Have three former army guys in my squadron and completely agree. Throw in what I saw from the Alabama accident, which was more of a negligent homicide, and yeah. Army doesn't do instrument flying.
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USN HT's a calamity
- Thread starter ChuckMK23
- Start date
Have three former army guys in my squadron and completely agree. Throw in what I saw from the Alabama accident, which was more of a negligent homicide, and yeah. Army doesn't do instrument flying.
I will pile on that during my stay in Iraq, our compatriot CASEVAC unit across the way, and I presume Army rotary aviation, at large, seemed to have "special" designations for red-weather (read: IFR) crews, crews that were FCF-only, and other peculiar and idiosyncratic qualification structures. This paradigm flummoxed me and the rest of us, as we were a bunch of junior Os (I was a JG mission commander/flight lead as was one of the other HACs) who were all FCF and instrument qualified, and it just seemed to be impossible, given our manning, to qualify crews that way.
For one thing, you don't want some weird European helicopter with blades going the wrong way.
You want one of these: http://www.bellhelicopter.com/commercial/bell-407gxp
Second, renting or buying will come down to pots of money. Services are O&M, purchases are procurement.
Third, the differences between light helicopters are significant to a pilot, but in the big scheme of things this is going to come down to dollars.
Fourth, the Army is doing it all wrong. Don't copy them. A twin-engine trainer is a colossal mistake, for starters. Don't even get me started on their IFR syllabus.
You want one of these: http://www.bellhelicopter.com/commercial/bell-407gxp
Second, renting or buying will come down to pots of money. Services are O&M, purchases are procurement.
Third, the differences between light helicopters are significant to a pilot, but in the big scheme of things this is going to come down to dollars.
Fourth, the Army is doing it all wrong. Don't copy them. A twin-engine trainer is a colossal mistake, for starters. Don't even get me started on their IFR syllabus.
Alabama accident? Or was that the one that ended in Destin bay? Either way, poor execution of IIMC procedures was a cause.
As someone who knows nothing about the Army's rotary training program, may I tempt the beast and request a summary of the issues with the Army's IFR syllabus?
I would bet this is a result of what makes the Navy the Navy: deploying on ships (yes I know the Army uses ships occasionally).
We have to do more with fewer people, because we have to fit them all on a ship. We can't just pitch a few more tents and dig a bigger latrine, so every pilot (in helos) who doesn't suck makes FCP, and most E-4 and below will take a spin on the mess decks, etc.
I've mentioned this before, but to piggy-back... After flying into Guatemala City under VFR (I think it was 1000/4) with heavy haze. The Army guys on the ground providing us tasking were skeptical that we could have made it in. Then their division called in and said they were 20 miles out, but the weather was "too bad" and they turned around. We fired up our helo to make our first log run and ATIS was still calling VFR.
At the end of the second day, we were getting ready to head back to the boat (some 80-100 miles to the south) and I printed of a METAR. It was calling 1200/4 with showers (we also knew where the boat was was much clearer). We walked outside and the Army guys asked how we were able to take off. We kind of chuckled and said, "You mean when it's VFR?"
Definitely a different set of standards, and they also had an even tighter SOP, apparently because a lot of their pilots were fairly junior in the experience realm. Apparently their CO was a TF160 guy and was worried about the experience level of his pilots. But still, it was amusing.
And don't even get me started on their altitude deconfliction calls over our common freq. Guys, you have a BARALT, why not use that?
This has been ridiculously enlightening. I participated in what became the Army's selection of the TH-67 Creek (Bell 206BIII) - and we did syllabus comparison in detail to compare maneuvers and maneuver descriptions in the Navy FTI. I remember what we called "BI" was relatively short in the Army syllabus - if memory serves, the HT syllabus has twice the instrument related in flight instructional hours - as well as a significantly longer period calendar wise focused on mastery of instrument flying and all-weather fundamentals - where as a third of the syllabus Army flight hours are on basic war-fighting skills - terrain flight and goggle fundamentals - some thing we don't see until the FRS.
You can bet the consolidation discussions will happen though.
My intuition says a complex light / medium twin will produce better results for the FRS, and less need to master as rigorously a basic unstabilized single engine rotorcraft with dozens of full autos to the deck. Using teh UH-72 like Army is doing, with the added background of 100 hours of T-6 time, would be a huge capability booster
You can bet the consolidation discussions will happen though.
My intuition says a complex light / medium twin will produce better results for the FRS, and less need to master as rigorously a basic unstabilized single engine rotorcraft with dozens of full autos to the deck. Using teh UH-72 like Army is doing, with the added background of 100 hours of T-6 time, would be a huge capability booster
The pilots I flew with as a former FRS instructor were noticeably better instrument pilots (on average) than the pilots I fly with now out of Army flight school. Other than me, we have only one other pilot in our battalion who has more than 50 hours of actual instrument time.
Altitude deconfliction calls. LOL Yeah, they make us do traffic calls on routes that are already setup with altitude confliction. Its in the APG. There is a little difference in the way the Army flies in weather. We do a lot more flying to areas with no (as in ZERO) instrument approaches. I am VERY comfortable flying IFR, but the thing that scares the $hit out of me are the VFR flights in IMC. The red weather crews we have are for a medevac call that is below VMC. In some cases the role 2 CSH has no approach available. NONE. In austere environments we may take off in IMC, scud run to a point of injury, then fly to the CSH. On more than one occasion I have had to do that. I have also taken off in VMC and ended up shooting a GPS approach to less than 1/4 vis. I had to ground taxi to where the ambulance could get the patient because by the time I landed I could not even see the taxiway lights under my goggles or runway lights through my goggles. On that deployment, had the CSH been where it is now, I would not have made it. Don't get me wrong, I agree that Army pilots (in general) are not as good at instrument flying. But to be fair, a lot of our missions can't be done IFR.
While your quasi ab-initio concept of jumping right into a complex twin turbine helo may produce a qualified end-product, the question is "at what cost?" Similar to ab-initio airline pilots. Will they kill the selves in a small light plane/helo that they've never flown before but got the ticket on the civil side via competency? I know that's not the responsibility of the service, but it's an interesting question, nonetheless. And yes I know this concept is already in play with a single turbine helo, but for fixed wing guys, at least they sent them through IFS and a piston single for a few hours to solo, first.
I don't understand the requirement for a light twin in flight school. Helo's don't have the asymmetric thrust issue that planes have when OEI. OEI flight in a helo can be simulated pretty efectivly with a torque limit. I have heard that some helos have a simulated engine failure switch that will replicate this issue. The reliability of a second engine would always be appreciated. I don't think it is worth the cost though.
I got a chance to fly a UH-72 once. It seems like a great light utility aircraft. As an instructor, it was fun to fly around in. I just don't see it as an effective trainer.
I got a chance to fly a UH-72 once. It seems like a great light utility aircraft. As an instructor, it was fun to fly around in. I just don't see it as an effective trainer.
For what it's worth, CNATRA has flatly stated he will not purchase a twin engine helo for the Navy, precisely because the Army's cost estimates for maintenance are (apparently) way off and are costing them far more than what the Navy can spend on helo maintenance. Granted, that's one man's stance, right now, but it carries weight, for sure.
I do not know if any of these are true, but they are routine are grumblings in HT Land. Someone with more knowledge can elaborate, but there's obviously some conundrums that the Navy faces if they are true.
1. The TH-57C is on an FAA waiver to be instrument rated.
2. The FAA has stated they will not grant said waiver to any future similar model helicopter; which is what effectively killed the TH-57D program.
3. The Navy refuses to buy a dual engine helicopter for cost purposes.
4. There are no single engine helicopters that are currently IFR rated by the FAA; but not necessarily because of the lack of a second engine, but something to do with flight control (stability?). (This is the one that I know the least about).
5. Leonardo's AW-119 is close to being IFR rated by the FAA. (Again, I know nothing about this). (Is the Bell-407 not IFR rated?)
--break break--
Could not agree more with what's been said about Army pilots in my dealings. Dudes know a lot about flying, but not a lot about instruments. In my limited experience with them, I generally felt dumb talking helicopter aerodynamics with a CWO with 3000+ hours, but bring up instruments, and they usually seem to smile and can't contribute to the discussion much. Historically, this seems to be true; if I recall, the opening chapter of U.S. Navy Seawolves was ground guys bitching about Army dudes not showing up in bad weather when they needed the help the most. It's been a bit since I've read it, but as I remember it, a Navy pilot found out about the problem and was like "uh, hey, we can fly instruments. Bet we can learn to fly helo's too!" And thus... HAL-3.
I do not know if any of these are true, but they are routine are grumblings in HT Land. Someone with more knowledge can elaborate, but there's obviously some conundrums that the Navy faces if they are true.
1. The TH-57C is on an FAA waiver to be instrument rated.
2. The FAA has stated they will not grant said waiver to any future similar model helicopter; which is what effectively killed the TH-57D program.
3. The Navy refuses to buy a dual engine helicopter for cost purposes.
4. There are no single engine helicopters that are currently IFR rated by the FAA; but not necessarily because of the lack of a second engine, but something to do with flight control (stability?). (This is the one that I know the least about).
5. Leonardo's AW-119 is close to being IFR rated by the FAA. (Again, I know nothing about this). (Is the Bell-407 not IFR rated?)
--break break--
Could not agree more with what's been said about Army pilots in my dealings. Dudes know a lot about flying, but not a lot about instruments. In my limited experience with them, I generally felt dumb talking helicopter aerodynamics with a CWO with 3000+ hours, but bring up instruments, and they usually seem to smile and can't contribute to the discussion much. Historically, this seems to be true; if I recall, the opening chapter of U.S. Navy Seawolves was ground guys bitching about Army dudes not showing up in bad weather when they needed the help the most. It's been a bit since I've read it, but as I remember it, a Navy pilot found out about the problem and was like "uh, hey, we can fly instruments. Bet we can learn to fly helo's too!" And thus... HAL-3.
The TH-57 instrument stack is pretty impressive on first sight. VOR, ILS, LNAV GPS, TACAN, NDB. It lacks any redundancy though. The stab system is primitive and should not be continued to be used. I expected to experience vertigo every time we went in the clouds. Helos don't have sealed cockpits. It is common when flying in rain to have water dripping on circuit breaker panels.
I had a friend 2 years ago who flew out of Atlanta coming home on a cross country. They had trouble with the VHF radio before takeoff and attributed it to rain. Switched to UHF. After taking off, approach asked why they were 40 degrees off assigned heading. Radio trouble again on UHF and back to the VHF radio. Shortly later, both heading indicators started spinning. They are both driven by the same physical heading gyro in the back. Its not in NATOPS, but they pulled the HSI circuit breaker. This stopped the heading indicators from spinning, but no one realized this also removed the glideslope indicator from the right side of the aircraft. Weather dropped bellow VOR mins and they were stuck with a ILS. We taught students how to fly no gyro VOR, TACAN, or GCA approaches. We never practiced no gyro ILS approaches. They had trouble on the first attempt and went missed. Their second attempt went better. Seeing some trees out of the side window was the first indication. Landed and everyone lived. It is all written up in a HAZREP.
Later, maintenance dumped water out of the heading gyro. Modern, solid state AHRS is easier and cheaper.
P.S. The only IUT who I ever failed was on his no gyro flight. He needed some more instruction.
I had a friend 2 years ago who flew out of Atlanta coming home on a cross country. They had trouble with the VHF radio before takeoff and attributed it to rain. Switched to UHF. After taking off, approach asked why they were 40 degrees off assigned heading. Radio trouble again on UHF and back to the VHF radio. Shortly later, both heading indicators started spinning. They are both driven by the same physical heading gyro in the back. Its not in NATOPS, but they pulled the HSI circuit breaker. This stopped the heading indicators from spinning, but no one realized this also removed the glideslope indicator from the right side of the aircraft. Weather dropped bellow VOR mins and they were stuck with a ILS. We taught students how to fly no gyro VOR, TACAN, or GCA approaches. We never practiced no gyro ILS approaches. They had trouble on the first attempt and went missed. Their second attempt went better. Seeing some trees out of the side window was the first indication. Landed and everyone lived. It is all written up in a HAZREP.
Later, maintenance dumped water out of the heading gyro. Modern, solid state AHRS is easier and cheaper.
P.S. The only IUT who I ever failed was on his no gyro flight. He needed some more instruction.
Pinged some folks at work who are smart on these things - there are a total of THREE Bell 407's in the US that are certified under Part 91 to conduct IFR operations. Thats teh extent of current IFR single engine helo ops in US.
Apparently for helo IFR, FAR's require a second source of electricity - and can not be on the same engine - hence the necessity for a second engine , if nothing else than to just drive a generator. Same for hydraulic redundancy.
The electrical system in the IFR kit for the TH-57 always seemed like it was "grandfathered in" (and it was). Ideally, the second generator ought to have been driven by the transmission instead of also just being another accessory mounted on the same part of the engine as the starter-generator and most of the other accessories. The hydraulic pump and the air conditioner are driven by the transmission and tail driveshaft (basically means driven off the transmission). Not sure why they didn't figure it out back in the day how to drive the standby generator off the transmission too, since that generator was just a little funky thing anyway and barely took up any space.