Hi folks,
I'm hoping to get some thoughts from people who fly helicopters as I don't know anything about them but I've found myself in a minor dilemma. I don't want to jump to any conclusions so I'm hoping that some people with more experience can help shed some light on my plight?
I live in Australia in a semi-rural area where all the properties are 30-60 acre blocks, mostly run as farming for vegetables/chickens/flowers/cattle/horses/etc. I have horses on my block, both my own and other peoples' horses and they're all horses in regular training and involved in competitive sports.
The property over the back fence is a commercial business, also on large acreage, who have helicopters come and go periodically.
For years there has never been an issue with the horses and the helicopters, except about 6 months back where one helicopter came directly over the house at a height that seemed too low as I could make out all the detail on the underside of the helicopter and the noise from even inside the house made me panic. It then flew down over the horse paddocks, where all the horses got a fright and ran, leaving some with (minor) injuries.
I emailed the company (they're a fairly large operation and it's not a case of being able to lean over the fence and talk to them) and asked them to please be mindful of flying so low over the horses as scaring them could easily result in a panicked horse running through the fence and breaking its neck/legs/anything. The email was very polite as I've never had issues with the neighbours (and they've never had issues with us) and I definitely didn't want any hostile relationship between us. I also explained that I'd never had issues with the helicopters before, but felt that this particular one was flying far lower than any I'd seen before it.
They actually responded right away, within about 10 minutes, saying that the pilot was still on the property, that they'd let him know that his flight in had upset the horses and would make sure he stayed a bit higher. All has been mostly good since then but this particular helicopter still seems to fly lower than all the others, and also seems to circle over the horses' paddocks.
Fortunately I have cameras that overlook the horses so that I can check on them while I'm at work, and one particular camera regularly captures this same helipcopter doing his circles over the horses' paddocks. My dilemma is that... as someone who knows nothing about helicopters... I find myself assuming that this pilot is doing this on purpose because he feels slighted that I asked him to not scare the horses. But I don't want to jump to conclusions.
Would anyone be able to take a look and tell me what is technically going on from a pilot's perspective? Is this some sort of pre-landing pattern that has to happen for him to land? Is it specific to different types of helicopters as no other helicopter does this pattern at this height?
Fortunately I've never seen him fly again at the (low) height from the original complaint but I feel he's inching ever lower just to try and scare the horses.
If anybody could share their thoughts I would be very grateful.
https://youtu.be/fUqVY1VqP00