two BO 105s down in the Antarctica

[Spunk]

According to this weekly report published by the AWI Alfred Wegner Institut (http://www.awi.de/de/infrastruktur/schiffe/polarstern/wochenberichte/alle_expeditionen/ant_xxviii/ant_xxviii2/27_dezember_2011/) on December 17th, 2011 a BO105 crashed on its way back from the research station "Neumeyer III" to its base, the research vessel "Polarstern".

Snow showers and strong winds (8bft. = 35-41 knots) are mentioned.
The backup helicopter (another BO 105) was sent out to rescue the crew and the pasengers but suffered a hard landing upon arrivel.

[Hedski]

Who's the operator?

[matt82]

I suppose Heliservice International from Emden, Germany.
They operate two Bo105 on Polarstern for many years...

[PO dust devil]

Do I recall correctly another accident involving the the Wegener inst. expedition a couple of years ago bo105 and polar stern?

Please not history repeating......all the best, that environment is absolutely without forgiveness. I will leave the arm chairing to those experts ....suffice to hope people don't think 35 - 41 knots is a severe condition.

DD

[helihub]

This operation is flown by German operator HeliService International - they have a page on their polar flights here (http://www.heliservice.de/polarflug.html)

Not the first time they have had an accident down there either - an accident in March 2008 in clear weather resulted in two fatal from 5 POB see Polarstern helicopter crashes near Antarctic research station Neumayer II - ROVworld Subsea Information (http://www.rovworld.com/article2057.html)

[Thone1]

IIRC on the 2008 incident the pilot suffered a white out, losing all reference as to the attitude of the helicopter.
I´ve read the accident report a few months ago, it´s available on the LBA website. (german only)

Thomas

[tecpilot]

losing all reference - yes, but while doing some kind of aerobatics on perfect weather conditions just for fun and to impress the others. A senseless accident and 2 lifes lost.

HeliService International is just a few years in this business. They operate on the Polarstern-research vessel just a few times a year, but the travels are not allways in Antarctica. In the past a lot of pilots were short hired for the short travels (mostly 6 weeks including sea-time) and with seldom further experiences in this special evironment or off-shore. The conditions on the ship and in flight ops are sometimes very rough. May be thats why not so much pilots were interested on a second trip.

[Spunk]

@tecpilot

and with seldom further experiences in this special evironment or off-shore
Basically I totally agree with you but in this specific case the pilot of the first helicopter which came down is very experienced in offshore as well as arctic and antarctic flying.

[tecpilot]

Nice to hear, sounds like that some things are getting better, than in the past.