Heli Crash Vid

[mrloudly]

Think this has been posted before. Freeze the video at around 21-22 secs though. How lucky were the guys in the yellow boat!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eff-t6cKLCM&fea...

[bakerstreet]

mrloudly said:

Think this has been posted before. Freeze the video at around 21-22 secs though. How lucky were the guys in the yellow boat!!!!

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eff-t6cKLCM&fea...

There are quite a few on YouTube. There is one where the Heli misses the landing deck on the back of a ship.

There is also one where a Sea King lands in the sea and it all goes a bit wrong

[Geneve]

mrloudly said:

Think this has been posted before. Freeze the video at around 21-22 secs though. How lucky were the guys in the yellow boat!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eff-t6cKLCM&fea...

That looks like a case of Vortex Ring, or settling with power. It affects helicopters when there is too high a rate of decent with insufficient airspeed and some power set. The natural reaction, to lift the collective to apply more power, just makes matters worse - the rotor blades have already stalled.

[gareth_t]

I don't think it's settling with power or vortex ring state, he just didn't judge his height well enough. Pilot error

[Madness60]

Don't think so, too high forward airspeed for vortex ring to have taken hold, it was just a badly flown wing over with insufficient height to recover. Only one winner in heli vs lake!!

DOh Gareth got there first but great minds etc etc

[magpie215]

blades are heavily coned ...low rotor RPM??

[mrloudly]

From what I understand, a "Vortex Ring" is when you descend at a rate equal to that of the rotor downdraft which then kills the lift. Go faster, forwards or slower you're OK
I stand to be corrected as a mere PPL ;-)

[mrloudly]

IMHO he/she just totally fked up here and the blades were stalled with no chance of recovery. A classic case of "Height is your friend", sadly they didn't have enough...

[AnotherClarkey]

Graphic demonstration of how much energy is stored in all the rotating bits - shocking to see how it just tears itself apart. RIP.

[Siko]

Think previous posters all hit nail on t'head, glassy surface of the lake, lowish wingover and probably had the collective up around his armpit as he impacted, hence the blade coning.

Also looked like a very high angle of bank (ie very aggressive manoeuvre) at the top of the turn which put his velocity vector very much down vertically rather than horizontal.

Definitely not vortex ring though as Madness60 also said, I was demonstrated it a few years ago now and it took a long time to get into, hence the other name for it 'settling with power'. If anyone's remotely interested in my experience its below, if not, sorry!

We only got in by flying backwards with zero airspeed on the clock, power applied and over 800' rate of descent. Was surprisingly difficult to get in, we finally entered at 6000', immediately pitched near 90 degrees nose down, rotated through 180 degrees and came out sideways at 1500', not a nice experience. It was shown as part of a course, but not shown anymore! One of the many reasons why helicopter pilots are brooding, grumpy b****rds!!