I'm sure this is from many years ago, not recent. I recall seeing it previously.

I'd put even more money on there being some real damage done to the poor dudes swinging around on the line!

From Mexican media, it happened July 16, 2019 during filming for "El Señor de los Cielos". The article also has a video of what is said to be the same 206 getting it's landing gear removed when in a hover.

https://lopezdoriga.com/entretenimie...y-dos-heridos/

Google translate:

"During a recording, a helicopter from which two actors were suspended crashed to the ground, causing one of them to go into a coma and the other to suffer fractures in both legs.
The incident occurred on July 16, during the filming of a chapter of the series "The Lord of the Skies", however, it was until this week that the images of the incident were released.
The injured are two members of the stunt cast, in charge of doing the stunts. The main cast, led by Rafael Amaya, who plays Aurelio Casillas, was not present.
Telemundo and Argos Comunicación, owned by Epigmenio Ibarra, producers of the series that is filming its seventh season, have not commented on this incident.
Later, the helicopter moved to Mexico City where it put the lives of five people at risk by performing a maneuver to change the landing pad.

Eye,
@SCT_mx
, this helicopter flew throughout the CDMX even after having suffered a forced landing at EDOMEX. Not only that, its pilot and administrator José Luis García put at least five people at risk by doing this maneuver to change the landing pad.

No cargo-hook on this helicopter. Rope was secured somewhere inside the cabin, and hung over the skids. there is a longer video where you can see the person in the cabin is throwing down the rope to the guys on the ground.

Reminds me a bit of this:

I know the skid gear removal shown was not the first, or second time this has been done and in theory if the pilot is smooth and willing to take the risk it is not complicated. But I think that in the grand scheme of things it is almost as dumb as why they had to change the skid gear in the first place. I will admit, that it is a pain in the butt to pull 206 series landing gear if you have to use jacks, but had they ever heard of a boom truck?

Back a few years, when working EMS, a company I will not name ( initials CJS) advised their bases to round up some matresses and hay bales in case there was a landing gear problem that might result in a tough situation during landing. Everybody said " no, we aren't going to do that, thanks for the suggestion". That concept vanished. Best to watch that from a distance if youre lucky enough to not be the one flying.

I think the point about the skids change is not whether it’s a sound practice, it’s the fact that the aircraft was in a totally unknown airworthiness condition!

aircraft in an unknown condition of airworthiness are shutdown, they aren’t flown somewhere else for new skids, the airworthiness of which is easily inspected visually.

If you need new skids, there’s a whole lot more that also needs doing.

roscoe1 - aircraft with retractable gear need that sort of mattress arrangement or a pit (in the case of the RAF Pumas) in case you need to land when the gear won't come down so I understand the thinking behind it.

A number of years back a 206 had a set of skids changed in the hover at Blackpool in England.. The aircraft a crop sprayer hit the crop/ground leaving the gear a tangled mess under the aircraft. I think at least one refuel was involved.
Aircraft landed successfully.

If it's still flying OK it's still a reasonable thing to do, fit new skids. Landing sans skids how might that turn out, besides incurring additional damage to the belly, what if it rolls on its side. One of our Hueys in Vietnam had a hover skid change, someone in a thread here had pics of a 212, I think in Alaska, doing the same. Once did the same as crab mentions, 76 nose gear wouldn't extend, landed with the nose on a pile of sand bags. Problem was the oleo did not extend on take off and the scissor link jammed up against, and bent, the hydraulic jack.

But it had already landed - heavily. Shut down and asses, not fly and change the skids.

Chacun à son goût. You wouldn't catch me under a hovering helicopter fiddling with tools, other people and a puckered pilot. Great for anyone who saves further damage and expense if it works. What could possibly go wrong. No problem if you have a dedicated landing pit or some other sort of set up that remains in place. Back in the day CJ expected people to grab the matresses and run out to set it up as it would have been unsightly to leave them about at a public airport. Oh yeah, what was the title of this thread, something about how quickly something can go wrong.....?

Undercarriage leg changes on the Wessex in the hover seemed to be an everyday occurrence

Why so FED? Never heard of it being an issue with our Wessii or H-34.

212, Sorry, I meant as a general principle and not this accident specifically.

I can see it being a workable solution if you're out in the field and have a leaky oleo or similar on an otherwise entirely serviceable helicopter without the lifting kit to do the job in the standard manner.

What's simply bonkers is to take a machine that has just been involved in a seriously hard landing (sufficient to have damaged the landing gear so badly it needs to be changed), which is safely on the ground already, take off again, fly to another location and then hover over the heads of your engineers while they swap the skids out.

If anyone seriously thinks that's ok then please don't ever come within 100yds of my helicopter with a spanner or a pair of flying gloves!