in high-gain situations, either 212/412: FT OFF. That means, basically, below about 250 ft. Above that, FT ON. Then ATT mode as soon as possible.
The comment began with "Personally..." thus I shall be polite and say I firmly disagree "personally". Ya'll young and impressionable take note of the difference in personal opinion here.
One must note the difference from ATT Mode to SAS Mode is but a cyclic button click or click and hold away. Chinook pilots are well aware of this as real Chinook Pilots have a well formed callus on their right thumb....just as I did when flying 204/205/212 and 412's. I also used Cyclic friction on the non-SAS'd 204,205,212's I flew.
Now the Sixty-Four Dollara Question has been asked!
No Engineering fault found.
No Test Pilot, Test Flight reproduced the fault.
We have a Pilot who says he got quite a fright out of an unusually strong uncommanded reaction from an aircraft.
No one else has come out to say they have had anything remotely similar happen.
Pilots with thousands of hours in the same type aircraft have not reported any similar violent events in the particular aircraft or similar models.
No one has said the involved crew "cocked it up" but some have suggested PIO as a probable cause.
We all are interested in the answer for a multitude of reasons....some out of sheer boredom, some for technical reasons, and some for flying that particular aircraft or similar models.
One thing is sure....we are back asking the same question...."What Happened?"