Today a MD 902, operated by the Police of Lower Saxony, Germany crashed at their homebase on the airport of Hannover after declaring emergency. ( possible loss of T/R-control ) The helicopter flipped over while attempting to land, all three on board escaped with minor injuries.

skadi

Looks like it was different one
I read they operate 3 MD902s (now 2 ) and two SA365s




Pics from http://www.nonstopnews.de/index.php?page=meldung&newsnr=6069

That MD 902 is from the Police in Stuttgart/ Baden-Würtenberg ( Southern Germany ), that one which crashed today was from the Police of Lower Saxony in Hannover in the northern Part of Germany.

skadi

Sorry if that added to the confusion then. I'll delete my original post.

Hi skadi,

with the video in mind the thought isn't that far fetched.

Due to the rumors network they had control difficulties in flight, did some approaches to evaluate and then made the final approach.
A/C drifted of the runway and turned over after touching the gras.
Seems like everything was done according to the book - but the luck was only sufficent for the occupants (only scratches, bruises and shock), not für the MD...

Greetings Flying Bull

I'm glad everyone made it out ok. This is the second 902 to go down in 2 weeks! http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=298613

From the pics it looks like that ship has had the tail boom extension mod.

Coconutty -- Interesting. A couple of months back an MD rep told me that the whole fleet had already been modded. Is this not the case?

All MD902s flying in Germany (about 10) got the thruster extension installed, including the one of the Police of Lower Saxony (D-HPNB) which crashed on 14/11/2007.


regards,
Jan

Turboshaft -

Don't know - If that's what the Rep said then that might be right.

Mine was just an observation from the pic's posted, after reading the first comment of

Any truth in the rumour that the uk police users have started a knee jerk reaction, units to fly into Staverton for checks?

on what and why.

Nothing on the MD site to instigate a check.

For what it is worth the literal translations of the German media texts talked of loss of tail rotor control and the 902 returning to Hanover shortly after take-off and then coming to grief in undertaking a run on landing. [Torque] toppled them during the 'skid landing'.

Always a difficult area using literal translations so I guess we will have to await further reports either way.

LOKON, why would you call it a knee jerk reaction? Something has happened and, with a max of only just over 1 1/2 hours flying time to get to Staverton, all of the units and their personnel can have their minds put at rest. At the very least I would call it a duty of care and, from a flight safety point of view, a very good move. A lot of manufacturers and their agents may have taken time, considered the markets reaction to a recall and decided to wait. If the recall has been made by either PAs or MD then I for one think that they ought to be commended!

Beeing german I might can shed some light on the afore mentioned translations...
Following the usual practice everywhere in the world also the german media tried to put the maneuver in "simple" but technically wrong terms, using car-driving terminology and broad assumptions like:

- "the pilot had to maintain a speed of at least 90 knots (!), otherwise the helicopter would have skidded uncontrollably"
Holy sh** THATs fast! Having never flown one, what's the maximum touchdown speed for the MD902?

- apparently he aborted two attempts and touched down on the third only to veer off the runway a 100 yards later.

Another newspaper interviewed a police helicopter pilot; the gentleman was quoted that "it seemed he had trouble with the anti torque system" - nothing more specific. It was not mentioned if the guy flies for that same unit.

A shame, the aircraft was worth 7 million euros (€1 = ~ $1.40+) and (quote) "nobody insures police equipment... no cars or helicopters"

I tried to find anything on the BFU (the german NTSB) and found nothing... their latest bulletin is from august 2007

Phil

ANON it might only be 1 1/2 hours, but it looks from here that the tail is wagging the dog!

90 kts isn't the run on speed

Phil77 -

If you have jammed right pedal or total loss of thruster control you make a high speed approach and bleed the speed off with a cyclic flare. As the aircraft starts to sink, you level the nose and make your running landing. "All" you have to do then is co-ordinate the raising of the collective (to cushion the landing) with the nose pointing along the runway direction whilst simultaneously rolling off two (very stiff) throttles.

It is not an emergency requiring an immediate landing, so the smart thing to do is have a few practise runs before you commit to landing, which probably explains the two "aborted" attempts.

However, the only other loss of NOTAR control I can recall was in Japan, and I believe they crashed too. So maybe it's an easier procedure to write than to actually perform "live"

A couple of weeks ago, a MD 900/902 in Austria also suffered possible loss NOTAR control and crashed.
http://www.pprune.org/forums/showthread.php?t=298613 .

Rumours are, that a link to the thruster control has broken....?

Anything to do with the tailboom extension???

skadi

LOKON, does it matter much which end of the dog is in charge of the wagging? What has effectively happened is that, in a very short space of time the UK Police/HEMS fleet will have been checked and, as far as I know, they've all had a clean bill of health so far.

skadi - I should have said the only other confirmed loss of NOTAR control. It was quite a few years ago, so obviously not thruster extension related that time. Not heard anything definite about the other recent accident yet.