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Old 28th November 2011 | 16:41
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From: EGDC
There was, and probably still is, a demonstration of this during the QHI course at RAF Shawbury. It was shown to all QHI students because someone had managed to crash a Gazelle whilst debriefing a student and flying cross controlled from the LHS.

Most people can hack it for a while, especially if control is handed over in a reasonably trimmed hover. However, once errors start to appear, the almost inevitable result is trying to hit the ground descending and moving backwards.

The natural reaction for a pilot is to try and get away from the ground by pulling up with the left hand to increase collective - this hand though is on the cyclic so it starts a rearward drift - then to counter the drift, the pilot tries to input forward cyclic with the right hand - this hand is on the collective which now goes down.

With practise, it is eminently possible to fly 'wrong-handed' - after all you could teach pilots that way from the start and it would be 'normal'.
crab@SAAvn.co.uk is offline  
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