Helicopter crashes in only open space

[lookout]

Us drones are not supposed to fly over people, but when things come undone, the helicopter just crashed into the ground below of wherever it happened to be at the moment. It caught on fire before hitting the ground causing it to freefall. It landed perfectly in the middle of an open field. Doubtful whether the pilot was able to place it there in the open space it landed in.

 

[ThatBeardedDroneGuy]

I heard about this yesterday but thought there was only one person on board. Pretty sure the Robinsons are fairly easy to whack the tail boom with the main rotor.

 

[lookout]

I heard about this yesterday but thought there was only one person on board. Pretty sure the Robinsons are fairly easy to whack the tail boom with the main rotor.

Student and flight instructor was the latest. They‘re saying something to that effect. Robinson has stated that their aircrafts are safe within normal operating range. After so many hours, you have to retire the entire helicopter and replace with an all new copter. That even happens with all metal airplanes. Expensive maintainance with wear and tear with all the moving parts.

 

[Dronut]

I heard about this yesterday but thought there was only one person on board. Pretty sure the Robinsons are fairly easy to whack the tail boom with the main rotor.

They are well known to the NTSB... Danger spins from the sky: The Robinson R44, the world’s best-selling civilian helicopter, has a long history of deadly crashes

 

[ThatBeardedDroneGuy]

Yeah. I think the problem is that it's not terribly difficult to push it beyond normal operating range. My brother was looking to get one several years ago and I remember talking about it but not the specifics. I have a friend who was a Navy helo instructor. Maybe he could explain it.

It's a shame, regardless. I just hope they blacked out and didn't ride it down alert.

 

[Deleted member 154956]

Not sure what this has to do with camera drones…

 

[lookout]

Not sure what this has to do with camera drones…

Just that terrifying moment when you lose control of the thing. Helicopter/drone/quad/whatever.

 

[lookout]

The R44s use the same piston engine as some small airplanes. It's not a turbine like the big bells were.

 

[Cymruflyer]

The R44s use the same piston engine as some small airplanes. It's not a turbine like the big bells were.

Many smaller lower cost helicopters have used piston engines, there is nothing wrong with a piston engine as long as it is properly maintained. You see Cessna 150s, 152s and 172 all the time in the sky as well as Pipers like 140 and 160 and these have piston engines, but you don't often hear of them coming out of the sky due to engine failure.

A plane can glide if there is an engine failure, a helicopter can autorotate down to a landing if there is an engine failure. Though a helicopter is more work to get down and requires a lot more practice compared to a fixed wing.

With regards to the Robinson range, when they first came out in Britain, the talk was, that if you wanted a Robinson, just buy a piece of land and wait. Eventually one would drop in. A friend had the R22 (the R44 is just a bigger version with four seats) and I learned to fly that one. I have had the chance to fly a few helicopters over the years from the Hughes or Schweizer 300 which is a piston engine, to the 500 turbine and these are nowhere near as sensitive as the Robinson helicopter on the stick.

The Robinson also uses that silly tilt stick system for control which I have never liked. When you learn to fly a Robinson you don't really move the stick around much at all, compared to many other helicopter makes. It is best to weld your forearm to your thigh when you are in the seat and then just lean your upper body forward, backward and to each side, to move the stick. That way you have a much more dampened movement of the stick.

I remember sneezing once while flying the R22 and we went all over the place because I had too tight of a hold on the stick for that second. Of course I am oversimplifying these here but I hope you get my drift, as to how sensitive the Robinson is. You can also get rotor mast bump which is another thing to be careful not to do.

The problem with the Robinson is that it is possible to have the rotor impact the tail if PIO pilot induced oscillation gets out of hand.

 

[frank candor]

Maintenance Skills Beyond acceptable risk range, i flew kites until 2016 WTFDIK
Everything To DO with Drones.

 

[Deleted member 154956]

Just that terrifying moment when you lose control of the thing. Helicopter/drone/quad/whatever.

Just happened to me a few hours after I posted that statement! My Mini 2 crashed and burned!! Then got run over! Ugh!!

 

[ThatBeardedDroneGuy]

Just happened to me a few hours after I posted that statement! My Mini 2 crashed and burned!! Then got run over! Ugh!!

Ok, this has to have a story behind it.

I got a little nervous today. I swear the wind was higher than UAV Forecast said and as I was flying over some abandoned silos I got blown about 30' laterally towards a road. I was high enough to clear the power lines (by a wide margin) but was happy to get it down and out of the wind.

 

[lookout]

Ok, this has to have a story behind it.

I got a little nervous today. I swear the wind was higher than UAV Forecast said and as I was flying over some abandoned silos I got blown about 30' laterally towards a road. I was high enough to clear the power lines (by a wide margin) but was happy to get it down and out of the wind.

As a general rule, the higher you go, the more wind upstairs. Some pilots go up and down to catch a favorable tailwind. If the wind at the surface is strong, it doesn‘t get any better upstairs. And while my downward sensors weren’t operating for whatever reason, landing the quad (with wind for sure) was a little rough as the mavic will keep things real on assisted landing.

 

[lookout]

Many smaller lower cost helicopters have used piston engines, there is nothing wrong with a piston engine as long as it is properly maintained. You see Cessna 150s, 152s and 172 all the time in the sky as well as Pipers like 140 and 160 and these have piston engines, but you don't often hear of them coming out of the sky due to engine failure.

A plane can glide if there is an engine failure, a helicopter can autorotate down to a landing if there is an engine failure. Though a helicopter is more work to get down and requires a lot more practice compared to a fixed wing.

With regards to the Robinson range, when they first came out in Britain, the talk was, that if you wanted a Robinson, just buy a piece of land and wait. Eventually one would drop in. A friend had the R22 (the R44 is just a bigger version with four seats) and I learned to fly that one. I have had the chance to fly a few helicopters over the years from the Hughes or Schweizer 300 which is a piston engine, to the 500 turbine and these are nowhere near as sensitive as the Robinson helicopter on the stick.

The Robinson also uses that silly tilt stick system for control which I have never liked. When you learn to fly a Robinson you don't really move the stick around much at all, compared to many other helicopter makes. It is best to weld your forearm to your thigh when you are in the seat and then just lean your upper body forward, backward and to each side, to move the stick. That way you have a much more dampened movement of the stick.

I remember sneezing once while flying the R22 and we went all over the place because I had too tight of a hold on the stick for that second. Of course I am oversimplifying these here but I hope you get my drift, as to how sensitive the Robinson is. You can also get rotor mast bump which is another thing to be careful not to do.

The problem with the Robinson is that it is possible to have the rotor impact the tail if PIO pilot induced oscillation gets out of hand.

https://twitter.com/x/status/1507425033924325380

It loses the tail. Then it sort of autogyrates, to the point of ripping off two of the four blades. And then it free falls from there.

 

[Cymruflyer]

https://twitter.com/x/status/1507425033924325380

It loses the tail. Then it sort of autogyrates, to the point of ripping off two of the four blades. And then it free falls from there.

Tragically lucky to have captured that, so that investigators have a very good idea what happened. It's clear part of the tail section with tail rotor broke off and the pilot was probably attempting autorotation down, but if the rotors hit the tail they would have been damaged and any fractures that developed would soon be causing separation. The R44 only has two rotor blades, I believe, not four. What you saw happening was that the helicopter went inverted and the rotor blade then bent downwards (up in an inverted position) and the blades impacted the remains of the tail boom and destructed. You can hear when they hit that tail boom assembly.

You can see that it is rotating about the rotor blade shaft, which is what will always happen to a helicopter, due to the engines torque without a tail rotor to offset that torque. That's why you have to be right there in a split second, to shut down the engine if you lose a tail rotor, to help offset that adverse torque and hope it was in time to allow the helicopter to autorotate down without starting to spin around itself, before pulling on the collective at just the right moment and height above the ground to slow the descent and allow for a landing you can hopefully walk away from. But a tail rotor loss almost allows means you better have jam in your pockets, because you're going to be toast.

Robinson makes an R66 which has a turbine engine, but if the design is all the same, which it looks like, these will also suffer from the same problems the others suffer, when flown outside of their prescribed safe limits. The problem is when the stick is pushed too hard and quickly forward, it tilts the helicopter far forward and the blades may well not have time to unbend enough/get back into a safe position, not to strike the tail boom assembly. A tail strike can happen in other helicopter, not just Robinson's, if not flown within its designed safety parameters. Only twin rotor copters, don't require a tail rotor, because both rotor blades offset each other's torque or in other words, cancelling it out. Very sad.

 

[lookout]

Tragically lucky to have captured that, so that investigators have a very good idea what happened. It's clear part of the tail section with tail rotor broke off and the pilot was probably attempting autorotation down, but if the rotors hit the tail they would have been damaged and any fractures that developed would soon be causing separation. The R44 only has two rotor blades, I believe, not four. What you saw happening was that the helicopter went inverted and the rotor blade then bent downwards (up in an inverted position) and the blades impacted the remains of the tail boom and destructed. You can hear when they hit that tail boom assembly.

You can see that it is rotating about the rotor blade shaft, which is what will always happen to a helicopter, due to the engines torque without a tail rotor to offset that torque. That's why you have to be right there in a split second, to shut down the engine if you lose a tail rotor, to help offset that adverse torque and hope it was in time to allow the helicopter to autorotate down without starting to spin around itself, before pulling on the collective at just the right moment and height above the ground to slow the descent and allow for a landing you can hopefully walk away from. But a tail rotor loss almost allows means you better have jam in your pockets, because you're going to be toast.

Robinson makes an R66 which has a turbine engine, but if the design is all the same, which it looks like, these will also suffer from the same problems the others suffer, when flown outside of their prescribed safe limits. The problem is when the stick is pushed too hard and quickly forward, it tilts the helicopter far forward and the blades may well not have time to unbend enough/get back into a safe position, not to strike the tail boom assembly. A tail strike can happen in other helicopter, not just Robinson's, if not flown within its designed safety parameters. Only twin rotor copters, don't require a tail rotor, because both rotor blades offset each other's torque or in other words, cancelling it out. Very sad.

That rotor doesn't just stop immediately either; too much momentum going. The blades droop down until he has a positive lift on the rotors. If the helicopter is anything like a constant speed prop, the blades can go flat providing no lift. I'm sure something like that could possibly happen with the tail rotor. But the tail rotor is usually a driven member off of the main rotor. In fact on an airplane crash they can tell whether it was a power on or power off landing just by which way the blades are curled.

Kind of looks like the yawing stopped and turned into rolling there.

Here's the Red Bull helicopter doing aerobatics.

Somebody stated that he doesn't ever completely stop and not in dead center of the upside down manuever. That might be quite a strange predicament manuever for a helicopter.

And then you have Jimmy Franklin's Jet Powered Waco.

 

[Crouching Leopard]

Just happened to me a few hours after I posted that statement! My Mini 2 crashed and burned!! Then got run over! Ugh!!View attachment 145898

Sad to see.

 

[Cymruflyer]

That rotor doesn't just stop immediately either; too much momentum going. The blades droop down until he has a positive lift on the rotors. If the helicopter is anything like a constant speed prop, the blades can go flat providing no lift. I'm sure something like that could possibly happen with the tail rotor. But the tail rotor is usually a driven member off of the main rotor. In fact on an airplane crash they can tell whether it was a power on or power off landing just by which way the blades are curled.

Kind of looks like the yawing stopped and turned into rolling there.

Here's the Red Bull helicopter doing aerobatics.

Somebody stated that he doesn't ever completely stop and not in dead center of the upside down manuever. That might be quite a strange predicament manuever for a helicopter.

And then you have Jimmy Franklin's Jet Powered Waco.

Quite a demonstration of expert helicopter flying. You will notice that everything was a nose up or roll maneuver or combination of the two, to maintain positive G on the rotor blades at all times. The few nose over tricks were always a gentle initiation and always followed with some sort of roll or spin to keep positive loading on the rotor blades.

If a helicopter were inverted and then began to fall like that, the main rotor would impact the tail boom and it would be all over. As for a fixed wing aircraft, well nothing applies to that which applies to a helicopter because the aircraft design and aerodynamic effects are completely different. Nothing could ever impact the prop on a fixed wing aircraft like what could happen to a main rotor, and the wings do all the lifting. In a helicopter, it's all about the rotor, with the tail rotor taking care of the job of offsetting and balancing the torque from the engine. You add more or less blade pitch to the tail rotor to effect a yawing of the helicopter.

A fixed wing when sufficiently braced in the wing and tail section, can fly upside down but no helicopter can maintain upside down flight. Thanks for posting the videos, great helicopter skills demonstrated.

 

[lookout]

Quite a demonstration of expert helicopter flying. You will notice that everything was a nose up or roll maneuver or combination of the two, to maintain positive G on the rotor blades at all times. The few nose over tricks were always a gentle initiation and always followed with some sort of roll or spin to keep positive loading on the rotor blades.

If a helicopter were inverted and then began to fall like that, the main rotor would impact the tail boom and it would be all over. As for a fixed wing aircraft, well nothing applies to that which applies to a helicopter because the aircraft design and aerodynamic effects are completely different. Nothing could ever impact the prop on a fixed wing aircraft like what could happen to a main rotor, and the wings do all the lifting. In a helicopter, it's all about the rotor, with the tail rotor taking care of the job of offsetting and balancing the torque from the engine. You add more or less blade pitch to the tail rotor to effect a yawing of the helicopter.

A fixed wing when sufficiently braced in the wing and tail section, can fly upside down but no helicopter can maintain upside down flight. Thanks for posting the videos, great helicopter skills demonstrated.

Ok that's sounds right.

I think I'd rather be on the bigger wings of a fixed aircraft than those skinny little guys on the helicopter having to support all that weight as long as it is spinning. On a hot day in the mountains, the density altitude will actually prevent a helicopter from taking off. It makes all kinds of noise but never leaves the ground. An airplane has to lean out the mixture on the piston engines and it takes up more runway to get off the ground, but it also gets leaned out when it flies up to a higher altitude.

But now our quads fly on 4 of them, but if even one of them has a problem, we're going to go in the direction of the slowest turning props. Quite nice to see 4 props turning at once!

 

[Cymruflyer]

Ok that's sounds right.

I think I'd rather be on the bigger wings of a fixed aircraft than those skinny little guys on the helicopter having to support all that weight as long as it is spinning. On a hot day in the mountains, the density altitude will actually prevent a helicopter from taking off. It makes all kinds of noise but never leaves the ground. An airplane has to lean out the mixture on the piston engines and it takes up more runway to get off the ground, but it also gets leaned out when it flies up to a higher altitude.

But now our quads fly on 4 of them, but if even one of them has a problem, we're going to go in the direction of the slowest turning props. Quite nice to see 4 props turning at once!

Well density altitude affects everything that flies, not just helicopters. You may be leaning out the mixture but that is just for the engine. The density altitude still affects the wings. I used to be a flight instructor in Granby Colorado, altitude 8,200 ft of our runway and by about 9:30 am in summer we could no longer take off and safely clear the slight rise at the end of the 1,800ft runway and miss the barbed wire fence. Down in Denver a 747 wanting to fly to Europe had to get off before noon or it would not be able to get off the ground safely and the flight would be cancelled on a hot summer day, until the next morning.