Helicopter Crash Central London

[horsebadorties]

ATC role

Would a safer option have been to get the helicopter to hold in the circuit for the heliport? The ATC clearance sent him back towards the tower with an extension round the bend of the river as far as London Bridge, where the Shard is located.

[Heathrow Harry]

the real problem is that at Vuaxhall the river is only 500 ft wide

All well & good if you are flying in a straight line in decent visibilty but a very different matter if you are manouvering in poor visibility

any normal turn was likely to take him over the river bank and, as we know, there are a lot of tall builings there

maybe if he'd slowed almost to a hover he could have made a turn in that space but at normal speeds.............

[alphaalpha]

Horsebadorties:

No. Thames could not have cleared him into the Battersea circuit without prior agreement from the ADC.

[DownIn3Green]

Flying Lawyer...Well, no, VERY Well said! I've followed your posts for what seems like forever, and have never found you to speak in a frivolus manner...

You know of which you speak and it seems a little strange to me that people want to know your ":qualifications"...

In fact, if you're like me, you probably lost your "member since" date back in the 90's when Danny had the problem with the server...

I for one thank you for your wisdom and I'm sorry for "hijacking" this post, but some people should get cited for "PUI"...(posting under the influence)...

[AtomKraft]

For goodness sake peeps.

He was trying to do a VMC task when it wasn't VMC.

He tried to compensate for the poor weather by using his experience- both of the area and the aircraft.

Got unlucky.

Anything to add?

[Richard J.]

the real problem is that at Vuaxhall the river is only 500 ft wide

And the St George Wharf tower appears to be less than 100 ft from the river bank, so that would mean that helicopter route H4, which I assume runs along the middle of the river, would be less than 350 ft from the tower. Pilots often can't climb above the tower because of a 1000 ft ceiling due to Heathrow traffic.

Actually the river width at that point looks nearer to 800 ft from the satellite view, but even so, that still means that H4 is less than 500 ft from the tower, and of course a smaller distance from the crane jib. And H4 is a route that the CAA say must be flown "precisely".

So it seems that you can't keep to the "not within 500 ft of anything" rule and keep to the precise route of H4. Or am I missing something?

[aterpster]

This reminds me somewhat of the midair of a Piper and tour helicopter over the compressed airspace beneath the joint New York Class B over the Hudson River. Couple of years ago?

[RatherBeFlying]

Too much space taken for turn over river in earlier accident.

2006 New York City plane crash - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

[brittleware]

Lighting

I don't think that lights positioned only on the top of cranes - or buildings - are adequate. I'd like a requirement for lights to be positioned at several (say three) heights 100/150 ft apart.

[TRC]

I'd like a requirement for lights to be positioned at several (say three) heights 100/150 ft apart.

I went past the building in question at 22.30 the night before last.

There were obstruction lights about halfway up, and again three quarters of the way up. I expect there were lights on the top but I couldn't see them from ground level.
Additionally, just about every other floor was lit internally by what looked like strip lights - as is just about every office building in London, 24 hours a day (so much for being green).

I'm not saying that all or any of these lights were or weren't on at the time of the accident, just that they were on during the night before last.

The recovery crane was also showing a red at the top of the jib.

From the Directorate of Airspace Policy:


"Article 219 expresses the requirements for “en-route” structures (ie those away from the vicinity of a licensed aerodrome) and dictates a statutory requirement to provide aviation warning lights for structures of a height of 150 meters or more. The Article 219 specification requires that medium intensity (2000 candela) steady red lights be mounted as close as possible to the top of the structure and at intermediate levels not exceeding 52 metres. Such lighting should be displayed at night and be visible from all directions."

[John R81]

Richard J

Or am I missing something?

H4 has a 1500 ft height restriction at that point and so helicopters usually do fly above 1,000 ft as they pass this building. Typically I will be at 1450 ft. At 1300 ft and beyond we can pass directly over the top of the building without breaching the 500 ft rule, though typically we do not, heading towards the centre of the river. Therefore the separation from the building increases - it is 500 ft clear, not 500 ft above.

When landing into Battersea we need to come down from this height - as PB was doing on this occasion. Once we are in that stage of flight the 500 ft rule does not apply and so passing within 500 ft of an person, vessel vehicle or structure is not prohibited.

[Richard J.]

When landing into Battersea we need to come down from this height - as PB was doing on this occasion.

Well, he was preparing to land, but had been at 800 to 1000 ft while awaiting clearance. Anyway, thanks for the reply, John.

[757hopeful]

The report makes for an interesting read. If I remember correctly there was 7 seconds between pb being told he was ok to head for battersea and the time of impact.

I would speculate that perhaps once he had heard he was ok to head that way. He may have begun pre landing checks and preparations. And was a tad occupied. Twinned with the very poor visibility (which I can attest as I drove down the very road around 2 hours before the incident), a set of very unfortunate circumstances ensued.

Again, my two pennysworth. Looks like the AAIB have recovered quite a lot of information in the bulletin. So with any luck the final report will be quite in depth.

From this we may be able to draw a few points which we can all learn from and keep us all safe when we're up there. From every accident something is learnt and aviation is made safer. It's just a shame there has to be an accident before the dangers are spotted.

I was quite interested in the parts of the report where it gave an estimate as to what height the collision happened


As a side note though. There is a lot of opinions and mud slinging happening in this thread which to be honest is of no relevance. Have the arguments via PM's chaps!

[TRC]

Well, he was preparing to land..

The aircraft was 2.5 miles from Battersea - no-one (I hope) starts their descent into the Heliport that far out, surely. We aren't talking 747's into Heathrow here.

[Richard Westnot]

Maybe if you consider the weather and only 2.5 miles from Battersea, I see no reason whatsoever why a decent should not have been taking place. (clearance had already been given)

"IF" the machine was travelling at 60kts, he was only 2 1/2 mins from touchdown.

[TRC]

Let's wait and see what the regular visitors to Battersea have to say.

In any case no clearance to land at Battersea is evident in the AAIB Special Bulletin. They were not 2-way with the 109.

[STS]

It's been a long time since I posted here - and I wasn't regularly doing so anyway - and no doubt the server reset my join date a while back. This thread has drifted into a CVs-at-dawn territory which I can't play. My legal knowledge, although I have some, isn't comparable to that of Flying Lawyer. I, like many others here, am aware who he his and defer to his professional knowledge. I don't have a PPL and the extent of my flying knowledge is a student job at UA to pay my way through college. I suppose I could count a bit of pratting about on the South Downs paragliding. The point is my technical knowledge is certainly not on a par with many professionals here and I'm not going to comment of any aspects of flying in this area. However, I live by Vauxhall and I see the tower when I step out of my front door - and I hope I can comment of the area I live in without being shouted down.

The current state of play is this: there are red lights approx every 15 floors. They're hardly Batman lights. There is one red light on the top of the crane. It's not visible from ground level, but it is from the elevated platforms of the train station and from the other side of Vauxhall Bridge. Whether that means it's visible to helicopter pilots - that is for you to assess based on the conditions you know in the air. The building has all the internal lights on every time I see it and has had as long as it's been there. It is not uncommon for the top to be totally obscured by fog or cloud. There have been times I haven't seen the top, and that includes at night when there are lights on. However, I could say the same about the Shard. Oddly enough, all these buildings seem clearer from a distance than close up. Again, I make no judgment but I will say that as someone who lives close to these developments, anything that can be done to improve safety in general is most welcome. None of the lighting that is currently there seems any different/an improvement on what was there before the accident. If it is, it's not noticeable on the ground.

The local community is irritated by the noise of helicopters - right or wrong, there is a perception that the number of flights is increasing. Personally, they don't bother me but I suspect this is something that will be talked about here as this, and other, developments continue to spring up next to the river. Keep in mind there are people who don't want the US Embassy here and don't want the flats being built - they will use anything they can to bolster their argument. That whole Nine Elms area is due to have work continue until 2024, and there is already a new crane up on a different development at Vauxhall Station, although it's much smaller and most definitely has lights on.

A poster mentioned the distance of the tower to the river - it's right next to it. The only space is what will be the Thames Path. That seems to be the case along the south bank.

I asked a friend who was at Vauxhall station that morning about the conditions. She couldn't see the top of the building because it was very foggy.

Regarding property development - whether £1.25m for a 5th floor 2 bedroom flat in that tower is worth it...again that's not for me to say.

[Machaca]

[Agaricus bisporus]

Can we please get over this irrelevant red herring of obstruction lights. They have little if anything to do with this case. They are there to indicate the presence of an obstruction that can be seen. ie in VMC. They are NOT there to indicate anything in IMC for two very good reasons.

1) They cannot be seen in IMC. D'uh oh!

2) No one should be flying in IMC anywhere near them so there is no requirement for this to be a function.

It is abundantly clear that this accident was caused by flying in marginal VMC or in IMC whether intentionally or not, far too low and bumping into something that wasn't seen due to the met conditions. Simply put, the poor fellow got himself somewhere where he just shouldn't have been in such weather and got unlucky.

Changing rules and regulations on the basis of this accident would be unnecessary and counterproductive, it certainly wouldn't/couldn't prevent a future accident if the same sort. Only an individual pilots judgement/awareness is capable of doing that, and I think this unfortunate accident has done plenty to raise awareness of the inadvisability of grubbing around in poor vis below obstructions with their tops hidden in cloud instead of diverting somewhere more suitable.

[Bronx]

Agaricus

Can we please get over this irrelevant red herring of obstruction lights.

= Can we please discuss what I want to discuss.

BTW, a lot of professionals in Rotorheads who regularly use the London helicopter routes don't think it's a red herring.

They have little if anything to do with this case.

Little is good enough for me if something can be done for low cost and might save a life.
That includes the life of someone who made a bad call as you think this guy did.

It is abundantly clear

That's the simplistic attitude you took on the Mull of Kintire crash thread and why it got up people's noses there.