Night engine out auto: video link
 

Nothing except for the link, here.

Looks as if it could have been painful at the end, does anyone have any further details?

It was San Antonio PD in Texas last week. Either a 500 E or a 333.
Both guys were released from hospital after a check up. Aircraft totaled.

John,

That was the San Antonio PD Schweizer 333 that crashed last Thursday following power loss. The crew suffered minor injuries.


I/C

Jesus!!

Looked like it hit very hard but well done to the pilot for making sure he and the crew could walk away!!

The audio gives the video a stark reality which put the hairs on the back of my neck up!

These days I work in police aviation in the UK (I know we have two engines!) but major problems low level at night over a built up area have got to be one of my nightmares.

Very glad to hear the guys were safe - it sounded like a bit of a team effort!

:ooh:

Far out! That was indeed hair raising stuff!
Damm good effort to the guys involved and glad to hear they are ok.
Hughesy

thanks john, what a descent.

i guess the pilot had a much better view than we got through the camera but he did a great job on the 360 +.

the observer must have been a pilot too judging by the instructions he was yelling out, the pilot was quite calm with the descent and the mayday call, very precise.

was that a ball on a wire passing in front of the machine??

great job, bad luck on the heavy ending. :ok: :=

SAPD helicopter makes crash landing
Updated: 2/19/2004 8:00:53 AM
By: News 9 San Antonio Staff

http://news9sanantonio.com/media/200...agle_Crash.jpg


San Antonio Police Department Chief Albert Ortiz called today's emergency landing "textbook."

He said both pilots, who were identified as Edward Ramirez, Jr. and Mike Welborn, reacted calmly when they were forced to set down the SAPD helicopter known as Eagle.

The pair attempted to make the landing in the H-E-B parking lot at 735 SW Military Dr., near Pleasanton Road, when parts of the aircraft caught on power lines, officials said.

The helicopter skid across the H-E-B parking lot.

The two pilots experienced engine trouble about one minute after launching from Stinson Airport to assist in a chase, officials said.

Witnesses on the ground said they heard a loud 'bang' and then saw flames coming from the helicopter.

The copter skid across the South Side grocery store parking lot and landed in some debris.

Area police officers along with San Antonio Fire Department rescue crews responded to the crash site.

Neither pilot was seriously injured, but both were taken to the hospital for observation.

The Federal Aviation and National Transportation Safety Board were notified of the accident and will conduct their routine investigations.

SAPD also confirmed this particular aircraft has the same tail number as one that was involved in a similar emergency land in April 2003 at the Alamodome.

Authorities said the helicopter — which is one of four in the fleet — is beyond repair. Estimated costs, including police equipment, is about $1 million.

Police said all of their helicopters receive inspections every 100 hours of airtime.

Both pilots have more than 10 years experience.

Ramirez has been an Eagle pilot for three years. Welborn, a 26-year-old veteran with the force, has flown in the fleet for seven years, officials said.

Fellow pilot Sgt. David Torres, who saw the pilots shortly after their crash, said their concerns for the helicopter and the chase they originally launched to assist.

Good auto and great situational awareness to find a spot in the middle of a built up area. Shame of the powerlines though (they seem to be everywhere!).

On an other note : Flying in a single engine helicopter, low level, at night over a big built-up area, is that legal in the US?

Here in Holland you have to have a twin engine to fly over built up area's (single engine allowed if you have enough altitude to autorotate to the borders of the built up area).

Good to know that the two pilots had only minor injuries and that they could walk away from their craft!

DJG

.... how scary is that !!!! :ooh: Hope this will NEVER happen to me. Well done to the crew to make it to that parking lot - and walking away from it! :ok:

Just out of interest, I've not flown this type before and can't identify the aural warning in the background which seems to coincide with the engine failure and seems to be on all the way down. Fire seems to be the obvious one can anyone confirm that?

Woolf

Amazing footage....congratulations to the crew they did a fantastic job.
Wires everywhere I'm sure,there was no way they could have been avoided at night given their situation.The most important aspect was the pilot flying located his forced landing area and went for it,he may have had it in his mind anyway as a forced landing area before the incident, as we all do,or should.
As I always used to say to my students"if the engine quits now where are you going land".This was an extreme example....hats off to you both!

On the footage I thought I heard the engine surge and saw the ac yaw before the bang ....anyone else notice?
:ok:

Delta Julliet Golf - single-engined over built-up areas is very common in the States and a source of wonderment / envy to accountants on this side of the Atlantic.

Brrrr, Man that was a scary video to watch. I watched it before reading all of the posts underneath. Very good to know they got out. Didn't seem like it was gonna end well when the video stopped. Good work everyones part there.

Floats, I noticed the surge too, seems to be a second or so before complete failure.

woolf:The first tone is the Engine Out. The second one seems to be generated from the police department radio. I doubt the 333 has a fire-warning anything.

arm the floats:Hard to tell from the two times I saw it, but there does seem to be a lot of yaw instability in that ship. Are all 333's that bad?. Was one of those left swings due to the engine-failure? Can't say. You can definitely hear the generator noise surging, but it doesn't begin to wind down until after the one big left yaw.

All in all, it took about thirty seconds from failure to touchdown. Seemed like an eternity while watching it. Probably a lot less from the vantage point of the crew.

Great job by the pilot. Too bad the wires didn't show up on the FLIR.

It's always a good result when the crew escape a crash like this one but before you all congratulate the Pilot on an outstanding job, I would raise the following criticisms and ask the following questions:

Based solely on the video evidence the 333 clearly suffered an engine power loss. The non handling Pilot had to tell the handling Pilot twice to enter Auto. The immediate actions following an engine failure should be instinctive. Based on the video, the Pilot was slow to react.
During the turn or in fact at any time, the Pilot said nothing and approaching the ground did not attempt to fly a technique that would arrest the rate of descent, reduce the forward groundspeed and rate of closure. The non handling Pilot screams for a flare as the video stops suggesting the handling Pilot was not up with the situation and was fixated by events (wires and ground rush).

Questions:

During the conversion to type of this helicopter for this job how many full engine out landings are practised?

If the perception of a 'veteran' is one of a Pilot age 26 with only 7 years experience, then what is the definition of an experienced Pilot?

If that landing was 'textbook' as described by the Police Chief, can I get a copy?

In my opinion, this is a case of better being lucky than good.

flygunz.....don't be a nob.
If you were flying and I was sitting there I would be shouting out advice as well. Human nature in a situation of high stress.

My own observation from a position of having a little bit of 300 time, was that the airspeed seemed to drop off a lot. But hey!, I wasn't there...... good effort.

At least after listening to the yelling in the background I have a better idea what this CRM is all about. Any guesses on the height he was travelling at when it all went pearshaped.

I've just stared flying in the city again after a few years in the bush and I've got to say that there doesn't seem to be much room down bellow in the event of problems. Add to that the difficulties of darkness & I think they can be well pleased with the result

flygunz - I think your criticism is a bit too harsh!

I think the reason the pilot seems so silent is that his intercom and the atc radio are not recorded on the cameras sound recording system. Only the observers comments and radio comms with the police unit are audible. I also think that when the observer called for "auto .... auto" the helicopter is already descending and in a right hand turn which would suggest the pilot did react immediately. It's difficult to judge speed and rates of descent from the video but in my opinion the speed was not that high on impact and considering the fact that they did make the parking lot does suggest good flying technique and situational awareness. I have listened to the sound over and over again and I think the observer doesn't actually shout "flare, flare" but "wire, wire" but I might be wrong. Even so the pilot might have elected to go for a constant attitude landing which might have been more appropriate in the circumstances. The fact that they struct the wire did obviously mess up the last bit of the landing but considering they walked away from this impact unharmed I think the pilot did manage to reduce rate of decent quite effectively.

Just my opinion.

Woolf

Woolf
Thanks for the constructive reply, I defer to your knowledge about the intercom recording and withdraw my remarks about the apparent silence form the handling Pilot.
Harsh or not though, my criticisms are based on what the video has revealed and I stand by my observations. I listened again to the final part and still think it's Flare thats shouted.

Your point regarding Situational Awareness is, like mine, subjective and I believe that for short periods in the descent SA was lost. I base that solely on the definition of SA:

'The accurate perception of the factors and conditions affecting the aircraft and aircrew during a specific period'

There are two side issues to this post. Firstly, had the outcome been anything but minor injuries then I wouldn't have posted but as I see it, this video raises a host of handling and CRM issues and If just one young Pilot learns something from this debate then it's worth it.
Secondly, I think that the release of this video into the public domain presumably during the FAA investigation, is at best insensitive to the crew and at worst a complete lack of managerial judgement.

Flygunz

In your earlier post you say
when in actual fact the statement says
Small point maybe but I think that the statement should have read that he had been with the force for 26 years, not that he was 26 years old.

Aside from that, well done to the crew concerned for getting it down.

Edited for lousy spelling