All these 'holier than thou' attitudes. If we all ensured that we operated in a 100% safe environment no helicopter would ever get airborne. My condolences to the families that have been affected by this tragedy and my thoughts go out to the pilot. Accidents happen and some just seem to go wrong in the worst possible manner.
Don't tell me all the drivers that have slung loads have never flown over an obstacle, that if the load had released for whatever reason, could have caused death or destruction :confused:

I agree with the last two posts.

This job was done in the interest of the public. Can you imagine how beneficial it will be to have a fully functioning mobile telephone system in that ruggered part of the world and how many lives that will save in the future.

recouperatorCheck my post mate ... I refer to many moons ago - specifically mentioned when Conrad Herbst and others died in the Mi-8 / 17 accident on top of the building in the CBD of CT.

You mention recent - so yes I will take your word for it mate - no problems but when Connies went down the CBD was cleared on a very early Sunday morning just after sunrise.

Cheers

Gunzzzzzzzz

imabell Yes that is exactly the sad accident that I am talking about. M ypost just referred to the time / place / safety issue re overflying a CBD etc ...

Yes a LOT of mistakes was made .. short strop .. Russian crew mized with Souf Efrikans ... comms gap - hughe comms gap. Slight tail wind / comms gap and short strop and in the ? Stannic Finance ? board he went.

Tragic as one of the Russians \'s daughter was watching from the top of another building.

I wa snever so drunk on a funeral before ... Nastarovia .. had LOADS of Vodka with the Russian Ambassador :E

tecpilot If you need to know / want to know more about my accident / our ops - feel free to mail me or open another thread and I will answer your needs but it seems like you know enough :E

Cheers

Really going to zzzleep now

Gunzzzzzzzzz

Managing risks...
 

I cannot agree with you more Guns that you have to minimise the risks, but was done in CT?

Just as roads were cleared and blocked off in Sandton, and the residential block and airport hall were vacated in PTA and JHB Intl. But was it done properly, could they have done more to make the lifts safer, even though there were no incidents?

I believe where this accident happened in the Alps, they felt that all precautions were taken.

Conrad wasn't just of the most professional pilots I knew, he was also a great person and he was taken away well before his time.

His accident was the second lift of the morning when it happened. Apparently, he was not flying the second lift; the co-pilot was and the co-pilot did not maintain directional control.

Their tail rotor contacted a Stannic billboard, with deadly consequences.

A longer strop and better comm's could have possibly averted the accident, but should they not have removed the bill board as well?

This is the same as saying should they not have stopped the traffic, or should they not have stopped the cable cars.

BUT...

There is always, always, always a risk involved in our business in helicopter aviation. It is a fluid, think on your feet situation we find ourselves in. Absolutely dynamic and the only constant we have in our environment is the constant changes happening. Should that be weather, wind, other traffic or any how ever small emergencies we are faced with. We weren't made to fly or we would have been issued with our own wings.

Nevertheless, even if we take away mechanical failures and mother nature, you will always have the human factor to deal with.

There are many aspects of helicopter flying and there are even more specialities and specialists. But, even the very experienced specialists get it wrong sometimes, or just get very unlucky, as it appear the case was here and unfortunately there were others involved in the accident that just compounded the severity of it.

Anybody dying in any helicopter related accident is always sad. However, as it is usually newsworthy and thus sensationalised and with the media is all over it like a bad rash, their often inaccurate reporting further hypes the situation.

Thus I agree it goes about managing the risks, but also having a large degree of luck on our sides often helps. !!!! doesn't always happen to someone else, sometimes it happens to us. Shot down, double engine failure, dynamic rollover, accidental jettison's etc, etc, say no more...

The pilot involved has to live with his conscience for the rest of his life, if he was right or wrong in his approach and decision making. Eitherway, I’m glad I don’t have that burden on me. Take care not to have that burdon placed on you...:ooh:

Thought this made interesting reading from the 'Times' (UK).

'Austria, one of the world's top destinations for mountain sports, has more than 3,100 ski lifts which carry up to 550 million passengers a year.

The lifts can also be used in summer for hikers seeking to get in to the mountains, earn more than £540 million a year, and employ 12,000 people.'

Lot of people, lot of money and year round so not so easy to just stop operating the lifts I would guess.

A risk assesment must have been done before the job started so after a site down stairs was established, a route must have been thought about and maybe the only way to get the job done was over the lift.

Pilots must have had a heads together, checked the hook a few times and said "watch where you put those fingers, hey whats the odds, we are legal right"?

Of course I'm in to guess work here but then again so is every one else untill the report comes out, not sure I agree about the airmanship side.

In aviation we try and limit the risk but you cannot limit every factor, that goes for life as well.

tecpilot, I am entirely familiar with the FAA requirements for formulating and approving a congested area plan. The congested area plan is required to ensure that when performing external load operations in what might be determined a congested area, that NO hazard is created that would endanger people or property on the ground.

You would NOT get any kind of approval to fly external loads over the public, or over inhabited property (within certain mitigating considerations). As the same basic rule is applicable to ANY external load operation, then the FAA would not permit the operation that caused this accident.

Each flight must be conducted at an altitude, and on a route, that will allow a jettisonable external load to be released, and the rotorcraft landed, in an emergency without hazard to persons or property on the surface.

If this operation were to be carried out in a congested area, the plan would require that the cable car be shut down, and no-one who is not involved with the job, would be allowed within the work area. At NO time, would the FAA permit an external load to be carried over people. If this operation were to be carried out in a non congested area, the same criteria would be in effect, but the Operator would be responsible for ensuring compliance with the rule.

I am quite genuinely shocked at the attitude of some of the posters here to flying loads over people. If we don't have a clear line of flight that does not overfly people or populated buildings, we wouldn't even consider flying it.

Ever wonder why the move to tanks over buckets is occurring in urban interface fires?

Cyclic Hotline

I don't condone this at all but don't tell me it hasn't been done and won't be done again.

Life is full of lessons .. hopefully someone can learn from this tradgic accident. Hopefully next time you do that long line - maybe give a thought where the load might end at the moment you drop it now.

It saved my life by always thinking where to do my power - off if and when it happens ... took 7 000 hours and it happened.

Thanks God for good training and great instructors :ok:

I will categorically state that I have NEVER been involved with any external load operation that has overflown people, or occupied premises, intentionally, at any time, nor would I permit it to happen, or be involved with it.

I say that on the basis of hundreds of construction lift jobs, and running operations that perform hundreds of external load lifts every day!

There is a damn good reason why operators that specialise in external load operations do not encounter accidents such as the one being discussed here. Completely and totally unacceptable operational practice.

And now I read today, that the cable car operator approved this operation to overfly their equipment. What is their experience in analysing this risk?

Well I take a big lesson from this. I do USL work only occasionally. I would of course avoid buildings / people on the ground. But I'm sure I have flown across a road with a load on before now, and I suspect it might not have occurred to me to consider an aerial cable carrying a gondola as "people to be avoided".

Question for guys who do this sort of work (USL liquid concrete) routinely: do you keep the hook live, or switch the cargo master off for the short transit element of the flight?

Never stop learning

Sven

Yes, this is a big lesson for all of us.

To the last devolopments in this file.
The austrian air control agency, Austrocontrol, declared that there is no prohibition to overfly the cables, with or without gondolas.

To all the mediasluts there was today a first meeting with the type of accident helicopter SA 315B "Lama". A more than 11.000h aerial work pilot explained in front of a lot of cameras the helicopter, the kind of operation (hauling concrete), the ways to open the cargo hook and his view to the accident pilot. In our times it needs 2 days before the mediasluts are interested in reality and substance.

He stated" I don't believe the pilot have opened the hook" and confirmed the flight route across the cable as absolutely usually in this kind of business. The helicopter wasn't overloaded with 750kg concrete in such altitude. The release happened on a part of the flight circuit without any knob pressing (radio,..). Therefore it's unlikely that the pilot pressed a false knob.

I am not a rotary pilot but I have been involved in H&S of and on over the last thirty years including railway and aviation projects. I am very surprised that the contractor did not have possession of the line for the few minutes of each pass. It would not have been that disruptive. I cannot believe that they passed over an occupied Gondola. I would have sacked any crane driver in the same situation. This said I feel for the pilot as well as the victims. It isn't something which you get over.

effortless To re-post the quote from Page 2 on 6th September:

JAR-Ops 4 attempts to address the issue of risk analysis and responsibility.

Code of Practice

X – CONGESTED HOSTILE OPERATIONS
Operations in congested hostile environment can be conducted utilising helicopters certificated or approved, in accordance with JAR-OPS 4 subparts F and G. In addition the following applies:
a) Initial training and recurrent training
Congested hostile area operation technic, specific precaution to insure third parties protection, normal and emergency procedures for single engine helicopter operation.

Maybe there is some value to more regulation. I have to totally agree with the comments of effortless. You would not be permitted to lift a load over the top of the general public with a forklift, or crane, so why would you do it with a helicopter? Basic safety training on any lifting devices teaches you to never stand under any load. For anyone involved to think that just because it is not specifically prohibited that it must be OK, simply makes me cringe.

This entire accident defies all safe operating practices and common sense. Not just for helicopter operations, but from a basic industrial safety stand-point. I will be even more shocked if there are no Health and Safety regulations in Austria, that also address this issue.

Please, besides that most of us here only have information relaed through the media - media of which we know do not care about facts in such cases - even a good and thorough media report would most likely not be able to find and transport all details necessary to cover this incident.

Honestly, in a forum like this I expect a more professional attitude.

To the accident itself: As already pointed out here by many others, it is impossible to stop the operation of a cable car / tram / etc. etc. just because a chopper is flying somewhere overhead.
This would mean the immediate breakdown of any public transport in an urban area and would make a cable car useless.
There are not only cargo flights conducted throughout the day, but also emergency flights, police flights, military flights, traffic surveillance,....

A helicopter on an emergency flight to Vienna's General Hospital crosses at least 10 tram lines (depending on the direction of approach). Besides that it would take time to stop the traffic (during whcih the helicopter would have to wait) it would not enlarge the safety of the chopper greatly, because the cable would still be there. Furthermore it would take hours during peak traffic to clear a path for the chopper without any obstacles. All this assuming that the patient in the chopper has plenty of time, the chopper plenty of fuel and there is only one flight at a time.

The same is true for flights above the lines of cable cars - especially in the winter you have plenty of ambulance flights, which cannot fly around every cablecar. In some areas there are so many cars, large parts of the Alps would not be reachable at all and the cable car could not work for one hour without interruption.

DEMANDING TO CEASE OPERATIONS IS COMPLETELY RIDICULOUS!

Regards, Bernhard

@ Cyclic Hotline:

I am well aware of the rules and the Austrian regulation means more or less the same as the rule made by the FAA.

We all know that laws are very often made to ensure that the lawmakers cannot be held responsible. I would like to know how you would execute an emergency release without any damage to property? This is impossible, especially so over urban area.

I cannot imagine that in every ski ressort in the US (for example), the cable cars cease their work just because a chopper is in the area . As a matter if fact, you do not have one cable car - in large ski ressorts you have 30 to 40 of such installations. Do you really believe they always stop because of a chopper? I really doubt that...

I am fine with limitations regarding the distance to the cables / above them, but everything else is completely unrealistic if you have ever been in such an area.

Regards, Bernhard

The point I made was that he flew with an underslung load over an occupied cable car. You cannot carry a load by crane over traffic nor over a train. At the very least you have to wait until the traffic has passed. The helicopter could have crossed behind the gondola. This would have presented a smaller target at the very least. This thread has demonstrated that underslung loads do slip more often than we would like. They certainly used to from cranes. We had many fatalities in the sixties on site. The consequence was the Health and Safety At Work Act 1974. Nowadays we rarely have anyone hurt due to a strop failure or similar in cranework.

Austrian H&S is as strong as any in the world.

N5528P, I think you have missed the point here Bernhard, a helicopter flying without an external load does not present the same risk as a helicopter flying with an external load.

External loads are notoriously fickle and sometimes they need to be jettisoned for the safety of the aircraft and sometimes bits fall off them and, as in this case, sometimes the load slinging equipment fails/malfunctions. That is why overflight of people, structures etc should be avoided as much as possible when carrying out external load operations.

A heli going into a hospital still might crash on finals over a road but the likelihood of it happening is tiny compared to an external load incident.

It's a sad time when our industry is involved in such an unfortunate accident where many innocent lives have been lost and families torn apart forever. Could this have prevented? Sure. Shut down the cable cars until the USL operation was completed. Could the loss of revenue have been the main reason the cable car operator agreed to allow helicopter operations to continue overhead whilst placing the public in harms way? I certainly hope not. It would be interesting to see if the cable car operator and the helicopter operator had their "safety experts" carry out one of their risk analysis prior to commencement to the USL operation. If not, shame on them. If so, shame on them. Safety, safety, safety, seems to be the buzz word of the times. Where were the "safety experts" in this debacle?
My condolences to the innocent. To those that could have possibly prevented this loss of precious life, may God have mercy on your souls.

Bernhard,

As crab has already pointed out, my comments are specific to external load operations ONLY. There is no need to shut down anything, so long as the load doesn't overfly it. I have never, and would never, suggest that these limitations be applied to any other helicopter operations.

I have constructed a large number of ski-lifts, along with just about everything else you could build (or take apart) with a helicopter, so I am intimately familiar with the layout of a ski area. There are NO circumstances that we would overfly an active cable car, with anyone on board it.

It is easy to avoid/mitigate exposure to risk when performing external load operations. In a congested area, it is achieved by picking each load immediately adjacent to the site, if it is otherwise impossible to avoid overflight of buildings or individuals.

No load would EVER be flown over any property without the permission of the respective property owner. You can guarantee that any other property owner is going to want a copy of the insurance policy that will be covering them. By ensuring this in advance of the operation, you have already taken responsibility for all damage that might occur under any circumstance. In this process, you have already got written permission from any property owner that might experience damage or loss in the event a load is dropped and notified them all of your intent. Most of the time, the only property owner who is going to get overflown, is the one doing the job.

In order to perform this operation and exclude the public from the area, it is essential to co-ordinate this with whatever local government agencies, police, etc; that have jurisdiction in the area.

Downtown areas may not be considered a congested area at 06:30 on Sunday morning. This is when much of this kind of work is done. With the police keeping outsiders and interested parties at a safe distance, it is easy to achieve every safety goal.

Once you have considered every aspect of the job, and if the customer is still interested (generally they are not using helicopters just for the sake of it), all of this can be contained in a detailed lift plan, which can be submitted to the FAA (or whichever responsible agency) as a congested area plan. No-one from any government agency is going to approve that plan (read responsibility) if you have not done the job properly. Mandatory safety meetings for everyone involved in the project prior to any lift work starting ensure that everyone knows the plan, who is responsible for what, what happens in the event of any problems and how to react in the event of emergency.

Safety is no buzz word. Safety has to be a committed and integral culture as the absolute foundation of any and every helicopter operation. If not, the outcome will make you wish it were!

How else would anyone here perform a job of this nature? Anyone?

This accident is a real tragedy for everyone involved, but nothing will change the ultimate responsibility for planning and executing the job. This should never have happened.

Seems to me this could be an really important thread. We, the PPRUNERS are on a very interesting point. We leave the accident level and turning into a principle discussion about helicopter safety. Thats the same situation now in the Alp countries. The public and the helicopter operators are splitted into the same two parties we have here on PPRUNE.
I hope we all understand how important this point is to the whole business. No question we have a risk in the business. On many points we in the helicopters are able the rise the safety factor, but on the other side it is very expensive or impossible to exclude some other risk factors.

It's easy to say close all traffic, all cable cars, all... and saving human lifes.

But, as i wrote before if we want to exclude all risk factors we have to stay in bed. Try to haul the concrete by snowmobile. How many accidents we have with snowmobiles and skier? A lot. OK, close the hole area in front of any construction work.

How many accidents we have with cars? Ok, close the areas around streets.

Don't activate nuclear plants if people could be hurt in case of a technical malfunction. OK, safety area at least 30 miles.

How many people get hurt by helicopters ?
1. direct on turning chopper blades - a lot.
2. direct by downed ships during take off or landing - a lot.

OK, close the area around turning helicopters. Prohibit take off or landing via every people on ground.

I do not dispute that in case of an engine failure or other technical malfunction the pilot will try to bring to ship out of any people on ground. But we have a lot of accidents after all people on ground get hurt. OK, they were standing on the false place.

Why we discuss about the safety of non involved people on ground? Let's talk about our own safety. If the allmighty FAA have safe rules to external loads, why it is possible to fly with singles out of land marks? Why with singles and non IR equipped a/c at night? Why is it possible to make construction work on high voltage pylons sitting on a self constructed board outside a MD 500, rotors turning only a some inches away from the cables?
What if the news chopper chrashed in the US, have killed some people on the ground or fired up the building. No news choppers, sorry, no helicopters above cities?

@ effortless

A detail perhaps not covered by the media ist that this is not one single gondula traveling the wire up and down. There are 30 to 60 gondolas with a spacing to each other of approx. 20 m.

Crossing between gondulas wpuld not help a bit since this gap of 20 m would prevent nothing. In this case, the payload of concrete hit one gondula, but also two others were ripped from the cable because of the oscillations in the car.

Such a cabe car simply means you have a barrier through a valley which you can only cross during the night. A time where it is nearly impossible to fly in areas where people are on vacation - even worse if this car ends in a village - the barrier through the valley is complete - no passing on either side.

Regards, Bernhard

The issue isn't single engine helicopters, flying at night, or flying offshore. Those have to be safety issues addressed by the individual operator and regulator. Helicopter accidents are not limited to single engine helicopters, helicopter accidents are not caused solely by engine failures or power loss.

The issue here is flying external loads over the general public, who should deserve a degree of protection provided by the Operator.

I have never suggested that helicopters be restricted from performing this type of work - believe me, it forms the majority of my business. All I have ever suggested that a basic safety requirement of ANY external load operation requires that overflying people, or occupied buildings is a totally unacceptable practice.

If you are trying to suggest that there is no way of hauling a load without overflying people on the ground, then respectfully, I totally disagree with you. It is possible to stage and deliver the load without exposing the public to any risk. If it means flying an extra 5 or even 10 minutes with every pick, then so be it. If it requires that the cable car be shut down for the duration of the lift operations, then that sure seems to be a practical option to me. It is up to the Operator to ensure and INSIST that this occurs. The operator understands andf quantifies the risk, a cable car operator may have no understanding of the risk involved. Ask that same question of a cable car manufacturer or constructor and I can GUARANTEE you what the determination would be. That is because they use helicopters to construct them and have a complete understanding of situations involving helicopters that would influence that decision.

External load operations are a safe and extremely efficient means of performing a large variety of projects - otherwise they would never occur. That doesn't mean that the risk cannot be managed. In fact the rarity of accidents of this type demonstrates specifically, that the risk is effectively managed in these kind of operations.

All the other issues you raise are indeed important safety issues, basic safety issues that concern every operator. The issue here is specifically safe operating practices whilst performing external load operations. It is not the FAA (or any other agency), it is not the customer, it is not the owner of the property involved. It is the responsibility of the operator, who is ultimately responsible for planning and executing a safe operation, that protects everyone outside the operation, from exposure to risk from the act of that operation.

I confirm there is a risk in flying with sling loads. You mentioned not to fly with sling loads over public areas. OK
But i stated there are allways risks around the helicopter operation. We can try to count now the risk factor of a sling operation. We can count now the risk of any helicopter operation. On which risk factor number you wanna stop the ops?
I'm also on your side, that the laws should build the basics and the operator must try to find the safest way on the special day of ops. In this sadly accident there are no questions about the aerial laws in Austria. It's in law to fly over cable cars with sling loads. This is confirmed by several authorithies. The glacier isn't a dense populated area. It was a "one- in a - million" accident to lost the load and followed by a direct hit of the cable. I hope that this company and other operators find other ways of their ops in dense populated areas. But in this area the ops seems ok to me. If the investigators find out that the pilot have overflown the cars in very low altitude, i would find such flying risky and not to declare. But at the moment investigators doesn't speak from risky flying or low level cruising.
The questions stays "What if the news chopper chrashed in the US, have killed some people on the ground or fired up the building. No news choppers, sorry, no helicopters above cities?"
With overflying this area (over the city) and the people around there was also a specified risk number.

1/10th of a second....
 

I have made some very crude calculations. With my poor math skills this was already a great feat and I ask for forgiveness in advance for errors or complete miscalculations.

Please feel free to correct me! (Especially you Farmer1). I will again stand humble in your mathematical wizardry.

Given parameters:

Height :1000 feet or 300 meters.
Indicated Airspeed : Approximately 50 kts or 92.6 km/h or 25.72 m/s.
Size of gondola (width): 8.25 feet or 2.5 meters.
Weight of bucket
with concrete : 1500 pounds or roughly 750 kilograms.
Time for weight to drop
down from 1000 feet : 7.82 seconds.
Gravity : 9.801m/sec/sec.

Thus:

A helicopter travelling with a underslung load at 50 kts will travel at 25.72 m/s. The gondola is 2.5 meters wide. By my poor calculations the helicopter was still 201 meters away from the cable at 300 meters or 1000 feet when the load accidentally jettisoned. If the load was dropped 1/10 of a second earlier or later it would have most probably missed the gondola.

As stated earlier in the thread:

SHortshaft

Even with the ballistic coefficient of a block of concrete the aircraft would not have even reached the line when the release occurred.

Tecpilot

But to hit a round about 2,5 inches steel cable and a 2,5m wide gondola from 800-1000ft is a feasibility only mathematicians or chair seater could calculate.

Auscan

This was a one in a trillion chance happening. ( I did the math )

Cyclic Hotline

You Cyclic Hotline, is the first one to know how cut throat the industry is. Adding 5 or 10 minutes per leg will probably get you losing the job to someone else who is prepared to take the more direct route. What if there wasn’t a suitable alternate in the mountains where the concrete can be delivered or mixed. Intimately knowing the outlays of ski resorts, you should also know that access is normally a problem and the client wants his cement at 10000 feet to build the new mobile telephone tower.

Nevertheless, I am sorry, but 1/10th of a second risk is hardly any risk at all. A single line feature 2.5 meters wide, less than the width of a dual lane carriage way, is hardly a risk in open terrain where there is masses of available space to do a controlled jettison or an emergency landing or autorotation.

I will bet you that in similar circumstances, you will never hit those cables again, even if you tried everyday for the rest of your remaining flying career.

I have done some of the most dangerous underslung work I think one can do in a Bell 206 Longranger and Bell407’s. That is precision vertical referencing with underslung crews doing live power line maintenance. If anybody knows anything about calculating the risks of underslung work, I think I do.

Don’t get me wrong, I agree with you that you have to manage the risks, but, if we have to say “what if” for every single time there is the slightest risk we will never get airborne to do any underslung jobs e.g.:

What if I have tail rotor failure at 100’ over the destination building in a CBD.
What if the cable tangles and snaps and shoots into the blades and coil around the pitch change rods and I loose control over my cyclic inputs.
What if I get the load flying into the helicopter’s tail rotor.
What if we use a new inexperienced engineer or loadmaster and do not use mirrors or vertical referencing and we have a hook up.
What if there is no alternate site to do the pickup.
What if I experience wild oscillations and I have to slow down and my fuel is running low.
What if I get vortex ring state during transition to landing or LTE in the high OGE hover.
And then my personal favourite:
What if we have an accidental release exactly in that 1/10th of a second window period and hit the gondolas.

You Cyclic Hotline stated:
I will categorically state that I have NEVER been involved with any external load operation that has overflown people, or occupied premises, intentionally, at any time, nor would I permit it to happen, or be involved with it.
Also:
Dealing with a construction crew and personnel involved with the operation on the ground, is an entirely different matter than flying an external load over the general public.

I can assure you that intentionally and unintentionally, with your hundreds of lifts a day, you probably have overflown people. Construction crews and people involved in your operations are also people.

I don’t understand what the difference is between construction crew, personnel involved on the operation on the ground and the general public. People are people, you have to manage the risks with the people on your operation or on the ground involved in the operation, as you do, as you have to with the people in gondolas.

I think flying at 1000 feet instead of 500 feet was a step in the right direction.

You know, if he was at 500 feet, as required and stated in the regulations you so carefully studied and so wisely pointed out to us imbeciles or even below the allowed height at say 400 feet, he would have missed the gondolas by roughly 74.9 meters and nobody would have said a word, not even you.

In my opinion you have a greater chance of somebody dying in your operations than flying over a gondola at 1000 feet. It sound to me, deducting from what you say, that you see your people on your jobs as expendable, because “they know the risks”. How does that make you a manager of risks?? Your arguments sounds a bit hypocritical to me.

Furthermore, and I can put money on this. If that ski lift was switched off for the duration of the flights, you would have had a mob of people, who paid a lot of money to be there, bitterly complaining to management about the infringement on their skiing time, as it is their right to be on the slopes. They would have been up in arms and would have said themselves, even if in their own lack of wisdom, that there were little or no risk to themselves or others from a helicopter flying overhead at 1000 feet. Even if you had a vote, some people would still have elected to go up in the gondolas.

Self gratification and greed is some of our human downfalls. The owner / operator would also not have wanted to switch off the lifts as he also would not have wanted to lost any revenue during this time and would have approved the flights to keep the customers happy and the business coming in.

And I say this because, I would have been in front of the queue complaining angrily that there was no risks to us in the gondolas and that I wanted to go up to ski.

I would even have argued that they had to keep on flying, while we skied, so that we could get mobile phone communications up and running, as it was in the public and my interest that I could happily continue running my business while keeping mom and the kids happy on the ski slopes.

I dare you to prove me wrong…;)

Hi guys,

first, I am Austrian and come from an area about 100 klicks east of this site. My village basically lives of tourism - mainly winter but summer gets better every year. Cable-cars are an essential part of the business.

N5528P:

---"To the accident itself: As already pointed out here by many others, it is impossible to stop the operation of a cable car / tram / etc. etc. just because a chopper is flying somewhere overhead.
This would mean the immediate breakdown of any public transport in an urban area and would make a cable car useless.
There are not only cargo flights conducted throughout the day, but also emergency flights, police flights, military flights, traffic surveillance,.... "---

a) There is no one living up there! This is a tourist attraction so to speak! There is nothing braking down if the damn thing is not working for a couple of days! Okay the operator will cry a while, so what? The main income season is still 3 month away!
What happened will do way more damage to the economy than stopping cable car ops for a couple of days! The media will take care of that!

b) Don't exagerate, as stated before USL is not everyday flying.
Suppose you loose an engine, the pilot still has control over the aircraft (hopefully!) and can maneuver out of harms way ( ....for bystanders anyway) - Once a slingload goes its own way it is out of your control!


---"I cannot imagine that in every ski ressort in the US (for example), the cable cars cease their work just because a chopper is in the area . As a matter if fact, you do not have one cable car - in large ski ressorts you have 30 to 40 of such installations. Do you really believe they always stop because of a chopper? I really doubt that..."---

a) That's why you try to do these jobs off the main season, so you don't do that much economic damage while you close down the area! Also you don't have to shut down all 40 of them, just those that are in the way.....


In this case, the blame goes to the people who allowed this ops over an active skiing area!
I don't blame the operator (Knaus), if he has all the papers, this is his business! If he gets too concerned the competition will take the job. Nor do I blame the pilot, if he doesn't fly someone else will - especially if everything was kosher with the permits. I don't suppose that the cargo was dropped on purpose or by accidental release, but some mechanical/electrical failure.

It is just the general greed, that doesn't allow to clear the area for some time - even off-season.....


3top

Recuperator, I do indeed know how cut throat the helicopter business, that is why there needs to be regulatory control of safety issues. That way, there is a level playing field for everyone competing in the marketplace. If you are not permitted to overfly people or property, then everyone has the same limitations. If the customer can't accept the cost of doing the job safely, then I guess he won't get to complete his project.

I agree absolutely about the miniscule possibility of a dropped load taking out a cable car, but it still does not absolve the risk manager from eliminating that possibility while it is in service and carrying members of the public. It is the risk managers duty to ensure that members of the public are not exposed to this risk (of which they are totally unaware).

All the examples of risk which you pose are directly related to the aircraft, pilot and operator. If the job is planned correctly, none of those should endanger the public. The operator and his crew either accept that risk, or find another profession. 3top makes some highly pertinent points including an excellent observation that a helicopter taking controlled emergency action is a very different animal than a dead weight external load dropping out of control from the sky.

Again, I categorically state that at no time have we ever intentionally overflown the general public or own crews. How can I make that statement so confidently? Because, in addition to the requirements of the FAA in the carriage of external loads, I have an entire other set of Federal regulation to obey. The Occupational Safety and Health Administration regulations.

Specifically:
1926.551(a)

Helicopter regulations. Helicopter cranes shall be expected to comply with any applicable regulations of the Federal Aviation Administration.

and

1926.551(i)

Hooking and unhooking loads. When employees are required to perform work under hovering craft, a safe means of access shall be provided for employees to reach the hoist line hook and engage or disengage cargo slings. Employees shall not perform work under hovering craft except when necessary to hook or unhook loads.

Additionally, we have to comply with specific State OSHA or equivalent agency regulations, and any other regulations specific to the type of operation being conducted. Within the above rule, it does not prohibit essential crew from being placed in a certain area of risk in positioning and placing precision loads, eg; tower construction - but that is an assessed, defined and mitigated risk by both the operator and contractor.

The OSHA regulations, like all rules, are an escalating level of regulation, with compliance from the most basic levels of general safety to the specific operation being performed. So;

1926.550(a)(19)

All employees shall be kept clear of loads about to be lifted and of suspended loads.

Do you start to understand why I can so confidently make the statements I make? In addition to basic safety sense, it is the law and I can ensure you it is enforced, observed, obeyed, complied with and is not subject to interpretation by either ourselves, or OSHA.

I assure you and repeat, categorically. I have never been involved in an operation that has intentionally overflown our crewmembers! It is simply not an acceptable practice. I would never consider any of my ground crew as "expendable" (your term), but they accept some degree of risk in the type of operation that we are undertaking. It is our responsibility to ensure the safe working environment for everyone of our crewmembers and we take that responsibility very, very seriously.

Let me explain the difference between anyone directly involved with the operation, and the general public. All crewmembers involved with the helicopter are directly aware of the risks associated with the specific helicopter operation being accomplished.

1926.551(b)

Briefing. Prior to each day's operation a briefing shall be conducted. This briefing shall set forth the plan of operation for the pilot and ground personnel.

The general public has no concept of the risk or understanding of any part of the helicopter operation being accomplished - nor should they. For that reason, it is essential that the operator assume the position of guardian of their safety - by ensuring that every step is taken to protect the public from any risk that helicopter operation places them in.

Finally. In the prepartory stages of this project the shutting down of the cable-car should have been discussed, and if required, compensated accordingly - it is all in the cost of doing business. The customers would simply have to do without the trip that day. Lots of things get shut down for lots of reasons - its just a part of life. I sincerely doubt that anyone was going up skiing at this time of year.

I would suggest to you that following this terrible accident, the Pilot, Operator, cable car operator, customer and families of those so tragically killed, might be more aligned to the viewpoint that I am presenting, than to the one that transpired. The people killed were an innocent party to what occurred. They paid their money to have a wonderful experience, not get killed in an entirely avoidable accident that was completely beyond their control or comprehension.

I would further suggest to you, that a regulatory framework will result to ensure that something like this never happens again in Austria and quite probably, anwhere in Europe.

I do sympathise with everyone involved. This is a terrrible tragedy.

Cyclic Hotline
That's what i call a "DENSE POPULATED AREA"!
http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v674/tecpi/heli5.jpg
And "NO" the whole downtown wasn't evacuated.

And believe me hundreds of cellular phone transmitters in dense populated areas were placed in this manner. I confess that's not the way i find safe to do such work. I would insist on a twin, a hook system with redundancy and i would at least try to evacuate the working area. But please think about the costs of such strategy. Evacuating a bigger area in such downtown isn't to pay. The ratio between costs of the transmitter, helicopter ops, personal and evacuating isn't acceptable.
And cranes? We have also overturned cranes in cities.

This is a sample picture of the glacier in soelden not far away the accident site including the type of cable car.
.http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v6...enbach-jpg.jpg

You can see in dense populated areas we are trying to find an agreement. But one this godforsaken glacier... such a tragedy

Cyclic Hotline: I couldn't agree with you more. Well done.

And the switch to the emergency load release is situated close to which switch?

Similar case to the YAK which had three fuel shutoff switches next to the three landing light switches - leading to a total flame out on final in hamburg or hannover some years back.

This thread belongs on the main page - these errors can occur on any type.

Greetings from Murphy.

Hi

Speaking as someone who only does very occasional underslung work, I would like to point out that every underslung check ride I have every done (military and civil) has been carried out from an airfield. Pick up barrel of concrete, fly circuit, avoid built up areas, houses, try and cross roads at right angles etc. but without doubt we have potentially overflown members of the public. It is possible that one of these flights might have flown directly over a school bus driving down a country lane!

Is the suggestion, that all future check rides would have to be carried out over some secure part of Salisbury Plain or similar?

TeeS

No-one has mentioned the general public's view in this:

Who has the God given right to decide whether aerial ops will / will not directly affect the safety of members of the public?

If you, as a prospective passenger read a sign at the entrance to the cable car saying:

The public is advised that during their journey, there is a risk of death or injury from falling debris.

would you and your family climb into that car?

Health and safety was introduced to protect the 'innocent'. In this particular instance, there can be NO excuse for NOT closing the cable car.
IF the project is that important, then the planners should build in a closing period for the cable car company and compensate them for their reduced earnings. If the local community wants this they should pay for it.

tec, I have done plenty of downtown congested area work, just like the picture you have shown. We would indeed shut down the area immediately affected by our operations. That could be as minimal as a single street/parking lot, that allowed us to stage the load and provide a safe emergency diversionary area. There is no necessity to shut down an entire city, simply the limited area affected by our operation.

As we pick the load in the area adjacent to the work site, then the area affected by our operations is minimal at best. That is why we do it that way. As the helicopter enters and exits the area without an external load, there is no restriction on the rest of our operation. We would still have to do it in the early hours of a weekend morning though. This is precisely how we perform these type of missions, and we are typically hauling something much larger than the example posted.

The picture of the glacier is indeed representative of the areas we, again, do lots of work in. Now, the picture obviously presents a limited perspective of the entire area, but from what is visible in that picture, we would stage out of the parking lot, and fly our departures to the right of the lift, and NEVER cross it. Safety is not limited to congested areas. The exact same criteria are considered in every job we undertake.

The point about lifts by cranes is indeed pertinent, as cranes do indeed drop loads and roll over. That is precisely why cranes are not permitted to lift loads over work crews or the public, and why access to work sites specifically excludes the public. Ever seen the general public wandering around a work site next to a crane?

TeeS, the answer to this would be to perform those lifts within the confines of the airfield, or indeed, perform them in some area which limits the possibility of endangering the public.

And TC, we are indeed tasked as the safety advocates for the public, that is our responsibility when performing these missions. It is precisely because we manage the safety aspects of these jobs, that signs such as you suggest are not required. If indeed we do not perform these missions without excluding that risk, then that is precisely the sign that should be required - and the associated liability it implies.

Somehow, I can't see the cable car operator or your insurance company subscribing to that one.

To summarize this argument:

Side 1:
"What are the odds? You can't eliminate all risk anyway, after all, a meteor could hit the gondola too"

Side 2:
"If it can go wrong, it will go wrong. The more risks you eliminate, the less chance something bad will happen when it does go wrong"

I lean toward Side 2 - being "wrong" in this case simply means you spent more time and money. When Side 1 is wrong, you get this accident (or New Orleans).

During the afternnon of 8 September a helicopter was flying over central London trailing a large Quantas advertising banner. The aircraft made several circuits during the 20 minutes or so it took me to walk between meetings.

I have no idea of the risk of an accidental detachment, and clearly a falling banner would not represent anything like the threat posed by a concrete laden container. Nevertheless, the consequences of such an event could be serious if it fell on a moving vehicle. The odds of landing on a car, lorry, bus or train must be much higher than the odds of hitting a lone cable car.

Given the comments on this thread about the regulation of carrying loads outside a helicopter and what does or does not constitute good practice can anyone comment on the regulatory position in the UK?

So that's what it was.
I was too far away to see what was being advertised and it had gone by the time I got back to central London. Splendid idea. I hope we see more.

The regulatory position in the UK?
Too many and too strict in the view of some, but Brits love rules so the position is unlikely to change.


FL

PS: Watch out for bombs on your next visit to the big city. London can be a dangerous place.

The head of the society of cable car operators in Austria says yesterday: "In my view is the closing of cable cars during transportation flights absolutely unconceivable".
"It's up to the helicopter operator and the authorities, they have to find safe ways".

"Wash my skin, but doesn't make me wet!" I would say.

Construction and service of cable cars in high mountain area are impossible without helicopters and their transportation flights.

And to the banner, yes in my mind it's also an external load operation. No question, such a banner isn't a bomb like the concrete kettle. But a few hundred pounds coming from the sky are allways dangerous.
But i'm shure the flight is allowed and in law, like the tragedy flight in Austria.

Was the banner tow using the river route? Nonetheless a banner falling is not such a problem as concrete. While driving around Brighton yesterday I took a look at the site that were using cranes. They all had cordoned off public areas which were being carried over.

The banner may have been over the river part of the time but it was both north and west of Kings Cross as well.

The estates of those who were injured or died, will now sue whoever stands still long enough, for millions and millions of pounds. It'll probably be spread between the helicopter company, the cable car company and the local authorities.
The wrangling over who pays what amount will take years, but the bottom line is: someone will pay big bucks.

Now for a tiny fraction of this payout, the cable car company could have closed on the days the loadlifting was done and been re-imbursed by the company doing the construction work. And that company could have charged the local authority that same amount to cover their charges.
Some people just don't believe it'll happen to them I guess.

Oh well ... they won't do it again:\