PPRuNe Forums - View Single Post - North Sea Helicopter ditching 10th May 2012
Old 21st May 2012, 10:29
  #211 (permalink)  
gasax
 
Join Date: Jan 2002
Location: Aberdeen
Posts: 1,234
Likes: 0
Received 0 Likes on 0 Posts
HC - this is partly how I earn a living - the numbers for helicopter transport are that bad....

One would have hoped that defect tolerant design codes would have lead to an improvement - but they have not - at least in the present incarnation. I'm not sure the certification inself is the real reason. For instance JAR approvals for a new engine are quite modest - but of course the certification process and approvals engineers can have a huge influence in terms of 'opinion engineering', drawing things out by insisting of often irrelevent justifications - and that leads to manufacturers doing everything possible to avoid the certification process. Hence the re-treading of earlier 'successful' designs with numerous mods.

Shytorque -- yes the information to date does suggest a QC issue - but underlying that are design decisions - this is a 'low duty' shaft with appropriate levels of design detailing. Titanium studs would be another. At the end of the day it all rolls up into an overall incident rate.
gasax is offline