paramedic who had plucked him and the others out of the Pacific: “I love you man!”
RPMN: Have you ever had an “Oh, crap!” moment in a helicopter? Can you summarize what happened?
In the summer of 1979, I was flying a Bell 206B III for Grand Canyon National Park on an OAS contract for search & rescue and general support missions. On this day, I was tasked to fly multiple trips across the canyon to transport equipment internally to a confined area LZ located at 7,800 feet MSL on the North Rim, with careful load calculations done in advance. There was one technician in the left seat who was, by chance, a private pilot. We had made two sorties in and out of the LZ with no power or control problems and were making our third approach with notably less fuel. While completing my approach, I began to descend below the barriers and noted a higher sink rate than had occurred on the prior approaches, while monitoring the TOT (turbine outlet temperature), that being the most critical limitation. Suddenly we encountered some sort of wind shear, which accelerated our sink
rate. Momentarily, I became concerned that in arresting our descent, it might cause a TOT over-temp, but that worry rapidly became the least of my problems. I suddenly ran completely out of left pedal and the aircraft began an uncommanded 90-degree right yaw.
I had never encountered LTE (loss of tail rotor effectiveness) before and likely would have crashed, save for what I believe were the positive instincts I had acquired while teaching full-touchdown stuck-pedal tail rotor failures and autorotations as an instructor pilot. At about 20 feet AGL, I rapidly rolled the throttle off and entered autorotation, which solved all my problems. I immediately regained full pedal control, kept the nose straight, and continued down vertically, with one positive pitch pull at about four feet. There was no longer any concern about TOT and although we touched down pretty hard, there was zero ground run and no damage. That fixed-wing pilot in the left seat looked at me with wide- open eyes and asked, “What was that?” to which I replied, “Well, that was my first for-real autorotation!”
RPMN: If you could give only one piece of advice to a new helicopter pilot or mechanic, what would it be?
If you want something, set a goal and be persistent; don’t take a first no as a final answer and never give up on your dreams!
RPMN: In your view, what is the greatest challenge for the helicopter industry at this moment in time?
How to address the anticipated shortage of
both pilots and mechanics. The
prohibitive training costs involved for both skill sets should be offset by some sort of loan-payback program, whereby recipients could pay back the incurred debt by working it off for the sponsoring employer.
Do you know someone who
would be a good subject for Meet a Rotorcraft Pro? Email your suggestion to the editor-in-chief:
lyn.burks@rotorcraftpro.com
rotorcraftpro.com
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