Pilots

[Moxie]

Speaking of rotor blades, the second most freaked out time I spent on a plane was taking off from Houston in an MD-80. Got halfway down the runway and then there was an indescribably horrific metallic cacophony. Pilot cut the engines, slammed on the brakes, and we went back to the gate. Flight canceled due to mechanical issues (no shit?!). As we left the plane and the pilot was standing there saying goodbye, I leaned over and said, "You threw a blade in the left engine, didn't you?" He looked mildly impressed and just said, "Correct, but don't quote me."

Most freaked out I ever got on a flight was leaving Paris in a snowstorm in an A-340. The planes were so backed up that they were throwing them out way too closely spaced once the runway was reopened. We hit the wake of the previous plane and our plane went in to such insane motions to maintain flight that half the passengers were screaming, my ex burst in to tears, etc., but the worst was the guy who COMPLETELY freaked out, tried to open one of the doors, and was tackled/restrained by about a half dozen passengers. Oddly, we didn't return to the airport. The guy's wife shot him up with some sedative and he was out cold the rest of the flight.

[Whirlybird]

I think there was an issue, and he was looking for somewhere to do an emergency landing. The pub roof was the same colour as the car park, from above it would have looked like a large area of parking.

The pilot had a massive amount of hours, it had 2 engines, unlikely both engines failed, fuel in tank, no gearbox issues, and rotors not turning.....

[Moxie]

It's a bilge pump!!!!

Thank you for making me do a spit take.

[Bibs]

but the worst was the guy who COMPLETELY freaked out, tried to open one of the doors, and was tackled/restrained by about a half dozen passengers.

They should have left him to it, I'm sure it's pretty impossible to open the doors in flight! 

 

I think there was an issue, and he was looking for somewhere to do an emergency landing.

 

While that makes some sense, how come no mayday call? In a built up area, I'd imagine it was high on his list of priorities.

[Whirlybird]

 

While that makes some sense, how come no mayday call? In a built up area, I'd imagine it was high on his list of priorities.

Indeed, why. If they were low, not a lot of time. I have not seen any details of what they were doing, which may indicate what height they may have been at.

[Bibs]

I'm sure I read they were at 700' iirc before it went wrong, I assume from their radar trace. I'm sure that would give enough time to finger the call button and get a mayday out. The face he didn't perhaps indicates the pilot wasn't aware of the severity (eg going back to my faulty AP having him too low, too slow which he was trusting perhaps in IFR conditions*?)

 

*I can't remember the weather conditions at the time, and to be fair although I'm sure commercial aircraft have to maintain 1000' vertically from the nearest high structure, I'm guessing the Police (currently) have an exception to this for chasing people. 

[Whirlybird]

700 ft is plenty for a mayday. Something doesn't add up, but I guess that's why there was an incident.

[redshift]

The comments from the AAIB are interesting in what they haven't said.

95 litres of fuel drained but didn't say from which tank?

No comment on position of engine switches etc?

 

Imagine major electrical fault, lose fuel transfer pumps, 1 engine goes out, no primary display to indicate which has failed, pilot then shuts down the still running one and attempts autorotate landing.

Backfire noises indicating engine surges. Clearly no power and possible full pitch application just before impact to slow it down would stop the rotors in very short order.

 

Anyhow they haven't stripped it down yet so  maybe they will find something.

[Whirlybird]

 

Anyhow they haven't stripped it down yet so  maybe they will find something.

. Clearly no power and possible full pitch application just before impact to slow it down would stop the rotors in very short order.

Sounds very possible, i suppose it's all a case of how fast it was coming down. Although you can auto without power, you need some height to get the rotors at a speed for it.

If they had pitched up at the end, would there have been so much damage to the heli ?

[molemot]

In extremis.."Aviate, navigate, communicate". First thing is always to remain in control of whatever aerodyne you are in. Then point it in a sensible direction...only after that does one get to transmitting anything. I would think that 700 feet over a city in a helicopter isn't going to give you much time to get to the third point! The usual eyewitnesses have recounted a plunge like a stone with the rotors stopped....now it seems that the gearboxes and engines were OK; the pilot was a very well respected RAF type with much time on Chinooks and suchlike, so I can't see him doing anything other than whatever was correct in the circumstances. This would make me think that - whatever happened to the helicopter - it wasn't going to be survivable.

[Bibs]

Cheeky little 60 page thread on pprune for you! 

 

http://www.pprune.org/rotorheads/528850-police-helicopter-crashes-onto-glasgow-pub.html

[Iconic Ride]

Incredibly interesting stuff in that thread, Bibs. Thanks. And no, I didn't read it all. But I did read enough to conclude that the "no rotor rotation at time of impact" observation (both by witnesses and crash evidence) is consistent with full main rotor blade(s) stall prior to impact. Apparently it doesn't take much loss of rotor RPM to reach a point where "autorotation" is no longer physically possible. It seems you can't "unstall" helo blades merely by descending rapidly.

[Bibs]

It won't embed but there's an epic video from Air Tahiti Nui here...

 

 http://www.news.com.au/travel/travel-ideas/air-tahiti-nui-releases-what-could-be-the-best-airline-video-ever/story-fnjpj945-1226786328928

[ChrisJ]

Pilot's and Flight Engineer's Notes Sleigh I & II

 

[ChrisJ]

A Christmas Tale

 

Santa like all Aviators has to have an Annual Check ride. Last week he was somewhat perturbed when the Examiner turned up with a shotgun.

 

Santa asked the Examiner what the shotgun was for.

 

The Examiner replied... I'm going to give you an engine failure on take off!!!

[Bibs]

[Bibs]

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sjvgC1cKQGA

[Bibs]

Holy shit!

 

[Bibs]

Anyone had a go of one of these?

 

[Iconic Ride]

No fair! No fair!  Always wanted to fly like that (and have in other aircraft under different circumstances), but the passengers (and especially the company) generally frown on it. 

 

My observations of the BA 787 flight to Austin seem to indicate a persistent reluctance on the part of the crew to perform such antics, likely in the interest of job preservation me thinks.  

[rogerch]

I still think it sad that 45 years on we still cannot approach the speed of Concorde.

[basalte]

It`s disappointing to see modernist visons melt away before the eyes in the form of Concorde`s retirement...mind you, from the same period we were all supposed to be wearing zip-up silver foil flared  lycra suits, living in grey tower blocks swallowing pills marked "roast turkey dinner", living in plexiglass pods on the moon, listening to relaxing pop tunes like "popcorn" indefinitely, playing stylophones and driving hovercars shaped like the Elite type 75, (rather than  for instance the Rover 75).  What went wrong ?(I have tried my best with the type 75 bit but the foil lycra and my stomach region contours didn`t really work).

[molemot]

Either we've been progressing backwards....stuck being subsonic and only robots get out of low earth orbit...or we're regrouping before another Great Step Forwards. Concorde and Apollo were the last vestiges of the advances from the Second World War. Since then, all the advances have been more subtle....microelectronics is the major thrust, nobody foresaw what's happened in that field.....not as earthshattering as going supersonic or standing on the Moon, but far more influential in the long run. I still hanker after some new Great Adventure..... Sitting at a keyboard doesn't cut it, somehow.

[oneshot]

I did a take off like that in Concorde out of Heathrow. Managed to get above the noise abatement limit before clearing the perimeter of the airport. Full thrust + afterburners. No luggage and very little fuel. It was a flight from London to Birmingham.

[molemot]

I've just watched the 787 video again. Wow. You couldn't design THAT with a pencil, a piece of paper and a slide rule, could you? That design has to owe a heck of a lot to the microelectronics I spoke about. Boy, don't those composite mainspars flex??!

The wing shape is so slender and delicate, you wonder where it gets all its lift from....and the control surfaces seem to be moving counter intuitively, too, bits of wing moving in all directions. A very spritely performance....as John said, not likely to cheer up the passengers.....

 

Thinking about airliners, we seem to have arrived - by an evolutionary process - at something that suits our planet. You can get anywhere on Earth inside a day, pretty much...if the schedules let you....so there's no real need to go any faster. Two reliable engines are all you need, these days.... technologically speaking, supersonic is fascinating and euphoric, but it isn't necessary.  Efficiency and range and enough speed is what is required...and beasts like this 787 provide it. The days of the 50s and 60s with loads of different airliner designs are gone; we've found the best sort of platform and have nearly refined it to perfection. We should end up with a Standard Airliner Design.....in various sizes for long and short distances, large and small passenger complements. The skies have got boring....but these aeroplanes provide efficient comfortable transport.

 

I doubt we shall see a supersonic Concorde style transport again; if we do make something really fast, I think it will be a sub-orbital craft.....London to Sydney in an hour or so....