Helicopter down outside Leicester City Football Club
I ,can say that if a rotor blade departs,then the remaining blades and gearbox will have departed too; this will likely take the Cof G past the nose,and the stick fully back...
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Have you personally experienced this particular failure, or practiced it in a simulator? Thirty years ago I was a QHI involved in a full motion helicopter simulator project for the UK military and was part of a team (of two) tasked to expand the then current teaching on tail rotor malfunctions, which was woefully inadequate. We did some practical test flying (hours costed by MOD on behalf of Boscombe Down) and developed a syllabus. We then began teaching both "ab initio" and experienced squadron pilots alike. I saw many highly experienced pilots fail to arrest the yaw rate in time, despite being pre-briefed and pre-warned that the T/R was about to malfunction. Bear in mind that this was in a simulator lesson doing nothing but tail rotor malfunctions.
Given that it takes a second or two to diagnose the failure in the real case, the pilot probably did as well as anyone could have in the circumstances. Note the slight pause in the yaw rate - it's likely that full opposite pedal was applied in an attempt to stop the yaw, probably a pilot response.Then once the tail rotor blades produced no more effective thrust, round it went again at an increased rate of yaw. Once a rapid fuselage spin develops, response to cyclic inputs may not be what is normally expected and that effective rotor rpm is reduced.
Other things that could cause a sudden yaw are a gust of wind, an autopilot/SAS malfunction, or an inadvertent foot touching a yaw pedal. Dumping the lever and chopping the engines would be an inappropriate immediate response.
This unfortunate pilot probably experienced a T/R drive failure at the most critical stage of flight imaginable. I say "probably" because AAIB haven't yet released initial findings and I am quite possibly wrong; obviously I'm only an amateur compared to some experts here.
Given that it takes a second or two to diagnose the failure in the real case, the pilot probably did as well as anyone could have in the circumstances. Note the slight pause in the yaw rate - it's likely that full opposite pedal was applied in an attempt to stop the yaw, probably a pilot response.Then once the tail rotor blades produced no more effective thrust, round it went again at an increased rate of yaw. Once a rapid fuselage spin develops, response to cyclic inputs may not be what is normally expected and that effective rotor rpm is reduced.
Other things that could cause a sudden yaw are a gust of wind, an autopilot/SAS malfunction, or an inadvertent foot touching a yaw pedal. Dumping the lever and chopping the engines would be an inappropriate immediate response.
This unfortunate pilot probably experienced a T/R drive failure at the most critical stage of flight imaginable. I say "probably" because AAIB haven't yet released initial findings and I am quite possibly wrong; obviously I'm only an amateur compared to some experts here.
In what follows I assume it was a tail rotor failure and the usual caveats to hasty judgement apply.
If I'm reading you correctly and not reading too much between the lines your sim experience tells you if you really do have a tail rotor failure, tail rotor control failure or failure in the drive train to the tail rotor by the time the handling pilot has evaluated all cues and eliminated other malfunctions; yaw trim actuator hard over, other pilots boots, or whatever then the situation is perilously close or already beyond effective recovery action. Put simply if you have a tail rotor failure especially at high power settings with low air speed, zero weathercock stability, then the collective lever has got to lowered immediately and swiftly, how long a second, two at the outside. Then given the T/O flight profile the nose must be lowered aggressively to recover airspeed for flare, check level. Do Flight Manuals even have graphs for this nightmare?
Another 'expert' who should know better...
Tony Cable
Tony Cable
Tony Cable, a former senior investigator at the Air Accident Investigations Branch (AAIB), has watched footage and said: 'The takeoff looked normal but as it hovered above the stadium you can see pieces falling away. It looks like from the rear rotor blades.'It is consistent with a tail rotor breaking off. There are lots of pieces flying around. If you lose a large proportion of the blade you get a very large imbalance and pull the whole tail rotor off the aircraft'.
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The significance of the anti collision light extinguishing in the video could be a sign of both generators going off line, this could be due to both engines being shut down, in turn suggesting the pilot shut them down in reaction to a tail rotor drive failure? Speculation on my part following a logical chain of events if the anti coll was extinguished.
etc etc Yep, I agree with all of that, 100%.
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Surely the time between seeing the so called object and the loss of control is way too long, would be instant.
His interview on Sky is shocking, implying that a simple lowering of the collective and cutting engines would have quickly brought the aircraft under control! He has either been seriously misquoted or lost the plot!
His interview on Sky is shocking, implying that a simple lowering of the collective and cutting engines would have quickly brought the aircraft under control! He has either been seriously misquoted or lost the plot!
He has either been seriously misquoted
Tony Cable:
B.Sc., M.R.Ae.S
University of London BSc Honours Degree in Aeronautical Engineering
Powerplant Design Engineer with Boeing Aircraft on large public transports
Systems and Safety Engineer with BAe, including Tornado and Concorde
Aircraft Engineering Accident Investigator full-time since 1976
Visiting Fellow at Cranfield University
And a cursory glance at the wreckage shows the tail rotor roughly where it should be, albeit sans half of one blade.
Surely the imbalance of losing half a blade would have put the TRGB somewhere in the next county...?
The significance of the anti collision light extinguishing in the video could be a sign of both generators going off line, this could be due to both engines being shut down, in turn suggesting the pilot shut them down in reaction to a tail rotor drive failure? Speculation on my part following a logical chain of events if the anti coll was extinguished.
I'm amazed by the low quality of the (Sun) video, and I've assumed that they have a higher quality version but have opted to share a highly compressed version online. The sun has now updated their video (watch from 1:18) where they replay the "interesting" part in slow motion.
I now doubt that they have a higher quality version, as I think they would have used that as the source for the replay. It's a shame, because it would have made it much easier to tell
I now doubt that they have a higher quality version, as I think they would have used that as the source for the replay. It's a shame, because it would have made it much easier to tell
Surely he should know better than to pronounce the cause of the accident from a Sun video...
The change in direction of the rising puff of smoke from the engine whilst it was being started suggests to me the initial climb was with a tail wind....granted, maybe the wind was swirling inside the stadium but that smoke did catch a bit of tail wind...I don't think it was sucked in to some inflow into the rotor disc as the rotor had only just started to turn.
I'm still suspicious about that smoke...perhaps caused by oil momentarily getting past a labyrinth seal and burning in the hot engine? I'm not familiar with that particular engine, but it does look unusual.
I'm still suspicious about that smoke...perhaps caused by oil momentarily getting past a labyrinth seal and burning in the hot engine? I'm not familiar with that particular engine, but it does look unusual.
Avoid imitations
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I’m not defending Learmount but as someone who has done his fair share of punditry let me tell you what the media is looking for. They want a very complicated subject explained in two minutes in a way that 99% of the population will understand. This is while, depending on where you are being interviewed, someone is talking in your ear and you’re trying not to think of how many million are listening to you making an ar*e of yourself. Not as easy as you think.
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As a former helicopter maintenance engineer, I can confidently say that if an AW169 lost a tail rotor blade then the gearbox will rapidly break free and depart from the airframe.
Helicopters with 4-bladed tail rotors might, with luck, throw the opposite blade too, thus putting the rotor back into some form of balance, but a 3-bladed tail rotor has no chance.
The pictures I have seen suggest that a tail rotor blade loss is highly unlikely to be the cause of this accident.
Helicopters with 4-bladed tail rotors might, with luck, throw the opposite blade too, thus putting the rotor back into some form of balance, but a 3-bladed tail rotor has no chance.
The pictures I have seen suggest that a tail rotor blade loss is highly unlikely to be the cause of this accident.
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The smoke coming from the engine is nothing to be concerned about, if engineers got twitchy every time we saw a start with white smoke, none of us would ever go flying! It's too thick and too soon in the start cycle to be oil, it is almost certainly fuel - perhaps unburnt from the last shutdown being kicked out, or a small purge coming through prior to the ignitors cracking off, but most certainly not an issue to flight safety
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Once DC buss 1&2 are lost the battery will power some essential services. The essential services busses can be used, but with limited systems, the anti coll is not on the list.. A rate of decent around 2500 feet per minute would give around six seconds before impact from that height, so not much time to do anything other than get the engines to off, not even time to get the switch made to get the gear down.
Looking at the latest Sun video, it looks like the 'object' approaches the rotor disc from behind, hits it and is spat downwards.......
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Not insinuating or inferring anything here-merely an observation. I've watched the Sun video several times, paused it and tried (as best as possible) to advance it frame by frame. At 1.20 and 2 or 3 tenths (at a guess), just outside the red circle at about 3 o'clock, is a white dot which then enters the red circle seemingly heading towards the tail. That same white "dot" then seems to be spat out initially to the right but them starts heading rapidly across the screen right to left. At first I was convinced it was just an insect flying close to the camera but now I'm not so sure. What started as a dot now seems to become a very regular (rectangular) shape as it travels across the screen