ACCIDENT DRIVES SAFETY INITIATIVES


It was the 2015 Frisco accident that brought this CRFS issue to a fever pitch in the regulatory community. It spawned several initiatives to convince the FAA to require CRFS to be retrofitted into legacy aircraft.


A grassroots safety group called “Save Our Crews” was created by the wife of the deceased Flight for Life pilot in 2015.


Earlier this year, Save Our Crews worked with several U.S. senators and U.S. representatives from Colorado to reintroduce the Safe Helicopters Now Act, H.R. 675. It would offer a 10-percent tax


credit to helicopter operators who retrofit their air ambulance helicopter fleets with CRFS.


In 2018, the FAA Rotorcraft Occupant Protection Working Group (ROPWG) — formed in 2015 after the Flight for Life accident — made several safety recommendations. They included upper- torso restraints for passengers and CRFT retrofits on all helicopters within three to five years, including those type certified before 1994. At the same time, the NTSB was making similar recommendations.


The 2018 FAA Reauthorization Act mandated CRFTs for all helicopters manufactured after April 5, 2020 (regardless of type certificate, closing the door on grandfathering). The new legislation required OEMs to comply with most, but not all, of the requirements in (FAR) 27/29.952, which mandates CRFT standards for civil helicopters certified after 1994. The differences between the 2018 Reauthorization Act and the original 27/29.952 requirements from 1994 are a compromise designed to make it easier and faster for OEMs to certify CRFTs for the thousands of legacy model aircraft currently flying around the world.


PRIOR EXPERIENCE PROVES USEFUL


Robertson Fuel Systems, based in Tempe, Arizona, and founded by safety research engineer Dr. S. Harry Robertson in 1976, is known for its rugged Robbie Tanks that were designed as auxiliary fuel systems and range extenders for military aircraft operating in a variety of extreme conditions, including combat.


As a military pilot, Dr. Robertson observed trends in fatal aircraft crashes that would have been survivable without their post- crash fires. He made it his personal mission to research and develop military aircraft fuel tanks and extension systems that would not only be crashworthy, but also ballistically self-sealing. Over the decades,


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Robertson developed Crashworthy Primary and Auxiliary Fuel Systems for most military helicopters flying today. He established the Robertson Safety Center at Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University in Prescott, Arizona, to ensure a permanent home for his pioneering safety designs. He was inducted into the National Aviation Hall of Fame in 2011.


In the mid-‘90s, Robertson Fuel Systems worked with Eurocopter (now Airbus), which was competing for a U.S. Army new training helicopter, to develop a CRFS for the AS350. Eurocopter did not get the contract and the product was shelved.


Fast-forward 20 years when StandardAero and Robertson, while working on a separate program for the Super Puma, decided to expand Robertson’s proven fuel retention technology into the civil helicopter space, recognizing the AS350 platform as a viable market and the opportunity to leverage StandardAero’s deep structural experience and knowledge of the airframe. Together, they pulled the product back off the shelf, dusted it off, and set out to develop, test and certify a CRFS for the airframe. That CRFS became the Crash-Resistant Fuel Tank (CRFT).


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