Helicopter landing on boat in rough seas

[Flying Razorback]

Two things that have never inspired confidence in me, helicopters and ships in rough seas.  The two reasons I didn't join the Navy to fly.  This is a good outcome video, I'm sure there are some out there that show not so good outcomes.

[grayhawg]

Looks like an "Oh Crap" moment to me.

[Flying Razorback]

Looks like an "Oh Crap" moment to me.

I definitely would have needed a change of shorts after that one.  You have to hand it to the deck mate there that was guiding the helicopter on.  He also has to have pretty big balls to be on a pitching ship while a helicopter is attempting to land right in front of him.  And stay steeled enough to do your job.  Pretty awesome display of teamwork and awesome flying.

[LSUFan]

That muh fugga got skills!

[Hogbody]

Oh lawd that looked scary

[GusMcRae]

Must have needed to land pretty bad.
And I thought my landing last night in a C150 in the dust with winds 27kts gusting 35kts was pretty reda$$,,,, this video makes mine look pretty benign.  Keeping the C150 from flipping over after getting on the ground was my biggest concern. 

Awesome display of skills that are not acquired by flying in calm weather.

[Flying Razorback]

Must have needed to land pretty bad.
And I thought my landing last night in a C150 in the dust with winds 27kts gusting 35kts was pretty reda$$,,,, this video makes mine look pretty benign.  Keeping the C150 from flipping over after getting on the ground was my biggest concern. 

Awesome display of skills that are not acquired by flying in calm weather.

High winds are dangerous wherever you are.  Get the practice when you can but it can be one of the most dangerous things we do.  Especially gusty winds with the possibility of wind shear. 

The scary part about ship landings is normally you don't have anywhere else to go.  All the other ships in the area probably are experiencing the same type of seas and the shore is probably a long ways away.  Those dudes have big balls.

[gotyacovered]

that fella was one with his bird. i prob would have just hovered until it ran outta go juice and plopped her in you can def tell he was just sitting there waiting until it got "smooth-er" and when it did sat her down real quick like.

[Flighthawg]

Impressive!  I flew helos in the Navy off small decks.

[gotyacovered]

Impressive!  I flew helos in the Navy off small decks.

that is cool.

random question... (and keep in mind i have never flown a helo and dont fully undertand it)

does the collective operate in conjunction with the throttle or is it two separate control features? dont you have to have one hand on it all the time?

in other words on the control itself do you push/pull for throttle, twist for collective (or visa-versa)?

[Ragnar Hogbrok]

that is cool.

random question... (and keep in mind i have never flown a helo and dont fully undertand it)

does the collective operate in conjunction with the throttle or is it two separate control features? dont you have to have one hand on it all the time?

in other words on the control itself do you push/pull for throttle, twist for collective (or visa-versa)?

Most helos today have an electronic control unit that meters the fuel and acts as the throttle in response to the demand of power the pilot makes when increasing the collective.

In other words, it keeps your rotor turning at 100% by increasing the "throttle" speed even though you increase the drag by increasing the pitch and angle of attack of the rotors.

Older birds had manual throttles which increased the workload of the pilots by an amount I couldn't imagine.  Also, my bird (AH-64D) has a g loaded spring on the collective that will hold it where you leave it as long as you don't exceed one g of force.  Also, it has hold modes that work through the flight management computer to keep the pitch and attitude you set it to which provides limited hands-off capabilities.  In other words, it ain't autopilot.

Yes, we helicopter pilots are just waiting for something to go wrong.  But we have guts..or we're stupid.  Fine line and all that.

Oh, and there isn't enough flight pay in the world to get me to do what was done in that video!

[gotyacovered]

Most helos today have an electronic control unit that meters the fuel and acts as the throttle in response to the demand of power the pilot makes when increasing the collective.

In other words, it keeps your rotor turning at 100% by increasing the "throttle" speed even though you increase the drag by increasing the pitch and angle of attack of the rotors.

Older birds had manual throttles which increased the workload of the pilots by an amount I couldn't imagine.  Also, my bird (AH-64D) has a g loaded spring on the collective that will hold it where you leave it as long as you don't exceed one g of force.  Also, it has hold modes that work through the flight management computer to keep the pitch and attitude you set it to which provides limited hands-off capabilities.  In other words, it ain't autopilot.

Yes, we helicopter pilots are just waiting for something to go wrong.  But we have guts..or we're stupid.  Fine line and all that.

Oh, and there isn't enough flight pay in the world to get me to do what was done in that video!

thanks, helos are so compliated.

another question.... when you practice auto-rotate do you do it at altitude and just establish a floor, like a fixed wing guy does when practicing engine outs/stall/etc? as a point of perspective, what are the book numbers on your helo to establish the (for lack of a better word) best glide...? i guess you are looking for the lowest VSI/sink rate possible?

[Ragnar Hogbrok]

thanks, helos are so compliated.

another question.... when you practice auto-rotate do you do it at altitude and just establish a floor, like a fixed wing guy does when practicing engine outs/stall/etc? as a point of perspective, what are the book numbers on your helo to establish the (for lack of a better word) best glide...? i guess you are looking for the lowest VSI/sink rate possible?

In the TH -67 (Bell Jet Ranger), I logged 30 something touchdown autos.  Army regs prohibit touchdown autos in multi engine helos, so with the 64, we start at 1000' and terminate the auto with power, simulating deceleration, leveling, and cushioning the landing never dropping below 5'.

[Flighthawg]

We did the same in the SH 60B and H 2F.  We tried to
stop the autos at 10 ft AGL to allow some buffer factor.
Only did full autos ( all the way to touchdown) in the TH 57B.
We would enter at differ  altitudes to get a feel for how the
hello would react.  Different style of autos for max glide range
or normal auto profile.

[Ragnar Hogbrok]

thanks, helos are so compliated.

another question.... when you practice auto-rotate do you do it at altitude and just establish a floor, like a fixed wing guy does when practicing engine outs/stall/etc? as a point of perspective, what are the book numbers on your helo to establish the (for lack of a better word) best glide...? i guess you are looking for the lowest VSI/sink rate possible?

I forgot to answer your other question about min rate decent vs. max glide.  For training, we do the autos at 90 +/- 10 KTAS.  Minimum rate of descent autorotational airspeed for the AH-64D is 77 KTAS and maximum glide distance autorotational airspeed is 107 KTAS.  It works based on drag of the rotor in auto flight.  77KTAS gives you the least "VSI/sinkrate" before the you're no longer "flying" and simply increasing your rate of descent once again.  Works the same for max glide.  Above 107, your rate of descent increases beyond control and you're no longer in auto flight.

For the record, it autos like a brick.  Very low inertia rotor system, but very light.  That's why God gave us two engines.  After doing my first and only real life single engine landing in Afghanistan, I was very thankful for that second engine or you would have seen me and what would have been left of the bird on the news.

[LSUFan]

Back in the day, a girl named Andree Martin used to smoke my bird on command, if that helps

[gotyacovered]

interesting stuff.

one more... is it true that in a tail rotor failure that you can auto rotate to keep everything under control?

[Ragnar Hogbrok]

interesting stuff.

one more... is it true that in a tail rotor failure that you can auto rotate to keep everything under control?

Control is a strange word for it.  Basically, you're taking the torque from the engines out of the equation and using upflow through the driven section of the rotors to keep the rotors turning.  The vertical stabilizer on the tail of thr 64D offsets the need for tail rotor counter torque at 100 KTAS.  So, theoretically, if you hold 100 KTAS through the auto, you could "control" it until you have to decelerate.  Then, you're just managing the crash.

Also, there are two types of TR failure:  complete and partial.  Complete usually means it's gone and partial usually means it's in a fixed pitch setting.

[gotyacovered]

Control is a strange word for it.  Basically, you're taking the torque from the engines out of the equation and using upflow through the driven section of the rotors to keep the rotors turning.  The vertical stabilizer on the tail of thr 64D offsets the need for tail rotor counter torque at 100 KTAS.  So, theoretically, if you hold 100 KTAS through the auto, you could "control" it until you have to decelerate.  Then, you're just managing the crash.

Also, there are two types of TR failure:  complete and partial.  Complete usually means it's gone and partial usually means it's in a fixed pitch setting.

haha. i guess if the blades are spinging there is some inertia or inherent torque (not sure what term to use) but that is pretty crazy that 100ktas will get her straight. seems like lotsa torque for that slow. cool stuff.

looks like for now you have killed my curiosity with such complete answers. now if someone could just explain to me how two engines drive one rotor.... haha.

thanks a ton... nate and flighthawg. good stuff.

[Pistol Pete]

I want to know how the same (generally speaking, has an upward angle of attack) pitch on the main rotor, both lift the aircraft, and will auto rotate with air going through it?

It still has positive collective when you auto rotate, right?

[Ragnar Hogbrok]

I want to know how the same (generally speaking, has an upward angle of attack) pitch on the main rotor, both lift the aircraft, and will auto rotate with air going through it?

It still has positive collective when you auto rotate, right?

You reduce the collective to near neutral collective pitch, which results in minimal to no angle of attack.  The result is getting the drag on the rotors as low as possible.  There are three regions of each rotor during an auto:



The upflow through the driving region drives the driven region which produces the lift during an auto.  You increase and decrease collecive pitch to control rotor speed within limits.





UPDATE:  Fixed the pics.

[Ragnar Hogbrok]

haha. i guess if the blades are spinging there is some inertia or inherent torque (not sure what term to use) but that is pretty crazy that 100ktas will get her straight. seems like lotsa torque for that slow. cool stuff.

looks like for now you have killed my curiosity with such complete answers. now if someone could just explain to me how two engines drive one rotor.... haha.

thanks a ton... nate and flighthawg. good stuff.

Two engines, each with a nose gearbox, has a drive shaft that extends into each side of the main transmission.  A sprag clutch on each side allows input to the planetary gear from both drive shafts.  When one engine  fails or is disengaged, the clutch releases the drive shaft and the DEC senses the loss of power application from one engine and tells the remaining engine to enable contigency power, which allows, under some conditions, single engine flight.

We have a term for this in my community:  PFM.  Pure friggin' magic.

[gotyacovered]

We have a term for this in my community:  PFM.  Pure friggin' magic.

LOL.

[GusMcRae]

We have a term for this in my community:  PFM.  Pure friggin' magic.

I'm adding this to my vocabulary.

We have one that I'll share.  NFN = Nice,,,,, friggin' Nice!  But of course using the full blown F-bomb. 
Applicable in cases such as in response to the reply Gotya received from the MX shop today.

[gotyacovered]

I'm adding this to my vocabulary.

We have one that I'll share.  NFN = Nice,,,,, friggin' Nice!  But of course using the full blown F-bomb. 
Applicable in cases such as in response to the reply Gotya received from the MX shop today.

exactly.

[Flying Razorback]

Ahhh.  The PFM box.  I love that part of the diagram when studying weapons.

[Ragnar Hogbrok]

Ahhh.  The PFM box.  I love that part of the diagram when studying weapons.

Speaking of weapons, here's your missile primer:

[Flying Razorback]

I was introduced to that in a class in college.  To this day I still can't follow the train of logic behind it...