View Full Version : Low level flying
rogerk
18th Oct 2020, 13:01
All the posts on here about low level flying made me remember the "lowest"
AAC Bell 47 Sioux - 5 feet !!
Shackman
18th Oct 2020, 14:10
Was that 'authorised min' or just before it hit the ground!
rogerk
18th Oct 2020, 14:15
Was that 'authorised min' or just before it hit the ground!
.. just taking a chance before hopping over next hedge !!
Vonrichthoffen
18th Oct 2020, 14:33
Did 2 feet in a Seeking Mk 2 once, but then was just the co-pilot !!!
Audax
18th Oct 2020, 14:53
Whilst trying the 5ft bit, didn’t an Army Sioux dip a skid into the water, possibly in a Lough in NI?
Herod
18th Oct 2020, 15:52
To quote an old Flight Commander: "If you don't hit your wheels on the ground every hundred yards, you are not low flying". Admittedly, Wessex; down and welded.
Mogwi
18th Oct 2020, 15:59
To quote an old Flight Commander: "If you don't hit your wheels on the ground every hundred yards, you are not low flying". Admittedly, Wessex; down and welded.
Ah yes, that is why we flew with the brakes off.
Lowest ever REAL low flying I have done was on 1st May 82, when the HUD camera recorded the radalt flicking between 5 and 15 ft at 480 kts on the run-in to deliver CBUs on Stanley. Seemed safer down there somehow with all the flak flying around!
Swing the lamp!
Mog
Salute!
Love those stories from the Mog.
I never flew real low in combat or even the other coupla thousand of hours back home. Maybe 100 feet, but I liked about 200 and it worked well in real life and one particular time at Red Flag when being tracked by a SA-6 and the video was used by the staff at the mission debrief.
Unlike Mog's experience with Argie gunners way south, the Vee up North were the most experienced AAA folks in the world. Especially trying to nail we Yankee Air Pirates. They had 7 years of practice before we ended that debacle. I only saw the supreme expression of their integrated AAA and SAM deal a few times in December of 1972. I was impressed.
The Brits and the folks they trained always had a easy time flying low when I flew with them. That includes a foreign group or two. But lowest I ever saw was a single Cunnuck in an F-5E evading outta the tgt at Red Flag. We were up at 200 or so feet but our doppler 'dar grabbed him a mile or two ahead and he was low! Flying that low precludes a good check six scan or other things, but ...... So we calmly joined about a thousand feet or so each side and escorted him out. He was so low that he was weaving a bit left and right to avoid the tall cactii. When he finally realized we were there and friendly he waggled and pressed on a bit higher.
Lowest I ever got was as a stoopid nugget in a VooDoo. Setting up for a buzz job on the Gulf Coast and got down where the airflow actually tried to lift the nose. That was a long plane, so we were maybe 30 or 40 feet and 400 kt . Never did that again after thinking about it. Also had "advice" from my RIO behind me.
Good stuff.
Gums sends....
just another jocky
18th Oct 2020, 17:40
Run up to GW1, Saudi desert....."you are cleared to 0ft MSD" from our DetCO.
Churlish not to really.
spitfirek5054
18th Oct 2020, 17:52
To quote an old Flight Commander: "If you don't hit your wheels on the ground every hundred yards, you are not low flying". Admittedly, Wessex; down and welded.
Not down and welded,down and locked[ 7 1/2 years as Wessex HC 2 ground crew]
OK465
18th Oct 2020, 19:04
Flying that low precludes a good check six scan or other things, but ...... So we calmly joined about a thousand feet or so each side and escorted him out. He was so low that he was weaving a bit left and right to avoid the tall cactii. When he finally realized we were there and friendly he waggled and pressed on a bit higher.
:) Yeah, there's not a lot of multi-tasking capability available below 100'.
I recall in the late 70s, the USMC had some interest in adapting the ANG FWS low altitude training approach for their needs. I was in an A-7D chasing a USMC WTI IP in an A-4 at around 500k thru some of our profiles east of Yuma. When it came time for him to descend from 'comfort level' to the absolute minimum altitude he felt could fly, he pulled the power back slightly.
Starting to move relatively forward from a comfortable low altitude 'safety' (hah) chase position, I put out the speedbrake, a monstrous size piece of metal consisting pretty much of the entire bottom of the aircraft. At 500k the decel literally thru you forward in the cockpit, and with a hand on the stick, it went in the same direction.....down below 100'. :eek:
Never did that again. (Marines did adopt the program.)
ShyTorque
18th Oct 2020, 19:19
All the posts on here about low level flying made me remember the "lowest"
AAC Bell 47 Sioux - 5 feet !!
Was that minus 5 feet?
Herod
18th Oct 2020, 19:37
Not down and welded,down and locked[ 7 1/2 years as Wessex HC 2 ground crew
Nope "down and welded" You can't unlock and retract the gear on Westland's finest.
NutLoose
18th Oct 2020, 20:08
5 foot.... go ask the Swedes ;)
Swedish NH90 CFIT: Pilot Experience and Skating on Frozen Lake - Aerossurance (http://aerossurance.com/helicopters/nh90-cfit-pilot-experience/)
seriously, didn’t they operate between 30 and 60 ft?
John Eacott
18th Oct 2020, 22:19
A life after the Mil: 50ft probably doesn't sound much, but it was in a JetRanger filming a Ferrari down LaTrobe Street in Melbourne :p I couldn't go lower as the street lamps and tram wires were in the way...
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/769x589/latrobe_street_low_run_05_caa3f96f7bb1b4a442c6ba157fa98279da 954045.jpg
Shot from the recce run, too busy during the actual filming.
https://cimg8.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/1043x589/latrobe_street_low_run_inside_02_601f0e3b2d31a4e409f3a82ec37 c0f5c5a974a73.jpg
Salute!
Good poop, Okie
Didn't know you flew the Sluf before the Viper ( same as me). Seems rest here are all blokes, tho we had a great RAF exchange pilot in the 356th Green Demons. The Queen wouldn't let him deploy with us to Thailand, but he was there when we got back after our 6 month rotation.
Was one of the 354th TFW that got to submit our recommendations to TAC in 1974 about realistic low level training and tactics. We had just returned from Korat and got to know the Sandy and Knife escort stuff (as Hobo).
Gums sends...
Fareastdriver
19th Oct 2020, 08:25
That picture of L Trobe Street reminds reminds me of China. There Air Traffic is paramount and on their sayso rules are overthrown.
Doing an airborne video job for Wenzhao TV ATC authorised us down to ground level so I and the film crew had a great time.
pr00ne
19th Oct 2020, 08:29
Pah!
I managed to fly at mere inches off the deck.
Immediately before touchdown and immediately after take off...
SAMXXV
19th Oct 2020, 08:31
AAFCE TLP, Florennes, Belgium, July '91: Spent a month flying in a Belgian army Alouette 11 all over Europe. There was hardly a day when we didn't have to pick corn from the skids on our return... Flying under the power cables with skids clipping the crops - happy days!
https://cimg4.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x1333/20151110165509_01_e30f646752cedfa4cb342f7848cf8c19c8cf9b37.j pg
A refuelling stop.
https://cimg7.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x1333/20151110165024_09_c4b30fa6b7607deea7551b518f7708ca4ce7eed0.j pg
Belgium.
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x1333/20151110165024_03_08d67b08edff31ca40d57af9b0635abc8d31d281.j pg
Crop skimming.
https://cimg3.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/2000x1333/20151110165249_03_18e80fad0a9a3c27e9df5a76ff24160c101c22da.j pg
Buzzing a Dutch barge.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hDDBbmedrgk
OvertHawk
19th Oct 2020, 12:59
Many years ago low level over water on an empty sector we were called as traffic to a fixed wing:
"Traffic is a VFR helicopter three miles in your 12-oclock Mode c indicates... Ummmm... minus 100 feet"
"G-XX - confirm your altitude"
"Periscope depth"
Reading the radalt from the centre seat of the Puma:
"15 feet.......higher pitch........10 feet............higher again...........FIVE FEET............there's no more!"
The gear was up - the radalt was calibrated for zero with gear down.
It was not a comfortable experience at all!
lsh
:E
sycamore
19th Oct 2020, 16:55
Long ago and far away, the beaches of W Sarawak were pretty well unspoilt,shallow gradient,firm sand at the waters edge,and so it was a`game ` to run the nosewheels of the Whirlwind along the sandy shore at 90 kts; to clean the sand/mud off the wheels,we move to running along the `shallows`(no significant surf or breaking waves) or maybe a bit further out....anyone sitting in the cabin doorway got wet....
Then ,one would wait for an opportune night sortie,preferably with a full moon,and use the landing light....until the `grown-ups` heard about someone wrapping the front wheels in a fishing net ......
Advice..don`t do it on a river,,a floating branch could be still attached to a log,or a`log` could just be a croc......!!
nickp
19th Oct 2020, 18:01
There used to be a classic pic of a biplane water-skiing that always appeared in these discussions. Can anyone link to it?
sycamore
19th Oct 2020, 18:43
Try u-tube....
Thud_and_Blunder
19th Oct 2020, 20:21
https://cimg2.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune.org-vbulletin/736x488/cc0fd309038d858eea44047fda7a39ac_22dd6e7b3bb35ddb3c350102195 ad85954a51190.jpg
Not quite biplanes, but you get the general idea...
BSweeper
19th Oct 2020, 21:45
Hi Mog
I was a nav on 29 Sqn (F4s) when we down to Stanley in October 1982. I remember talking to a Harrier "mate" on arrival and, on asking him what bombing Stanley was like, he replied that the flak was so intense he actually stuck his head right down in the cockpit and flew lower and lower until it was going over his head. He then realised that at 30 feet, his bombs were never going to fuse properly but at that point he didn't care. You and he (and it may well have been you) were truly brave people.
the sweep
Ah yes, that is why we flew with the brakes off.
Lowest ever REAL low flying I have done was on 1st May 82, when the HUD camera recorded the radalt flicking between 5 and 15 ft at 480 kts on the run-in to deliver CBUs on Stanley. Seemed safer down there somehow with all the flak flying around!
Swing the lamp!
Mog
Mogwi
20th Oct 2020, 15:40
Hi Mog
I was a nav on 29 Sqn (F4s) when we down to Stanley in October 1982. I remember talking to a Harrier "mate" on arrival and, on asking him what bombing Stanley was like, he replied that the flak was so intense he actually stuck his head right down in the cockpit and flew lower and lower until it was going over his head. He then realised that at 30 feet, his bombs were never going to fuse properly but at that point he didn't care. You and he (and it may well have been you) were truly brave people.
the sweep
Aye, the climb to min release ht over the sand dunes (140ft if my recall is correct) seemed positively suicidal. That is when I copped a 20mm HE through the fin before ducking down again to pass ATC level with the windows, in thick smoke. Only discovered later that it was only a 2-storey building!
Kids today; they wouldn't believe it!
Mog