alpine long line rescue gone fatally wrong
 

English: Fall by rope recovery: Cause unclear
Source Absturz bei Seilbergung: Ursache unklar - steiermark.ORF.at


Can such "variable cable" be disengaged midflight?

Does "human cargo certified" lifting equipment feature a similar mechanical discharge lever at the cyclic
as does the S-300C I fly regularly? (It has an external cargo hook mounted at the bottom)

I was under the impression that human rescue "long-line" equipment is always attached abreast the CoG,
to the side of the fuselage, high up, so that the person rescued can be reeled in to floor height, by coiling up the cable electircally.

Does a side-of-fuselage rescue system feature a quick release mechanism?

Could it be that this tragedy in fact was some form of pilot error?

Is it legal to rescue people with a cargo type external hook right at CoG below the fuselage?
That would mean it would be legal to carry human load dangling on the long line, constantly exposed to both
rotor downwash and forward airspeed, all the way from site of mishap till landing zone, due to unavailability of "reel in function",
as the cable is attached to the belly of the a/c.


edit: I discovered that apparently belly hooks are ok for human rescue:
http://imgl.krone.at/Bilder/2017/06/...c2_tmp_jpg.jpg
N.B.
the failed rescue was attempted by a federal police helicopter "OE-BX.." (B federal, X rotorcraft)
and not a SAR company.

edit:
still curious: does a belly hook long-line system feature a mid-flight reel in capability?

I think, this should answer your questions.

https://www.verticalmag.com/features/highvaluecargo/

skadi

Thx, very interesting read! :ok:
On a side note: how does the system prevent the "cargo" from being windmilled by forward flight ?

Back to OT:
Sadly there is a high chance that the real reason for the mishap will never be published, especially as a police helos is involved.
In 2011 a "border controlling" police helo crashed into the Achensee on an sunny day, at close to Vne.
First reason was "bird strike". Due to lack of cadavers, feathers and witnesses having seen birds,
next try was "flicker vertigo" + epilleptic seizure, in a four bladed helo (wrong flicker freq) piloted by some w/o any history of such issue.

The transport Ministery hinted towards "cowboy flaying" on "sightseeing" or "alpine cabin-taxi" flights.
The Ministry of interior (opertor of police a/c) knee-jerkingly opposed.

Then Austrian Ministry ping pong sets in, denying existence of crash-analysis..:
Ministry suppresses security reports on flight accidents

Remember the 750kg bucket full wil concrete dropped onto an occupied cable-car cabin in 2005 (9 died)?
Still no accident report, investigation closed!

We are a Banana Republic of accident investigation:
"The ICAO found out in a topical report that the quality of the investigation of flight accidents in Austria behind those of countries like Botswana, Iran, Sudan, Russia or even Egypt limps behind. And it comes even more badly: Already in 2008 there was a similarly destructive result. At that time was of Doris Bures at the head of the department. A lot was promised afterwards, the flight investigation place was renamed, laws were reformed, but the acting people remained the same ones. Austria lies meanwhile far away from all European standards (even behind Greece or Bulgaria) – just still a thin percent point before Vietnam, Armenia or the Caribbean state Antigua and Barbuda."

Reely340:
It appears that the rope snapped for some reason!
HEC - human external cargo is carried on a double cargo hook system. 1 rope connected to a Y piece which is connected to 2 seperate cargo hooks so that if 1 accidentally opens, the 2nd is there as backup.

Police says the found fragments of the rope still attached to the helicopter.
They claim the rope was up to the taks (not old/brittle), the hook system is claimed to function properly,
current suggestion is towards "weather" and challenging environment of narrow gorge:
local downdraft induced descent + rupture after contract with mountain.

Absturz bei Seilbergung: Seil dürfte gerissen sein - steiermark.ORF.at

When I read variable length rope or cable, I'm thinking Rescue Hoist, not long line.

Do we know if this was long line, or hoist???

Well, w/o saying the picture shows the involved helo, what type of HEC is that
http://imgl.krone.at/Bilder/2017/06/...c2_tmp_jpg.jpg

Can the pilot "reel upwards" the external load with a setup like that?

With the cable length depicted I severely doubt that they could have lifted the hikers out of a narrow canyon with the system shown, unless it provides a way to winch them up from way further down.

That is a dual hook fixed line system, no way to reel it up or down. THough they could have been using linger lines

The last link talks about THREE people on the hoist/HEC. For those that do this, would that weight be too much for it or is that normal.

From what i heard and read, it was a dual hook long line set up...so three people hanging from the hook should be no problem for the helicopter.

Reading about downdraft and the load crashing into the rock, it wohld explain why the rope broke..the question is-what caused the height loss?


From all i read so far, there was nothing wrong with the system itself....
Three possible explanations i could come up with so far (guessing, of course):
-Pilots error
-Strong winds (leading to pilots error)
-line trapped (see above).


Really interested in the cause-might be some interesting "lessons learned" in there...

Long line, no hoist! They can fit variable lenghts of the longline.

skadi

The system we’re using it’s possible to rappel down. On top of the 60 m fixed lines we're using an additional variable line up to 80 m extension for rescues in steep narrow Canyons or rock faces. Total length 140 m and afterwards there is no way to hoist them up; you got to fly them out. The Police is using a similar system

i'm not an expert on the system but that the picture that google delivers for "variable tau"

http://www.bergrettung-salzburg.at/u...ferner1jpg.jpg

I can imagine that pulling on the left "pulley/brake" (?) will let you down, using the rope stored in the yellow bag


(picture taken from here)

The whole idea of human external cargo on a longline is just a poor mans hoist.

On that point do you have any idea of the number of SB's and AD's on the existing hoist? Possibly actually a better option.

Many operators use the hoist attachment with a static line - the hoist is painful to keep serviceable.

The only real advantage of a hoist is over water - otherwise.............there is a thing at the top that goes up and down as required - aka a helicopter.

A hoist is useless in some parts of the mountains-small canyons or crevasses (?) Too deep for a hoist cable...

And a hoist extension is sometimes also not possible due to weight / center of gravity limitations.


Standard procedure is to land close by, get the rescue peorson onto the line and long line him into position, pull the people out and land nearby again to get them on board..

Yes and no. There are operators that use a combination of Static line and hoist - particularly inshore coastal rescue. The static line combined with helocasting is a much quicker form of rescue for someone drowning. Hence why they havent switched completely to hoist - they can effect their rescue faster - in time critical situations.

It says two on the hoist, with three falling. One person left on the ground, knocked over by the other two?

Yes, looks like a standard rope access "descender" in the right hand.