Ask a helicopter pilot anything

[Siko]

williamp said:

Is there much of a difference between the military and civilian helicopters?

"Choppers". No, right?

Depends what you mean, lots of military and civilian helicopters are the same..ish. The Chinook is used in the civilian world, my S92 is used in the military etc. We don't tend to call them "choppers" as we are a bit sniffy about it in the helicopter world...no idea why, but calling a helicopter a "chopper" in front of a real helicopter pilot is akin to meeting your future father in-law and telling him about your plans to introduce his daughter to your gentleman sausage.

But I don't mind, call it whenever you want....rotating death banana etc

[Siko]

normalbloke said:

The Bolkow is very well suited to it! I hear the new Wildcat won’t ever get the OK to do it, which is a shame! Most of my time (non pilot) has been in a Jetranger, so you only have to think about lowering the collective, punting the cyclic forward before the tail boom comes off!

Yeah that is bloody lethal! Funny but the most difficult to fly and potentially lethal helicopters are strangely enough, the simple trainer ones you fly as a newbie. A mate of mine with thousands of hours in big helicopters (mainly Chinook) wanted to get his PPL H and paid for a trial lesson in a jet ranger and brought his girlfriend along to show off basically. He told me he couldn't even hover it for the first few minutes and had to give control to the 500hr flying instructor....it was just so twitchy compared to his Chinook and very embarrassing apparently

[Siko]

texaxile said:

If you went upside down, would you and your co pilot fall out, or would you still be friends?.

Also:

There have been a few tragic accidents due to Helo's hitting power lines, if flying low in unknown terrain is it a serious hazard or something that you have made yourself aware of prior?.

And how many cojones does one need for this job?:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xIrcRu-dsV0&ab...

Yup, I've lost a lot of friends in helicopters. A lovely chap called Vince Hussell was on one of my flying courses and was killed instructing in a Squirrel which hit power lines in Devon. A few friends have hit them and got away with it too....

Powerlines are a massive hazard to military pilots. Flying in Bosnia was bloody lethal because they would place the mast itself on a ridge and one on the opposite ridge with just a powerline hanging between (in mainland europe they often have coloured globes on the lines or strobelights). Our maps were marked with all the powerlines from 60' upwards and the 50 thou ones with the small house type powerlines too, It was incredibly difficult to see them and I landed once in the desert in Iraq, at night and as the troops got off I noticed a massive set of powerlines that ran along the road. Despite 4 of us looking out on approach none of us saw them and just pure luck we flew parallel to them.

Those powerline guys are totally nuts.

Edited by Siko on Wednesday 30th March 17:21

[Siko]

Theraveda said:

Spot of tree pruning?

Not sure which one is worse

[Siko]

ecsrobin said:

I know a pilot who managed to clip some lines and take out the power of a village in wales. During the investigation the MAA (from memory) started to get very excited about the low flying chart in the ops room, I got dragged in on my day off with a very unhappy squadron boss where I then pointed at the big sign above the map saying “This chart is not CALF amended” MAA soon moved along from that line of inquiry.


MAA = Military Aviation Authority
CALF = chart amendment low flying (basically published every 28 days with any new wires/masts and so on.

Lol I remember the joys of CALF amending a half mil and losing a day of your life….thank god for technology I get funny looks from the other pilot if I take the paper map out of the cockpit door but old habits die hard

[Siko]

Madness60 said:

Do you prefer left or right quickstops??

Oooofff that cut deep

[Siko]

The_Doc said:

Yeah, my brother spent lots of time navigating for Pipeline surveying, flying over the National Transmission System gas pipelines.
He said it was mostly boring, punctuated by landing quickly over the (buried and unmarked) pipe, when they found a farmer with a JCB unknowingly about to dig into the main gas supply to a powerstation.

Literally running over from the helicopter to the bemused farmer, and shouting.

He also said it's still amusing to phone up a hotel in advance for the night, when on a 2 day jaunt and ask "do you have a helipad for me to arrive on?"

- and then find they've run the Bentley over to the H for his arrival.....

That’s why helicopters are so freaking awesome A buddy of mine flew for the lighthouse board in Scotland and used to turn up at the Sumburgh hotel in his EC175 and park it out the front…..now I don’t care what anyone says, that is super cool.

[Siko]

Gaines178 said:

Do you work for an oligarch? Only asking as the other thread went quiet very quickly.

Lol nope and that is a great thread indeed. I’ve never done corporate/VIP but when I got my licence one of my instructors was a VIP pilot who had been let go. Whilst he may have been biased (he was a pretty chilled out sort of guy) he said that most corporate/VIP pilots only last in the region of 2 years with a particular client before they are let go and that most clients were *****.

A good friend of mine worked for a very wealthy uk family and was basically treated like dirt before he left, he was put under a huge amount of pressure at times to “get the job done”. I think it’s probably 50/50 between client/self-induced pressure but there have been a number of high-profile corporate accidents/incidents which shouldn’t have happened. I won’t go into it here but it’s freely available all over the Internet if you look.

[Siko]

Register1 said:

Another amazing and interesting thread,

Thanks

Thank you

[Siko]

Madness60 said:

Ooooh another one....hang on... you said you'd choose the 412 out of all the helis you've flown, worst one for me, overcomplicated for training ac and horrible roll and pitch rate, felt like flying a giant angry American redneck

Are you better at hovering over the sea than on SARTU??

Lol I only hover over a helideck/airfield nowadays mate I basically fly a 747 with a whirly disk on top. I adored the 412, just a simple fun aircraft to fly and could do anything…there’s a reason the Canadians/USMC use them operationally.

[Siko]

paintman said:

AAIB website shows report in the Consultation stage.
This AAIB bulletin from 2018 worth a read.
https://assets.publishing.service.gov.uk/media/5c0...

Thank you, interesting read indeed. IIRC the captain was a FW pilot aswell and current on several types at once with his girlfriend as co-pilot but also not a dedicated AW169 pilot? Personally I’m not a fan of being current on multiple types, especially mixing fixed and rotary wing. In my last couple of years in the military I flew the Grob Tutor fixed-wing as I mentioned previously and at the same time the Puma helicopter. It was ok and I was safe on both but it was for a relatively short time and it took a lot of work to stay on top of all the different checks/procedures. Some people do it quite well but I think for the majority of us it is a big ask.

[Siko]

TheSecretSurgeon said:

Evening Siko.

Is it true that flying a helicopter is the most complicated eye-hand-foot coordination skill a human can accomplish?

Because.........

TSS

well of course I’ll say yes but I’m assuming with your username you are fairly handy too?

Joking aside you do need good hand/eye coordination which amazes most of my family and friends as I can barely drive these days without bumping into something.

Night dust landings in Iraq into talcum powder type sand are probably one of the hardest things I’ve ever done though and pushed my meagre flying ability fully to the limit.

[Siko]

speedyguy said:

Is there anywhere in the world you would like to fly a helicopter?

First time ever on one was down the grand canyon with the kids, quite enjoyable but noisy and the flight back across it was pointed out below where all the helicopters crash dotted about.

2nd time unintentionally was in the Himalayas from Lukla back to Kathmandu another bloody noisy experience where you just wonder how well maintained they were, my pal who's a mechanic just watched the oil pressure gauge the whole flight whilst carking himself as it was too misty/cloudy to actually see anything out of the window once they took off.

That sounds amazing, I am very jealous! Being an avid reader of accident reports/Aircrash investigation etc I am rather suspicious of aviation in third world countries, I’m sure it’s fine and you probably wouldn’t die (!) but I just wouldn’t risk it in many countries. I won’t go Into it in detail but a really dodgy bloke I knew in the military who wasn’t a pilot and basically got thrown out, somehow managed to get into commercial aviation in Africa which led him back to the U.K. as an airline pilot. He’s no longer flying here so you don’t need to worry about him per se, but he was flying commercially in Africa for a long time….

[Siko]

TheSecretSurgeon said:

Some of my endoscopic instruments have foot pedals. I stomp with my leg and peer at the screen.
I wonder, and this isn't a willy waving contest, but could you fly a helicopter ambidextrously? Eg total Left-right exchangeability?

Because........

Anyhow ill get off here, this isn't my rodeo. I'll get back into my domain! Thanks, Siko.

In theory you could and some of the smaller/older more basic training helicopters you might only have the one collective in the middle where you would have to swop hands if you swop seats (eg fly in the RHS, use RH on cyclic and LH on collective, fly in the LHS use LH on the cyclic and RH on the collective). I once let one of our crewman fly a Puma from the centre seat just to demonstrate that he could get us back if both pilots were killed/wounded. Granted he couldn't get to the pedals but he did a great job using the LHS collective and the RHS cyclic stick.

Hell of a long answer sorry, shorter one is: probably not

Edited by Siko on Thursday 31st March 08:17

[Siko]

ruggedscotty said:

Ive watched the helicopter pilots fly storing lighthouses and well impressed with them, a different breed indeed.

They're a great bunch indeed and that is a great job; my friend left when they changed the Ts&Cs drastically but it was a bit of a hidden secret, one of the best helicopter jobs nobody knew about.

[Siko]

IanH755 said:

At some point I've been your groundcrew on 1419Flt with those dates, small world! I did mid '05 to early '10 on 28Sqn & MES (as it became) averaging a few Op-tours a year. I left on my return from the first Merlin Afghan tour (Xmas '09) for sunny Lossie.

Still had my Black R34 Skyline back at Benson too IIRC.

Thanks Ian! I do remember a Black Skyline, very nice! Thanks for keeping me safe in iraq - our engineers were amazing (my grandfather was an RAF engineer). It used to make me laugh though when we'd start all 3 engines on the Merlin but couldn't get no3 into main drive...shutdown to a cold aircraft and then see some poor newbie traipsing out with that massive rod to stand on the top and wind the damn thing into main

[Siko]

RobbyJ said:

Amazing thread, thanks for taking the time. If you refer to someone as a 'throbber' too then this thread will overtake the superyacht crew one in my approval ratings, happy for that person to be me.

I remember reading an AAIB report a few years ago that from memory was an S76 charter landing at a country house at night. The pilot had some form of spatial disorientation and long story short nearly stacked it fatally a few times in under a minute. After a quick bit of Google sleuthing turn out it was Paul McCartney's house (allegedly). Very frightening experience but never made the media.

Also the incredibly sad Colin McRae AAIB report is very grim reading but lessons to be taken away from all of them.

Thanks Robby - sadly the only throbber on this thread is me (well and Madness60 ). In fact we used to have a saying going through flying training that has stood me in good stead through life, which I will share here - if you don't know who the course w*nker is, then it's you. Because there is always one

Yes that Paul McCartney one is typical of what can happen - there was a fatal a few years back in similar circumstances when Lord Haughey was killed. Also a good read is the AAIB investigation into the G-LAWX near miss when they came within 12' (iirc) of trees on a hill during approach to another landing site.

The Colin Macrae one is very sad indeed for a number of reasons, but fundamentally he flew his helicopter like he drove and flying is infinitely more unforgiving, as those kids sadly found out....

[Siko]

Chuck328 said:

He didn't happen to be a winchman at one point did he?

Great thread btw.

Hahah nope he didn’t. He has been in the national press a few times and it is all 100% his fault, but I feel quite sorry for him too, He’s a really lovely bloke despite being a bit dodgy and going through a very rough time right now (we have mutual friends who keep me in the loop), he just made some very bad personal choices over the years.

[Siko]

normalbloke said:

We used to use a hotel near Wolverhampton regularly. We used to have to keep things tight, as we’ve have nights where we were in, and two of our Transco colleagues wanted some of the action, so 3 Jetrangers huddled up. I’ve also been in there in the summer,after a rotors running refuel at (what used to be) Halfpenny Green. Only problem was, we were being cheeky, as much fuel as we could and then didn’t have enough power to leave from the grounds. So a small IGE bounce over the hedge into the airfield, then room for a decent running takeoff.

Haha love that! In Northern Ireland I used to fly out of Bessbrook base on many occasions, which had a high fence maybe 30’ high around the helipad. A Gazelle crew was asked to take a rather large army officer back to Aldergrove and loaded him up but couldn’t actually get over the wall with him on board…he had to wait for a Puma later.

[Siko]

Castrol for a knave said:

You may have touched upon this already, but where are the hotspots for pilots these days? A couple of guys I know left the North Sea to work the African oil fields a few years ago and another is over in Denmark on renewables.

and another

Would you ever fly the old school piston engined stuff? Those things looked like death on a stick. Is there a classic helicopters thing - those Bell 47's look lovely but not when some thing goes wrong.

and another

Are Robinsons as dangerous as they reckon, or is it just a case of there's loads of them, doing lots of hours so they tend to have more incidents?

Loving your work - I'm a total heli nut. I live Shropshire, so a couple of my mates instruct at DHS Shawbury. I also like to tease the wife - her ex is an Apache instructor but she ended up with a short fat man with a square head.

Good question, I've seen quite a few pilots leave offshore for rewnewables or for the ME - corporate/oil & gas. But there do seem to be quite a variety of jobs in the helicopter world, we were affected by Covid but nowhere near as much as in the airline world. I only know one bloke flying in Africa and he has returned to the UK, it used to be a common place to work but for a variety of reasons it is no longer as popular. What I have seen become more prevalent in some of the more traditional overseas employment destinations for a helicopter pilot, is a desire to employ locals rather than expats. That's fair enough of course but it has reduced the positions available to us europeans.

I would love to fly a Bell 47 - something iconic about it probably the MASH imagery. Yeah I think the old school piston-engined ones are nowhere near as reliable as a gas turbine but as long as they are well looked after/serviced they should be just as safe as anything else. Yeah I think you hit the nail on the head about Robinsons - lots of them and flown by very inexperienced pilots mean lots of them get crashed. I have never flown them but have heard just good things from pilots I know who learnt or taught on them.

Haha well I'm sure your wife made the right choice over the Apache dude I had a job offer to go back to Shawbury as an instructor a few years back but decided to stay flying offshore, I was really tempted tbh. I had a tour there for 3 years as an instructor and it was one of the most enjoyable times of my career, but I just felt that it was going back in time and things wouldn't be the same. I live in Shropshire still - fabulous place

Edited by Siko on Thursday 31st March 08:51