Crash near Bude, Cornwall: 24th July 2011
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Common sense
Guys I have followed almost every helicopter crash that has been in the news over the past few years, all to often pilots are pushing the boundries when weather hits.
I bought a bell jet ranger and have a pilot employed to fly the machine, I am in and out of England every week from Ireland. Both myself and my pilot put safety first and if the VIS gets bad and we cannot skirt around it we land in an open field to it passes, there is nothing to be ashamed of.
Safety and life comes first.
I bought a bell jet ranger and have a pilot employed to fly the machine, I am in and out of England every week from Ireland. Both myself and my pilot put safety first and if the VIS gets bad and we cannot skirt around it we land in an open field to it passes, there is nothing to be ashamed of.
Safety and life comes first.
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BB
Do you have floats on your Jet Ranger. Just been over there myself and the IAA are telling me ALL single engine helicopters that fly over water MUST have floation, is that true?
Do you have floats on your Jet Ranger. Just been over there myself and the IAA are telling me ALL single engine helicopters that fly over water MUST have floation, is that true?
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4 is fatal
4 is of course a trick answer - and can have fatal results.
It is not possible to chose conditions which negate the need for the ability to maintain visual references. Yes you may well reduce the number of times you actually need to do what you should be doing all the time anyway as a VRF pilot. You're still just playing Russian Roulette with 1 bullet per 40 chambers instead of 30 ... still a really bad game and should not be played at all.
Weather forecasts are not even nearly reliable enough to keep you visual ...
As Vee-r says
Yes that is right - they often do not realise - they have not been taught/shown.... Some of them are highly conscientious fathers of small children with no desire to kill themselves....
some think it should not be taught and a few people here believe it is not worth teaching this because of some incomrehensible NONSENSE to do with some Darwinian principal meaning that successful businessmen being primarily PPL's who have not been through Military screening and are clearly too arrogant to want to stay alive, in some odd way deserve to die ... to me that is the incomprehensible theory...
TC ... you are so tantilizingly close to 'getting it' with your remark:
Some do learn the hard way... and narrowly avoid killing themselves ... I was shown how to stay visual a long time ago and I have never even nearly IIMCd ....
I really do think that there are two main camps opposed to showing people how to stay visual:
1) those that do not realise that they do anything to achieve assured Visual References (and for them it is not a skill at all - just perfectly normal to look out of the window and control where you go - they would be surprised if they saw the intelligent conscientious types being incapable and they (you?) might just spare a moment of thought to working out what it is they (you?) actually do to stay Visual)
AND
2) those who think that showing people how to keep their visual references when they encounter the reality of 'the weather of the day' might encourage them to fly in poor weather... (it seems immoral to me, to withhold life saving knowledge)
CAN IT POSSIBLY BE TRUE? :
that people who are capable of maintaining their visual references just don't and choose to die because of something to do with their business success which apparently means they are unsuited to be pilots because they can't make decisions - I am open minded , but that does not seem to make any sense to me .... if that is actually what you are saying then just run it past me again ..... please
Obviously that cannot be what you are saying (surely?).... the bit in the above which makes it ridiculous is the choice of people who ARE capable ... it is not surprising that people who are not capable of maintaining their VR go IIMC - some of them probably tried really hard to select appropriate weather, set themselves personal limits, secretly didn't want to kill themselves (despite being that hopelessly suicidal breed: Successful Businessmen!) others of them may have had an ego problem and been caught in the whole civilian/Darwin/PPL/ego problem .... but the common theme linking them was their Inability to Guard thier Visual References.
... they were just not equipped to Guard their Visual References...
... a vital element of Visual Reference Flying (not taught and not universally understood)
... until it is they will go on dying
(a 900 ft 'invisible' cloud on a 5K vis day gives a pilot at 1000ft and 90kts approximately 6 seconds to notice that the 'Horizon' is no longer running away... but it is actually coming at him. That is 6 seconds before you are actually in the Cloud. You have only 3 seconds to reconfigure your aircraft to descend at 8 Degrees descent angle if you are to avoid flying into the cloud (difficult to acheive from 90kts). The pilot was flying with the 'horizon' at 4 Degrees below his horizontal ... the 'horizon' became 8 degrees down after just 3 seconds).
'Invisible clouds' are clouds with the same tone of grey as the BAD Vis - making them indistinguishable until they obscure something
It is not possible to chose conditions which negate the need for the ability to maintain visual references. Yes you may well reduce the number of times you actually need to do what you should be doing all the time anyway as a VRF pilot. You're still just playing Russian Roulette with 1 bullet per 40 chambers instead of 30 ... still a really bad game and should not be played at all.
Weather forecasts are not even nearly reliable enough to keep you visual ...
As Vee-r says
Do people that end up in these situations not realise how quickly you can go from 1 mile vis in mist to in the cloud at 60 knots? By the time you notice the visibility dropping below your 1,500 metres you may not have time to execute a 180.
some think it should not be taught and a few people here believe it is not worth teaching this because of some incomrehensible NONSENSE to do with some Darwinian principal meaning that successful businessmen being primarily PPL's who have not been through Military screening and are clearly too arrogant to want to stay alive, in some odd way deserve to die ... to me that is the incomprehensible theory...
TC ... you are so tantilizingly close to 'getting it' with your remark:
I re-iterate: it's a catch 22 for PPL's: they have to stay alive long enough to experience and learn from those things that stop them from living long enough!!!!
I really do think that there are two main camps opposed to showing people how to stay visual:
1) those that do not realise that they do anything to achieve assured Visual References (and for them it is not a skill at all - just perfectly normal to look out of the window and control where you go - they would be surprised if they saw the intelligent conscientious types being incapable and they (you?) might just spare a moment of thought to working out what it is they (you?) actually do to stay Visual)
AND
2) those who think that showing people how to keep their visual references when they encounter the reality of 'the weather of the day' might encourage them to fly in poor weather... (it seems immoral to me, to withhold life saving knowledge)
CAN IT POSSIBLY BE TRUE? :
that people who are capable of maintaining their visual references just don't and choose to die because of something to do with their business success which apparently means they are unsuited to be pilots because they can't make decisions - I am open minded , but that does not seem to make any sense to me .... if that is actually what you are saying then just run it past me again ..... please
Obviously that cannot be what you are saying (surely?).... the bit in the above which makes it ridiculous is the choice of people who ARE capable ... it is not surprising that people who are not capable of maintaining their VR go IIMC - some of them probably tried really hard to select appropriate weather, set themselves personal limits, secretly didn't want to kill themselves (despite being that hopelessly suicidal breed: Successful Businessmen!) others of them may have had an ego problem and been caught in the whole civilian/Darwin/PPL/ego problem .... but the common theme linking them was their Inability to Guard thier Visual References.
... they were just not equipped to Guard their Visual References...
... a vital element of Visual Reference Flying (not taught and not universally understood)
... until it is they will go on dying
(a 900 ft 'invisible' cloud on a 5K vis day gives a pilot at 1000ft and 90kts approximately 6 seconds to notice that the 'Horizon' is no longer running away... but it is actually coming at him. That is 6 seconds before you are actually in the Cloud. You have only 3 seconds to reconfigure your aircraft to descend at 8 Degrees descent angle if you are to avoid flying into the cloud (difficult to acheive from 90kts). The pilot was flying with the 'horizon' at 4 Degrees below his horizontal ... the 'horizon' became 8 degrees down after just 3 seconds).
'Invisible clouds' are clouds with the same tone of grey as the BAD Vis - making them indistinguishable until they obscure something
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Cause: Successful businessman?
Quebec businessman, granddaughter among the dead in helicopter crash - The Globe and Mail
It'll just keep happening while (ex mil?) IMC helicopter pilots who don't understand this issue keep crediting it to Darwin ... this type of tragedy is avoidable. Something can be done...
VRF is not the same discipline....
TC: Don't get personal, let the merit of the discussion stand on it's own, I've watched you fail to grasp basics of helicopter flight (eg Vortex ring state) don't let your experience cloud your superior judgment and try and take a fresh look..... Do you stay rigidly VMC ? If so how? Lack of respect for VRF has crashed many professional pilots 2xChelsea AS355s, 1 Police EC135, 2xNorth Sea S61, AS365, A109 etc...
It'll just keep happening while (ex mil?) IMC helicopter pilots who don't understand this issue keep crediting it to Darwin ... this type of tragedy is avoidable. Something can be done...
VRF is not the same discipline....
TC: Don't get personal, let the merit of the discussion stand on it's own, I've watched you fail to grasp basics of helicopter flight (eg Vortex ring state) don't let your experience cloud your superior judgment and try and take a fresh look..... Do you stay rigidly VMC ? If so how? Lack of respect for VRF has crashed many professional pilots 2xChelsea AS355s, 1 Police EC135, 2xNorth Sea S61, AS365, A109 etc...
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AnFI
Do you actually fly helos yourself? If so, what experience?
And where exactly is the relevance of the Quebec R44 accident to your unorthodox campaign?
An awful lot more people die in automobile accidents than flying. Any views on what should be done to minimise these? Did you have any training to drive in poor visibility - you know, rain, mist? Even fog perhaps? Do you think others should have?
Do you actually fly helos yourself? If so, what experience?
And where exactly is the relevance of the Quebec R44 accident to your unorthodox campaign?
An awful lot more people die in automobile accidents than flying. Any views on what should be done to minimise these? Did you have any training to drive in poor visibility - you know, rain, mist? Even fog perhaps? Do you think others should have?
ANFI - I asked a simple polite question: you know what I do. What do you do for a living? Plain and simple. Others have asked but you evade the question. Why is that. What are you afraid of?
[And I won't bite with that last comment of yours, either
]
[And I won't bite with that last comment of yours, either
]
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Yea - I have made pretty clear that the whole macho willy waiving culture is IMO not relevant. So I do not wish to answer that OFF TOPIC question.
I may not have a great deal of experience - I do have a pretty strong feel for what the cause of a great proportion of these accidents is - and the merit of the 'argument' should stand by itself... I also feel a moral duty to try and do something.
It is just so much easier to criticise that to DO something....
You could keep an open mind ... could you answer my ON TOPIC questions ..... please?
You might concede that advice from your world does not necessarily translate well to the Private Civil VMC world... try and see it from another place ... perhaps?
You might agree that staying VMC is one of the most important tasks of a VFR pilot in a VMC machine. Do you?
You could perhaps concede that it is possible that some pilots do not recognise the imminent loss of their Visual References.
Do you believe that?
We could perhaps show them how to not just blunder into IMC... It might help ... don't you think?
Do YOU have a better suggestion?
(Or anything constructive to say?)
There was an attempt to fix this problem by introducing 5hrs IRF training ... at least someone was trying!!
There has not been an attempt to solve this problem by showing people HOW to keep Visual References regardless of the conditions encountered...
Worth a try - don't you think?
Or perhaps you could just try critiquing a bit of simplified test logic:
Given:
People who know how to keep Visual References don't IIMC.
People who die in IIMC incidents didn't intend to die.
Then it follows:
People who die in IIMC accidents do not know how to keep their Visual References. Q.E.D.
Anyone trying to fix this problem from any point of view is fine in my book .... but anyone trying to 'attack' someone who is, is just plain disgusting.
RotorSpeed
More people die in helicopters per person.hour than cars - I think.
and
They do make many public campaigns wrt automobiles to get people to slow down so that they can stop in the distance they can see. In helicoptering (or whatever you call it) the official advice is to NOT SLOW DOWN and DESCEND because you might bump into the ground. You agree with that?
and
Quebec - reinforces that Successful Businessman is an accident cause (as suggested here on PPrune)
I may not have a great deal of experience - I do have a pretty strong feel for what the cause of a great proportion of these accidents is - and the merit of the 'argument' should stand by itself... I also feel a moral duty to try and do something.
It is just so much easier to criticise that to DO something....
You could keep an open mind ... could you answer my ON TOPIC questions ..... please?
You might concede that advice from your world does not necessarily translate well to the Private Civil VMC world... try and see it from another place ... perhaps?
You might agree that staying VMC is one of the most important tasks of a VFR pilot in a VMC machine. Do you?
You could perhaps concede that it is possible that some pilots do not recognise the imminent loss of their Visual References.
Do you believe that?
We could perhaps show them how to not just blunder into IMC... It might help ... don't you think?
Do YOU have a better suggestion?
(Or anything constructive to say?)
There was an attempt to fix this problem by introducing 5hrs IRF training ... at least someone was trying!!
There has not been an attempt to solve this problem by showing people HOW to keep Visual References regardless of the conditions encountered...
Worth a try - don't you think?
Or perhaps you could just try critiquing a bit of simplified test logic:
Given:
People who know how to keep Visual References don't IIMC.
People who die in IIMC incidents didn't intend to die.
Then it follows:
People who die in IIMC accidents do not know how to keep their Visual References. Q.E.D.
Anyone trying to fix this problem from any point of view is fine in my book .... but anyone trying to 'attack' someone who is, is just plain disgusting.
RotorSpeed
More people die in helicopters per person.hour than cars - I think.
and
They do make many public campaigns wrt automobiles to get people to slow down so that they can stop in the distance they can see. In helicoptering (or whatever you call it) the official advice is to NOT SLOW DOWN and DESCEND because you might bump into the ground. You agree with that?
and
Quebec - reinforces that Successful Businessman is an accident cause (as suggested here on PPrune)
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Rotorspeed - maybe this will help?
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AnFI
I was shown how to stay visual a long time ago and I have never even nearly IIMCd
ANfi - stick to your day time job (is it populating wikipedia or amending thesaurus'? because I think you have sent everyone else here - to sleep. Toodle pip Zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
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TC - illuminating as ever
TC - u complain when I don't answer your irrelevant question - but u don't answer any ON TOPIC question yourself... and then you are just plain rude.
Not to mention your liberal insults of the dead - ref Darwin and ego etc
... and adding nothing to the solution
Uncivilised ... is the correct word I think.
Good night! ...... 
Not to mention your liberal insults of the dead - ref Darwin and ego etc
... and adding nothing to the solution
Uncivilised ... is the correct word I think.
Good night!
......
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AnFi, are your rambling opinions based upon your own experience or Googled theory? You may wish to avoid the question by lamely declaring it Off Topic but the is little point in constructing such long posts if you don't care if your opinions are respected. If you don't, why bother? It's not 'willy waving' or 'hours snobbery' to simply ask you DO YOU FLY HELICOPTERS OR NOT??!!
Put up or shut up.
Put up or shut up.
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AnFI
Given your concern on maximum visibility, how come our comments to me are in a tiny point size?
So the Quebec accident proves that being a successful businessman is an accident cause, does it?
Well I'm pretty sure you're not really a pilot, nor now a successful businessman. But I do know you're a grade A moron.
Given your concern on maximum visibility, how come our comments to me are in a tiny point size?
So the Quebec accident proves that being a successful businessman is an accident cause, does it?
Well I'm pretty sure you're not really a pilot, nor now a successful businessman. But I do know you're a grade A moron.
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Moron - gee thanks...
Given your concern on maximum visibility, how come our comments to me are in a tiny point size?
So the Quebec accident proves that being a successful businessman is an accident cause, does it?
Well I'm pretty sure you're not really a pilot, nor now a successful businessman. But I do know you're a grade A moron.
B47 I do hold a current UKPPLH as well as other 'qualifications', and a reasonable degree of experience. FWIW
I don't think it is productive to discuss other than the issue... and you didn't answer my question to you, nor did TC nor Crab.
You'd rather talk about unproductive irrelevance?
I think there is a danger in IMC pilots giving the wrong advice to VMC pilots.... there is a way too casual respect for the Solid need to stay VMC which VMC PPL must have very firmly or they will and do die...
Sweet little 8yr old girls should not have to die because this topic can't be advanced .... this forum should be a great place to do it if the conversation could be a little more mature and respectful.
Please attack the substance of what I am saying by all means .... but leave the personal insult side of it out ... eh?
Moron yourself - with brass knobs on... just sounds a bit childish to me...
..... anyway I agree with TC - I'm beginning to bore even myself do death
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AnFI
You were taught long ago 'how to guard your visual references'. What precisely is this technique you talk of? I've run out of vmc a few times and variously punched up, turned about, landed out or latched onto a hover reference. I may be one of the 20% that needs to know what you're talking about 