If you care to read my other post, I'll go with Shawn, however as previously mentioned, chances are you won't have much of a choice.
I do however care enough about the dark side of these threads where the actions of some are considered the norm, and those actions are only supported by the impressionable.
The real tale behind the video;
Full down auto from HV curve
Last Veterans day ....November 11th, I was flying around and decided to go up to the airport. I landed and noticed a friend of mine watching. I decided to show him a very aggressive rate of climb...so I took off and pulled the collective like I had never before.
I am kicking myself as I let euphoria take over common sense. The helicopter was climbing like a homesick angel, when I noticed my rotor rpm's were declining. There isnt a torque meter...or a manifold pressure gauge since its a turbine...and its not necessary to pull a lot of collective...which I did anyway as I was caught up in my dumbass moment. I saw the rotor rpm's down...and dropped collective.
Unfortunately, this caused the turbine's rpm to surge....and it overshot the overspeed limit, shutting the turbine down......flameout! I immediately dropped all the collective and here I was at low airspeed, no more than 100 feet up....and dropping like a rock.
I lowered the nose trying to milk out as much energy as I could. The ground was rushing up...and my only possibility of saving this ship was to do a runon landing at around 40 mph. I landed straight with my flight path which started in the grass on the west side of the runway...then sliding on a diagonal across the asphalt runway...into the grass on the other side before stopping.
I held full collective on the whole ground run on to minimize my decceleration so as to help keep from flipping on my nose. It came to a stop...and I lowered the collective...got out and checked it over. I started the turbine up and all was fine. It was getting dark so I left it in a hangar...checked it over the next morning and flew it back to my shop. I just happened to have had my skid mounted video on...and it was very clear.
If you watch it...the video starts at my shop where I keep the helicopter...then you can see me flying around a farm tractor. I land at the local airport...and at 5:28 I lift off and start doing something I had never done...over torqued the collective.
At 5:42 in the video, you can see a left yaw when my turbine flamed out...and the rest is history. Time came to a crawl. I let euphoria get me into this situation....and I was given the chance to redeem myself by doing what was necessary to hit the tiny keyhole that would save my helicopter.
I have been told that this is probably one of a few if not the only actual video of a real flameout in the HV curve and able to fly it away afterwards.
I am just a fledgling helicopter pilot.....and I learned more in that 10 seconds than any instructor could bark in my ear in a year.
I had the dreaded 3 C's on this flight. Crowd...one is enough.....Camera.....yep ..it was on....confidence....you bet....
Thanks for all the comments. I beat myself about this, and learned a lot. I have an excellent helicopter that I almost destroyed by asking it to do more than it was designed for.
I had a chance to save it though, and I did. I am a fledgling helicopter pilot but having this happen on Veterans day made me feel like maybe I am more of a helicopter pilot now, at least a veteran of having a real auto at a most serious time.
I have over 800 hours in gyroplanes and have had 18 forced landings in them without a scratch. Helicopters are a different animal, and I will be a better pilot by keeping myself at flight speeds and altitudes where another auto will be a lot easier to handle.