Basic flying skills vs flight control augmentation: where is the rotary world?
 

Just a thought. The FMS is classified as a Client's Optional Equipment and as such a defered defect on the FMS is allowable for despatching the aircraft offshore. However, the FMS is the heart and soul of the navigation system esp for offshore work. Has anyone flown offshore with an unserviceable FMS? As for me I am from the old S61 N school where I was brought up with "nothing" so it is no big deal to go offshore using the VOR, NDB and radar for navigation. However, I will only do it in good weather. What about the rest of us?

I've flown the 225 offshore without an FMS on numerous
Occasions.

Pretty simple we just flew off the VOR and did manual calculations for time to go, ground speed etc. Just had to make sure an ARA wasn't called for at the installation as were not allowed to shoot ARA's without the FMS otherwise we are good to go.

The FMS is not "Client's operational equipment", it is part of the basic aircraft and thus must be serviceable unless allowed to be U/S in the MMEL/MEL. Which it is, but with the caveat "provided procedures do not require their use". And for the GPS "as required" (by operational regulations).


So taking the bureaucratic view, if the FMS forms part of the SOPs and procedures in the OM Part B and it does not make provision for when the FMS is inoperative, you can't depart. If the Operational Regulations require you to have GPS, you can't depart.


From a common sense point of view, it depends on the intended flight. Presuming the above criteria were satisfied I would look at the flight, the availability of other navaids / visual nav, the need to navigate accurately (traffic density, risk of "missing" the offshore installation, terrain etc), the weather, the tightness of fuel planning and make a judgement call. If it was "out in the bay" 20 miles offshore, then probably yes. If it was 280 miles out to sea with no navaids after 80 miles, then no.


In the case of Bristow, the FMS/GPS forms a basic part of operating offshore as far as the Operations Manual goes, so the answer would always be No.

However did we do flights without all that Gucci Kit?

With a good dose of bravado and lack of self preservation! However, most of the time some sort of Area Nav was in use even if only Decca or loran.

However Did We......?
 

Here is a short little book that describes how some of our forbears did it:

The Long Way Home

" The Long Way Home " about a PAA Boeing 314 return to LaGuardia after hostilities commenced in the Pacific.


Couple of bucks, marvelous story.

HC wrote

My company (one of those ignorant interfering clients you like so much) requires 2x FMS. I think we can depart with 1 unserviceable in certain weather conditions.

Jolly good. Dual FMS is standard for SAR machines, optional for crew change. Our Australian machines have dual FMS - that was required by CASA for GNSS approaches at an IFR alternate without any land-based navaids.


So do your helicopters have dual FMS installed out of the goodness of your heart, or to meet an operational requirement (ie no choice)?

With dual FMS no probs departing with one inop provided it is not required for the above, nor configured to do the radio tuning - although in the latter case it is allowable if configured to do the radio tuning but you have the emergency radio tuning head.

Ah yes, Decca. :{

Not so much of the 'forbears', Mr Dixson! We managed quite well with a plotting board (when the looker had to go emcon silent) in order to go and play for four hours then find the carrier. Last I looked, offshore facilities didn't move nearly as much; are we so totally dependent on GPS and other aids these days? Have we lost the basics of navigating around the sky?

http://www.rekeninstrumenten.nl/page...ures/05701.jpg

Ask the GOM old timers about having just a Magnetic compass and a watch.:eek:

Watch?

Eeh lad, tha' were lucky; sundial had to do us with the special mod for night ops :p

HC

They are not our helicopters, although we are now thinking about leasing ourselves and conducting our own operations for various reasons.

Dual FMS is a requirement under our Minimum Equipment Standards designed to meet an operational requirement as you mentioned, however, we rarely ever see a cloud so we rarely have the requirement. Perhaps that makes it out of the goodness of our hearts!

Watch?
 

Messrs. Eacot and Boudreaux: It appears that you two would especially enjoy that read! John, your remarks brought back the first time one of the SA pilots took me ( Army pilot just back from VN ) out to do night dipping. I thought it was like joining another religion.

Best,
John

I meant "your" helicopters in the same way as one might say "your" hotel room. Not owned, but rented/chartered or whatever.


Anyway it will be interesting to see you start up a new operator. Even more interesting to find out if you can do if for the same cost as you pay your contractors, or whether you will have to throw more money at it to put on a good show!

No more than a question asked at a recent management meeting so can be considered a thought bubble until the evaluation is complete. It would be for Company use only, not for charter.

It's all very predictable these days, we can lease 225s from the same lessors at fleet rates (due to their buying power) as the helicopter companies do, we can get the same PBH rates, we already lease the base facilities that our operator occupies, we can buy fuel at our bulk rates we use for boats and rigs, we can insure for competitive premiums, we can employ good people at the same union rates + a little. Importantly, we could more closely control the standard of the product and have transparency with safety issues.

Unless our contractor is providing the services for love, we shouldn't have to throw money at it to put on a good show.

So (not really knowing anything about the world of twilight aviation aka corporate) does that mean you don't need an AOC (or equivalent)? If so, can you still carry contractors?


Do you receive oversight from the Authority (CASA or whatever) at the same level as a helicopter charter company, and if not, is it not perhaps a little "dangerous" in terms of reputation, to be totally responsible for everything - it's fine until the unthinkable happens (and it will eventually, it is just a matter of time)!

Brother John, reading up on the Imperial Flying boats and other early long distance flyers has always been amazing stuff. Remembering there was a time when it was Needle, Ball, and Airspeed that was considered State of the art, is just mind boggling.

That spry young fellow that flew a Tiger Moth between the UK and OZ is also a good story.

One of my favorite hunting spots outside La Grande, Oregon still had one of the old Airway Beacons that has replaced the Bonfire that was maintained at that site during the early Air Mail Days.

It does not hurt us to look back to the old days to begin to appreciate how good we have it now. That is a concept that applies to Helicopter flying as well.

Instrument flying on the old LF Airways, stepping on the Ball, using a coffee grinder ADF receiver with a manual Loop, with no directional Gyro and only a Mag Compass, definitely required some Airmanship.

Yes some of the record breaking stuff was impressive (obviously) but let's not get too carried away. Aviators in those days had a different skill set and narrower safety margins - and crashed a lot as a consequence. Modern pilots have a perfectly valid but different skill set - and the equipment to maintain higher safety margins. Put either the pioneer pilot or the modern pilot into the other's role and they would each be incompetent.

Or to put it another way, get those rosey shades back in their case!

HC, true but I still particularly like this incident - a definite case of 'resilience'! Cessna 188 Pacific rescue - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia