A bit too close for comfort!

[cptjim]

Found this vid on Youtube last night......:eek:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q3idQKi5EqM

Anyone have a spare pair of underpants for the chap at the left rear? :E

[[email protected]]

Not sure what possessed the pilot to try and lift with a man under the disc near the tail. The groundie was probably looking at the evidence of the TR drive failure and could have prevented the pilot getting airborne if he had been given half a chance. What a lucky guy!!!if he had nine lives, he used them all up then!

[Lenticular]

What the hell is wrong with people. There appears to be absolutley no proceedure in place for helideck operations. The pitch, roll and heave look to be out of limits, well the pitch and heave at any rate.
As for the helicopter, using the 480 with its single engine and with no floatation equipment in that enviroment is just a recipe for disaster.

That is one very, very lucky pilot.

[Farmer 1]

It's always so easy to criticise after the event, and from a distance, but I think a prize could be offered to the first person who finds an example of a safe practice going on here.

How many examples of a safe landing have there been after tail rotor failure? And on a moving deck? Is it possible he took off inadvertently, when the deck fell away? A miraculous escape for all involved. That could have been very messy indeed.

[yellowbird135]

I know this incident happened on a Greenpeace tub. I also know that not all of these boys and girls (enthousiastic as they are)are highly professional boatcrews.
The story was that the lift-off was unintentional (obviously no hands on the controls) and when he corrected he slammed the tail to the deck and was lucky enough to dump the 480 on the deck net.

[Barndweller]

And that is why we have deck nets ladies and gents. Had there not been one, the aircraft would almost certainly have continued spinning and left the deck or hit the superstructure.

Lucky!

[MightyGem]

The groundie was probably looking at the evidence of the TR drive failure and could have prevented the pilot getting airborne
Errr...I don't think he had a tail rotor failure before he got airborne.

[on21]

Greenpeace, say's it all really. What a bunch of amateurs. :D

[kissmysquirrel]

Extremely lucky chaps. You can see the ship start to pitch/heave and the aircraft gets airborne as it's not fastened down. The guy on the starboard side is so lucky but he probably had no idea the a/c would lift off. How the hell the pilot managed to keep the a/c onboard is unbelievable. Good piloting skills or a spot of luck?

As mentioned above, sea state is obviously out of limits for the equipment available and a/c.

:hmm:

[Aser]

Another one to the archive...
download link http://chi-v34.chi.youtube.com/get_video?video_id=q3idQKi5EqM
rename to xxx.flv and download a flv player.

[peterperfect]

Barndweller,

General practice is when skid equipped helicopters routinely use a helideck, a surface net is not recommended. Admittedly the net appeared to reduce the turn rate but only because the tie down snapped and he probably shut down pronto at the same time.

Reason: Front and/or more likely the back of the skids can easily get snagged in the surface net leading to dynamic rollover.

Ref: CAP 437 5th Edition Chapt 3, 1.2 Note at the bottom of the table.

Pilot did remarkably well though after the inadvertant lift off.
pp.

[IntheTin]

Great flying in what could have ended up a horrible situation :D

New pants for the deck hand :}

[scooter boy]

Deathstrom for sale, (er I mean Enstrom). I careful owner, slight damage to tail rotor, brown staining on front seats, smells slightly of hippies, cannabis and seawater, runs on lentils and chicken****.
1-800 GREENPEACE

Save the Whale

:E SB

[GLSNightPilot]

The heave isn't that bad - I've landed on many vessels moving that much, both barges and seismic vessels. You do have to pay attention all the time you're on the deck, though. Putting skids on nets like that is begging for dynamic rollover and slipping around. The skids are only touching wet rope in a very few places, and thus move around easily. The potential for getting the end of a skid underneath the rope as it moves and thus rolling over is very high.

My initial take, from just watching the video and knowing nothing else, is that nobody knew what they were doing. The pilot apparently wasn't paying attention while sitting there, and the crew started trying to repair the net with the blades still turning. It's amazing that the right front skid didn't get caught during the initial movement, and that the rear crewman didn't get hit by the tail rotor. Helicopter ops on vessels are no place for amateurs.

[Land of LA]

Well I have not landed on a ship but I think the pilot lost track of where the hell he was and what he was supposed to be doing. Glad to see no one was injured or worse. Pay attention!!!!

[crispy69]

It is a pity they were out at sea I am sure if the crew man and pilot brought a lotto ticket that day they would be millionaires

[[email protected]]

I stand corrected Mighty Gem, on closer inspection it is clear he trashes the TR when he smacks the tail in.

[Barndweller]

PP.

Fair point. The risk you describe can be minimised though, by properly maintaining the net and ensuring it is correctly tensioned. A net that is loose will prove just as big a hazard for a wheeled helicopter as for a skidded one.

Cheers
Barny

[OffshoreHeli]

If you look prior to him getting thrown in the air the tail moves up and then settles. The heave may be within limits but the rate of heave when the incident happened was,nt, particularly if he was not used to taking off under these conditions. As previously stated, it all looks a bit amateurish.

[jetflite]

This footage is gold. . great job by the pilot to get the deathstrom on the deck. :D

[Lenticular]

This footage is gold. . great job by the pilot to get the deathstrom on the deck. :D

Looks to be more by luck than judgement to me. The guy is out of control.

The Enstrom 480 is a very strong aircraft and with the large spread on the skids gives it great stability and makes it very forgiving in the situation in the video. I can think of some aircraft that would of rolled over.

Once again a lucky guy to walk away from that one.

[thecontroller]

mmm.. when sitting on a heaving deck, like this, do you have to keep adjusting the cyclic to prevent the heli taking off? i would think if the guy had the collective full down then take-off is impossible??

[Farmer 1]

It is easily possible for the deck to fall away fast enough at least for the helicopter to become very light on the skids. Then, it does not take much of a lateral movement of the vessel for the helicopter to start skidding across the deck.

That's when the problems start.

[Cyclic Hotline]

Does anyone have a link to an accident report for this?

[Heli_Sticktime]

Very lucky is what I say, why a single for off-shore ops, with no floats:(
They're looking for Sh*t

[Doc Cameron]

You must maintain the disc horizontal to the deck - so no, don't chase against the deck pitching or rolling. A multitude of reasons for this!

Having spent a week in the sim doing this excercise many times... He was either very skilled or very lucky (or a combination). It's tough enough trying to keep the aircraft within the confines of a huge runway, let alone a small helideck!

Cheers,

Doc

[BossEyed]

Does anyone have a link to an accident report for this?

There's nothing on the NTSB site (http://www.ntsb.gov/ntsb/Response2.asp) for N480KP. I wonder how recently this happened?

Lucky, lucky people.

[LIMIT NOT TARGET]

Answering to 'the controllers' question, I think that is safe to cyclic to adjust for pitch and roll to stop or minimize sliding. Adjustments have to be small and you have to over come your tendency to jam the cyclic hard. Though you do have to know yours and the aircraft limits. To much input and you can mast bump, and as the video shows when the ship drops out from under you, you will be heading very quickly in the direction that your cyclic is pointing.
I think that the pilot thought that his rear right strap was still on, and that was why he tried to go backwards, in a very out of controlled way to say the least. Instead of flying away to the safety in wild blue yonder.
But yes a very un-organised situation.
Though I think the pilot did do a good job of keeping it dry, though maybe not his pants.
Wouldn't negative pitch be wonderful in such a situation.

[rotorrookie]

Again! collective power control. ...... how many circles to you think he would have done on the deck if he had overhead throttles:confused:
Good pilot skills though, to land safe in that situation:D

[BlenderPilot]

I vividly remember hovering an E480B for a friend as a favor a couple of years back, I had never been in one and the mechanic walked me thru it, and I remember it had a collective friction lever which if let go completely, the collective would go up by itself since it's spring loaded, I remember loosening that thing and being unable to remove my hand from the collective at all because if I did the collective would come up, nasty design characteristic in my opinion, maybe that friction came off at the wrong time.

[Brian Abraham]

Blender you are so right about the Enstrom collective coming up if the friction is not on TIGHT. Something that only catches you out once and this may very well be one of those occasions.

[Cyclic Hotline]

Who has jurisdiction over this accident? If this accident occurred on the high seas off the coast of Ireland with an N registered aircraft, who or where would you report it to? Is there even a requirement to report it in this instance?

Any ideas?

[gadgetguru]

surely either the country of registration of the helo (or the ship)
would have a legal requirement to report to the appropriate authority

[thecontroller]

i dont see how moving the cyclic around to counter-act the pitching of the ship will help if the collective is full down. if the collective is full down then there is no thrust so moving the cyclic around will make no difference??

[TiPwEiGhT]

The pilot in question is a frequent visitor to Pprune. I am sure in his own time he will tell you all about. Good on him for getting it back on the deck.

TiP:O

[Scubs]

I reckon he spent the rest of the day trying to work out how to do the lotto from a boat!

[Tweedles]

Blender and Brian,

No problems with the design of the 480B collective, your aircraft were just misrigged. On a properly rigged a/c, before start, with friction off, the collective will stay full down since the spring will be over center. Lift the lever a few degrees and the spring up-force comes online. With rotors turning the spring is still over center with full down collective, but once raised the spring balances the collective forces very well...when rigged properly.

[Gaseous]

T. I agree. The design is fine and when rigged right it will fly 'hands off' so you can play with the radio while your left hand holds the cyclic. The collective should stay where you put with no friction applied.

However, I have flown quite a few with collective problems. Its a maintenance issue. The collective spring preload should be checked by flight testing when any adjustment of the control system is performed. It is a quick and simple adjustment that seems to get overlooked and is potentially disastrous. It also makes it most unpleasant to fly.

If you find an Enstrom that does this, get it sorted out. It should have been done before it was released to service.

[topendtorque]

surely either the country of registration of the helo (or the ship)
would have a legal requirement to report to the appropriate authority

A check with the Darwin AMSA office reveals that any ship encounbtering an accident in international waters has an obligation to report to their country of registration. even if it's a death at sea, the receiving port will not want to know about it they simply pass details on to the nearest consular office.

i don't know what severity of accident is required before the ship has that obligation.

The Chicago Convention seems a bit hard to follow, but the definitions in the ICAO agreement might suggest that is the same case or that it would extend to where the helicopters operating base is and or the owner wherever it is registered. if that makes sense.

maybe someone who knows ICAO rules backwards could let us know.

[hotzenplotz]

The description of the video on the youtube website says: This is a Turbine Enstrom Helicopter on the Heli Pad of a Greenpeace ship some where off the coast of Ireland. One of the deck straps has not been released correctly, with what was very nearly disastrous consequence. Pilot skill and quick thinking saved the day. But I can just see the two straps that get removed by the groundcrew.
Maybe the rear end of the right skid was stuck to the net and the ground guy tried to fix that.
What I dont understand is that the engines got started and the disk loaded, before the straps were removed.
What is the "by-the-book" procedure in a deck operation like this?

[rudestuff]

What has it being a single without floats got to do with it?
there wasn't an engine failure and it wasn't a water landing!
Don't worry - just stay inside your plastic bubble where you're safe...

[crispy69]

I dont fly off any ships or rigs but if I was doing it as a regular part of my job there is no way I would be doing it without floats. Single engine or twin it seems common sense (not that there is such a thing).
That ocean looks big, mean and cold I bet it would be hard to spot one guy floating in it.:sad:

crispy

[Heli-Ice]

It seems to me that the sea was a bit rough and ships tails tend to jump in conditions like that.

I guess you have to fly the disk to try and follow the ships pitch to prevent this to happen? .... or just go flying when the weather is better....

Even though some may find this a silly move to go for a flight in these conditions bu my hat is off to the pilot for being able to keep it on board! :ok:

[hotzenplotz]

***push***
The description of the video on the youtube website says:

"This is a Turbine Enstrom Helicopter on the Heli Pad of a Greenpeace ship some where off the coast of Ireland. One of the deck straps has not been released correctly, with what was very nearly disastrous consequence. Pilot skill and quick thinking saved the day."

But I can just see the two straps that get removed by the groundcrew.
Maybe the rear end of the right skid was stuck to the net and the ground guy tried to fix that.
What I dont understand is that the engines got started and the disk loaded, before the straps were removed.

What is the "by-the-book" procedure in a deck operation like this?

[Two's in]

It wasn't just the pilot and the first handler that had a lucky day, the crewmembers that walked back under the disc at minimum rpm and maximum blade sail on that moving deck were all candidates for new hat sizes. Breathtaking imcompetence.

[Chairmanofthebored]

The landing was awesome but the take off a bit average. I am certain that when other members of this forum - ROTORBOY etc get into this one they will tell you they have operated in worse. The heave of the deck is consistent, he is just freed at the wrong moment.
He save his life and an aircraft there - well done.