simulator I can't recover from bank angles over 90 degrees without losing significant height.
Last edited by Gaseous; 8th Apr 2008 at 01:08.