Tandem, well put.
Baston,
All those of us who were lucky enough to train doing real engine offs from all stages of flight were very lucky as the Queen did not worry about "£6 million" aircraft as the crews were and are more valuable. At the end of the day if you end up sitting in a field in your seat surrounded by a few tons of scrap aluminium - so be it - you have survived and can let the engineers worry from then on.
I'm 100% certain that the Queen
did not allow her
twin engined helicopters to be EOL'd to the ground. That was reserved for single engined aircraft only, at least since the 1970s when I was trained by the RAF. The reasons should be obvious.
The only time it was allowed on twin engined helicopters was for test pilots carrying out a trial. Even then, almost two decades after the aircraft came into service, during ideal and pre-planned circumstances over the very lengthy Boscombe Down runway, they managed to bend the one (Puma) they were allowed to EOL all the way to the ground. We (the OCU) had already come up with total engine failure/EOL drills and tail rotor malfunction drills in the simulator. At least one crew said after a tail rotor pitch spider failure over the sea that the training we provided saved their lives. Had they not been privy to it, the pilot said he would have possibly shut down the engines which was the incorrect thing to do in his case.
The most important thing on any helicopter to practice is the recognition and recovery from total power failure followed by a successful autorotation. Without that the chances of a successful landing are very poor indeed.
The chances of minor damage to an expensive helicopter on landing during an EOL are relatively high. Any minor damage would mean the job stops because we don't another aircraft in reserve, nor would the insurance companies allow us to train in that way.
Fixed wing jet pilots would throw up their hands in horror if it were suggested that they be required to carry out true engines off (deadstick) landings in the actual jet airframe for training purposes. Same thing.
So simulators are used, that's the whole point of them. However, beware of taking the handling responses to be as per the real helicopter in all extreme circumstances. What happens (i.e. what is programmed in the software) is based on a a "best guess" (off model) scenario because no-one has obtained real data from the aircraft, again for what should be obvious reasons.