Wire strike protection?
Join Date: Aug 2006
Location: Wiltshire, UK
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Any stats on the number of occurrences, without wire strike kit of where the wire bites, is it mast or skids?
An Alouette II, wire strike - three wires. One around the mast and rotating controls, the second through the cabin - you can guess the outcome and the third hit the skid posts.
A 350 with a side mount, hit a single wire with the forward crosstube - went under the camera operator's feet by inches - would have taken his legs off if they had been flying a foot lower.
It's quite arbitrary which part of the helicopter is hit by the wires.
The answer is a good recce before you fly the shot.
Wire strike video
Sept 8th, Quebec, looks like he/she turned to miss the pylon and the main cut the wire.
Watch the slo mo to see wire hit the ground.
mickjoebill
Watch the slo mo to see wire hit the ground.
mickjoebill
Last edited by mickjoebill; 10th Sep 2013 at 00:01.
Join Date: Aug 2013
Location: Andover
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The Closest call we've had here in recent times was a Gaz on a night sortie, while on the day recce, A set of power lines was observed and noted. unfortunately there was two sets of power lines and the P1 and P2 "noted" each one of the two lines. on the night sortie the lines were seen at the last minute and evasive action was taken. The power line struck the FWD upright section of the Stb Skid three inches below the top of the skid, if it had been three inches higher the line would of passed over that into the skid support between fuselage and skid, causing a much nastier end to this story. the line snapped and left a large arc burn on the skid and blacked out the surrounding area that night. That was two very luck pilots.
