Huntington Beach Helicopter Crash

[JTS11]

We’ve hurt and damaged more people and aircraft doing practice autos in the last 20 years than we have in actual ones. Engineering reliability, maintenance standardization, and materials science compared to the 70s and 80s aircraft is significantly better in basically all TMS these days.

Most military RW are in excess of >16k lbs in most regimes anyways. We’re not autorotating aircraft, we’re controlling a meteorite and hoping the stroking seats save the VA a 100% disability rating. Let’s just be honest about the situation. Not really comparable to most civilian helicopters that weigh less than 5-7k lbs.

Autorotations as a skill set and air work drill? Building confidence in the systems and aerodynamics of our aircraft? Sure. However the cost benefit as a hard requirement doesn’t buy us a lot anymore.

The only place 53's did practice autos was at the FRS. Never heard of a single one being done in the fleet, even on NATOPS checks. When I did an IP tour at the FRS, the practice auto was basically an exercise in terror.

As a stud going through the FRS, I had an IP say that if you had enough altitude during a real auto, just pull your flightsuit down and stick your ass over the cyclic...At least you'll give the mishap investigator a funny story/something to scratch his head for a while.

 

[ChuckMK23]

The only place 53's did practice autos was at the FRS. Never heard of a single one being done in the fleet, even on NATOPS checks. When I did an IP tour at the FRS, the practice auto was basically an exercise in terror.

As a stud going through the FRS, I had an IP say that if you had enough altitude during a real auto, just pull your flightsuit down and stick your ass over the cyclic...At least you'll give the mishap investigator a funny story/something to scratch his head for a while.

We did crazy shit with autos in the FRS for the '46. For some reason we had night 180 autos in the syllabus and for daytime on NATOPS checks. And we bent aircraft doing them. There was never a reason other than the ol' " That's the way we've always done it"

 

[PhrogPhlyer]

Never heard of a single one being done in the fleet, even on NATOPS checks.

We did... for the '46. ...we had night 180 autos in the syllabus and for daytime on NATOPS checks. And we bent aircraft doing them.

We did full autos, from hover to translation, and from various altitudes in the TH-57 at Whiting. And we did them in the CH-46 on all NATOPS checks and at least once on every flight if we could. Never heard of a mishap because of it. The reasoning for this and many of the things we did tactically with the -46 came from the Viet Nam vets (just 2-6 years ahead of me). They did or knew guys that did actual autos from combat damage, and all of them said had it not been for the auto being just a routine maneuver, they'd be dead. So I think there is a real possibility that lack of full autos as just part of helo flying may have contributed to the more recent training/auto incidents. Neither approach is right or wrong, and it has nothing to do with "That's the way we've always done it." There was solid empirical knowledge behind doing them. Just as there is solid current incident data for not doing them.

 

[Lawman]

We did full autos, from hover to translation, and from various altitudes in the TH-57 at Whiting. And we did them in the CH-46 on all NATOPS checks and at least once on every flight if we could. Never heard of a mishap because of it. The reasoning for this and many of the things we did tactically with the -46 came from the Viet Nam vets (just 2-6 years ahead of me). They did or knew guys that did actual autos from combat damage, and all of them said had it not been for the auto being just a routine maneuver, they'd be dead. So I think there is a real possibility that lack of full autos as just part of helo flying may have contributed to the more recent training/auto incidents. Neither approach is right or wrong, and it has nothing to do with "That's the way we've always done it." There was solid empirical knowledge behind doing them. Just as there is solid current incident data for not doing them.

Autos are the least likely maneuver I see performed not to standard by the average pilot in the 64. Single engine failure without power to continue is usually the one people F up, and honestly the one I’m most interested in having flown D models in the mountains with the E pure population we have today.

For what it’s worth Chinooks DO NOT do autos outside the SIM. It’s genuinely acknowledged that a true auto will never happen only a power on decent, and the conditions to have a full up dual engine failure would result in far larger catastrophic problems across the aircraft that knowing how to auto good won’t fix.

Now for the single engine trainers, yes absolutely we need to be doing autos, because we have lost crews to poor execution of the bottom end of that procedure in a host of scenarios.

 

[Gatordev]

From someone who would spend extra time teaching autos in the -60 to studs because of the basic airmanship it assisted with for low time pilots, here's perspective from the Part 135 side...

I've done an auto (defined as all the way to the flare and hover) exactly once in the aircraft in my current job (I'm not counting Mx autos which don't have auto recoveries). Otherwise, we do them in the sim. For the record, the sim is absolutely terrible for autos. And from a business perspective, I get it and I'm okay with it. That's not where we're crashing aircraft. Instead the industry crashes from stupidity, Mx problems, or lack of SA (bumping a tree, for example).

What we do spend some time on in the sim is the single and dual engine failure in the high hover/transition, because that's when it's going to suck the most. And even then, more of the focus is on SE failure, because that's more likely for the reasons that Hotdogs stated. Technology is pretty good.

(Oh, we also do T/R stuff, but I'm not convinced the former Army IPs all truly understand the aerodynamics, so it's a mixed bag of training).

 

[Lawman]

From someone who would spend extra time teaching autos in the -60 to studs because of the basic airmanship it assisted with for low time pilots, here's perspective from the Part 135 side...

I've done an auto (defined as all the way to the flare and hover) exactly once in the aircraft in my current job (I'm not counting Mx autos which don't have auto recoveries). Otherwise, we do them in the sim. For the record, the sim is absolutely terrible for autos. And from a business perspective, I get it and I'm okay with it. That's not where we're crashing aircraft. Instead the industry crashes from stupidity, Mx problems, or lack of SA (bumping a tree, for example).

What we do spend some time on in the sim is the single and dual engine failure in the high hover/transition, because that's when it's going to suck the most. And even then, more of the focus is on SE failure, because that's more likely for the reasons that Hotdogs stated. Technology is pretty good.

(Oh, we also do T/R stuff, but I'm not convinced the former Army IPs all truly understand the aerodynamics, so it's a mixed bag of training).

Aero in the Army is getting better largely because we started allowing (yes you read that word right) people to bring the Navy aero manual into the conversation.

Having learned aerodynamics prior to the Army I was repeatedly dumbfounded when I’d have senior IPs give their version of how it all works.

Most of the tail rotor problem though does come down to training specific to the LUH and improper reactive procedures. There is nothing wrong with the E model’s tail rotor, there was a lot wrong with our training model prior to putting pilots in it. That said what’s been killing our pilots lately is less that and more spacial D usually compounded or caused by flying VFR in low VFR/IMC and getting into conditions the crews lack the experience to get out of. Again… not an aircraft equipment problem as much as a training and standards problem. That crash in Louisiana with the Raiders on the back being a classic example of somebody should have said no but it was too important to not disappoint and they killed themselves and their pax because of it.

 

[ChuckMK23]

Mishap aircraft on the truck of shame.

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