Biggest lesson
I had the biggest lesson of my rotary flying career a few months back.
I present it in the hope it might prepare someone better in case they suffer the same.
1. It's easy to burn all your reserve fuel if you engage in 15 minutes of unplanned fun at high manifold pressures. Viz chasing rabbits. I calculate the helicopter that normally burns 50litres per hour must have been burning well over 100 liters per hour for that 15 mins.
2. Don't forgo a landing to check your fuel level even if it's getting a bit dark and you are not quite home. Motels or taxis are cheap.
3. a real engine stoppage, even if semi-expected, is nothing like a practice. Your eyes dilate (adrenalin I suspect) making focus difficult. Its hard to read the airspeed. Time stops. Your brain tells your limbs what to do but they don't move. You wonder if the blades are still going around - you look for them. You are confused. I still wonder how long it took to make the inputs.
4. You fly too fast shortening the glide. You flare on the high side. You pray there's enough inertia left to cushion the touchdown. You slide for an eternity.
5. You realize that if you had 1 litre less you wouldn't have reached the flatness and space of your home airfield and would have probably made the papers.
I was lucky - there was no doubt the engine had stopped - and my training worked.
But I recall once taking off in a fixed wing (with 1200 hours under my belt) and it took me a good 30 seconds to realize the engine wasn't functioning properly. I cleared the fence by 300 feet instead of the usual 800 feet due to an intermittently blocked injector yet I had convinced myself the take off should go ahead and that I was 'seeing things' and everything was fine. The instrument panel was a blur during the take-off due vibration!
The same delayed decision making with a semi functioning engine in a helicopter in any part of the flight could easily chew up a lot of your height.
I was flying a helicopter deemed to have high inertia blades. I don't know if I would be here right now if I had been flying one with a lot less inertia.
OOW
Last edited by outofwhack; 24th Oct 2011 at 13:49.