Alpine operations - Question
I'm just back from some early season skiing in the alps. Lots of helicopter activity, possibly early season training. As a simple fixed wing flyer, I'm trying to expand my knowledge of rotary flight limitations....
The ship of choice seems to be an AS350 (though I'm not smart enough to tell the variant). The SAR ones are fitted with an external winch. The guys I watched doing cliff rescue (either for real or as a practice) seemed to have superb skills flying close and slow at what must be near to the limits of the machine in very gusty conditions.
There are also a fair few AS355's though not it seems in the SAR role.
At first sight, it seems strange to be using a single-engined machine in a highly risky SAR environment but a quick look at the Eurocopter data sheets seems to suggest that at the kind of altitudes these guys are working at (up to around 12,000 feet) the second engine is not much use - if the lights go out on one, the remaining engine barely has enough grunt to keep you flying.
As far as I can see they prefer the better high-altitude performance of the singe with its attendant risks to the inferior performance of the twin with marginal single-engine performance.
Can any of you thrashing-wing types enlighten me further?