Hero since it worked, zero if it had gone poorly.

I'm wondering about the clearance he estimated to have and actually had left with the rotortip... 10, 20 maybe 30 centimeters? If this is your comfortzone I'm impressed.

There is no doubt about that nor that the flying is anything but skillful - is their decision to operate nose in when you have a winch justified though?

There is so little margin for error that a person with a hurty knee really doesn't justify the exposure of the aircraft and crew like that (nose-in) when a safer alternative is readily available.

if speed was of the essence - casualty bleeding out or needing CPR for example - then I might have a different opinion but there was no urgent lifesaving here.

May be they have the pointy things on the front of the skids to make it easier to judge if they will have clearance or not. If the top of the pointy thing is going to touch first then no but if the bottom or the whole thing then good to go. To me it looks like the driver has done this many times before and it's all in a days work. I fly a BK and my normal landings are slower than this, so I take my hat off to this guy. Beautiful, silky smooth piece of flying in my opinion.

Amazing flying indeed! Are there sensors available much like parking sensors on cars which can indicate how close to something ahead the helicopter is?

When the 'Proverbial *^"! hits the fan' as it eventually does... well lets say it will be messy.:ugh:

Having done similar pick ups in the Australian Alps during searches in my BK I have little issue with the nose-in pickup, it was done smartly without fuss and IMO safely. It could be argued that a winch of three persons would expose the aircraft unnecessarily in the hover over hostile terrain for a longer period than it took for a stable hover pickup.

Picking at nits, I would prefer to see all on the hoist recovered into the cabin before leaving a hover. Let alone the spirited pedal turn and fly away as the double winch passes the skids; but that may be deemed acceptable by the operator and is only an observation from one who knows of fatals where the winch weight has separated from the winch and dropped too far to the surface.

I keep thinking about the granite boulder or rock face that might be just a few inches below the snow layer. On the other hand, without more context, it could be that this pilot knows the area very well and it's perfectly safe. One video isn't enough information.

Wonder if the crew did their HAPS checks, 3 H's and E's and were safe single engine throughout? Good job they are French and EASA rules do not apply ;-) If I had flown away over a drop of what looks like many 000's of ft with winchman and cas dangling on the wire there would have been an interesting debrief.

but an engine failure (or many other malfunctions) from a winching hover is easily managed with a gentle flyaway - not so from the nose-in position

No doubts about the competence of the crew flying, it looks smooth and precise.

I agree it is difficult to estimate the clearance from the video!

What I read from the discussion is that a short contact of the the rotortip with an uncompacted soft snow surface doesnt necessarily stop the machine from flying as long as there are no rocks?

Regarding autopilot malfunction, do you leave the AP/SAS on for a maneuver like that?

Thanks for the insight from the professionals, I'm just a PPL student who gets nervous with less like 1.5 meters rotor clearance on my S300.

I'm still impressed like an amateur driver watching a racedriver taking a corner at three times my speed.

Watch this over and over a few times and concluded that they've done it before many times as the execution was very good - and the weather was ideal for being on the piste.

Regarding losing an engine, I guess you can weigh the risk with the time spent in that configuration (less than a minute), I guess there would be more risk on a day like that of someone coming down the mountain for a look and not seeing the rotating bits.

some facts on the operations here
with google translate

and "en francais" with 3 videos (skipped by google translate)

That might be a little too close for comfort for some.

Two winching evolutions (a double lift and a single lift) to put the team down on the slope is hardly excessive exposure.

Now on the BBC with an interview with the pilot...

My worry with your statement is that you're happy for less than a 1.5m rotor tip clearance as a PPL. As an ATPL I wouldn't use 1.5m as a comfortable clearance unless doing a job like the above. But seriously, you might want to revise your clearance figures upwards somewhat. I hope you never have a blade contact with anything as your insurer will have a field day after reading your comment above. Just saying. As for AP, yes they'll be in use with SAS im sure.

Thank you for your answer.

My happiness with clearance starts to go down actually around 4-5m. As soon as I get closer than 2-3m to anything with my rotor, I feel the severe urge to fly away from it. At 1.5m I would be probably already in deep panic.
This is for a calm wind day. With some wind or even worse with gusts my panic might as well start at 4-5 meters, impairing how smooth my control inputs are. Of course I hope to never have blade contact with anything as well.

Isn't it wonderful how we jump in criticising a crew without having the facts that prompted them to act as they did.