Octacopters = no more Kobe-style helicopter crashes ??

[Rockycat]

As long as the helicopter does not lockup the transition, or totally loose the "Jesus nut" the air craft can be autorotated to a hard landing.

 

[Cymruflyer]

Those that don't fly themselves have no idea what it is like. Greg S said "an experienced pilot should never have flown in those conditions"
Not quite correct... First off, you do not know what conditions were like from where they took off. With fog conditions, the situation changes by the minute, so what you have at a destination, or anywhere along the route, will be constantly changing on a foggy morning. One minute you can be clear at a location and a few minutes later you can be socked in. There are times when you can be on VFR and if you encounter some changing conditions, request SVFR and get assistance from ATC.

They will help guide you where you need to go, but... you need to know where you are if you suddenly encounter fog, while flying. When you are in a hilly area and this happens and you are below the tops, you need to be aware of what direction you can turn to get out of that area/situation, without flying into a hillside. You would be surprised how quickly foggy conditions can change all around you and in hilly conditions, this can happen much faster than you can image, with different temps on each side of hill depending on where the sun is.

As for obstacle avoidance systems, yes they are available but for helicopters, that presents a different issue, to a fix wing aircraft, due to the fact that they are often flying at a lower altitude and into areas that they can access, but a fixed wing aircraft could never get into. Therefore, when flying in a rotorcraft with obstacle avoidance on, there are many times when the bloody thing keeps going off, and causing you more hassle than with it on, due to where a pilot might be flying and the terrain around them, and I am speaking of a situation whereby you can clearly see around you. So, often the instrument is simply turned off, or not installed because it would be giving too many false positives during flight.

This may be why that helicopter did not have such an instrument installed. So to GregS, it is not an experienced pilot you should be speaking of, but a more safety conscious pilot, because even a less experienced pilot might decide not to fly on that morning, but an experienced pilot may feel fine flying in that area, but when conditions quickly change it might be that no amount of experience can get you out of the situation, if the pilot made a decision to do something that turned out to be not the best way out. It would be a very different thing if a pilot was socked in but chose to take off anyway and try and figure things out in the air. But to take off in acceptable conditions and then find things changing quickly while enroute, that presents a completely different situation.

Now, how this all came to be, that is best left up to the NTSB to work out. What I can tell you that in any aviation accident, there is 99% of the time a chain of events that have to take place to arrive at that accident and if just one of those links were removed, most often that chain would not lead to an accident, a close call maybe, but most times, not an accident. Therefore, we need to find out what all those links represented in that chain, in order to see what led up to the accident happening, We all learn, as pilots, from looking at all those links and remember them, in case we find ourselves flying into such a situation.

 

[Cymruflyer]

As long as the helicopter does not lockup the transition, or totally loose the "Jesus nut" the air craft can be autorotated to a hard landing.

If you are in fog, you can not see the ground below you in order to perform a proper auto rotation. You need to see the ground to judge when to pull on to arrest your descent and perform a safe landing. It is not a button you just push.

 

[Deleted member 93449]

Your brain uses what you see and what is being sensed by your inner ear to establish orientation. Remove outside visual clues, add motion in close proximity to terrain and it's a formula for disaster. In this case, even with an instrument rating, the pilot may not have had time to adjust from using outside visual clues, transition to instruments, establish orientation and make a proper decision about what to do to prevent flying into the terrain.

 

[Maviac]

What I don't understand if the LA PD decided to ground all of there Helicopters due to the bad conditions why was this guy flying period?

Weather at takeoff was much clearer Per the NTSB.

 

[Deleted member 93449]

Weather at takeoff was much clearer Per the NTSB.

As mentioned, the weather was much clearer and I'm wondering if all the delays in his flight (ATC had him circling outside of controlled airspace for 12 minutes while IFR flights were landing and taking off) allowed the weather at his destination to further deteriorate.

 

[BigAl07]

......Now, how this all came to be, that is best left up to the NTSB to work out. What I can tell you that in any aviation accident, there is 99% of the time a chain of events that have to take place to arrive at that accident and if just one of those links were removed, most often that chain would not lead to an accident, a close call maybe, but most times, not an accident. Therefore, we need to find out what all those links represented in that chain, in order to see what led up to the accident happening, We all learn, as pilots, from looking at all those links and remember them, in case we find ourselves flying into such a situation.

Very well written. It's usually many factors (often bad decisions) that lead up to most aviation accidents. Rarely do things quit, fall off, or just quit working. That's why during training we have this one thing beaten into our heads "No matter what happens keep flying the aircraft because once you quit flying it's all over"

 

[Cymruflyer]

Yep for sure, rule number one .. ALWAYS fly the aircraft and the other things to remember as a pilot, there are three things that are always useless to a pilot: The runway behind you, the altitude above you (when you need it RIGHT NOW) and the fuel you left on the ground. That's why as a pilot you are always taught that if there is a problem, there is safety in altitude, which to non flyers, does not seem to make sense.

I used to tell students that if they were ever flying at night and they had an engine out (on a single engine) keep their landing light turned off until about 100ft off the ground, then turn it on and if they don't like what they see, just turn it off again!

 

[Mavic-Master88]

Perhaps but not for reasons you propose. Simply because it takes no skill to fly a GPS equipped drone. RC heli’s require training and a lot of hours to become proficient. Your average drone operator might get 30sec max on the sticks of an RC heli (electric or nitro) before crashing it.

I'm talking all things being equal except the RC aircraft --- so let's suppose an experienced RC pilot flying a nitro copter for 30 hours and then flying a Mavic 2 Pro for 30 hours under the exact same weather conditions --- common sense says the heli has a higher probability of crashing --- simply because of single-engine and single rotor as opposed to four motors and four rotor blades

 

[Mavic-Master88]

Very well written. It's usually many factors (often bad decisions) that lead up to most aviation accidents. Rarely do things quit, fall off, or just quit working. That's why during training we have this one thing beaten into our heads "No matter what happens keep flying the aircraft because once you quit flying it's all over"

That's why this crash is pointing to mechanical failure --- the pilot had 20+ years of heli experience and the first thing he would do in low-visibility conditions is go HIGHER, not lower as the rapid descent data suggests --- his instincts would tell him to gain altitude and get above the cloud deck and then make decisions from there

 

[BigAl07]

I'm talking all things being equal except the RC aircraft --- so let's suppose an experienced RC pilot flying a nitro copter for 30 hours and then flying a Mavic 2 Pro for 30 hours under the exact same weather conditions --- common sense says the heli has a higher probability of crashing --- simply because of single-engine and single rotor as opposed to four motors and four rotor blades

Your missing the fact that a Mavic has 4x as many single failure points and cant auto-rotate. Lose any single component and it’s tumbling to terra firma.

 

[Mavic-Master88]

If my mavic pro has obstacle detection in a $1,000 aircraft, why don’t choppers? Also, why couldn’t pilot ascend, if he was disoriented, to a height over the highest hills and then use gps to get over airport? Even if he had to use an iphone? He knew the terrain from previous flights. If the highest hill was, say, 500 feet, why not simply fly at 600 feet from point A to point B, then slowly descend to the airport? This doesn’t make sense.

That's why I'm getting peeved about people saying it was "pilot disorientation" --- a heli pilot with 20+ years flying commercial helis has all kinds of certifications --- he is not going to fly into a huge fog cloud over familiar terrain and have no idea what to do --- his first instinct is to ascend and get above the cloud deck, and thus plenty of room to clear mountainous terrain --- then make appropriate decisions on what to do next --- the preliminary NTSB data says the heli was rapidly descending so that seems to point to catastrophic mechanical failure

 

[Harro]

Aren't most drone crashes noted in this forum due to pilot error? So why is this so crash different? We will probably never know, just speculate on the result. Think back to the 80's when the auto manufacturers tried to make a car crash proof, they found it to be impossible and eventually gave up. Crash proof aircraft are no different in that respect.

 

[Mavic-Master88]

Your missing the fact that a Mavic has 4x as many single failure points and cant auto-rotate. Lose any single component and it’s tumbling to terra firma.

Yes true but I have 25+ years experience flying both nitro-powered helis and electric-powered quadcopters --- lost count how many times I crashed the helis (although no GPS mode in those days) -- never crashed a single electric quad yet --- the reliability of a human-transport electric octacopter would be orders of magnitude more reliable than a turbine heli

 

[Mavic-Master88]

Aren't most drone crashes noted in this forum due to pilot error? So why is this so crash different? We will probably never know, just speculate on the result. Think back to the 80's when the auto manufacturers tried to make a car crash proof, they found it to be impossible and eventually gave up. Crash proof aircraft are no different in that respect.

Single engine, single-rotor aircraft like helicopters are inherently more dangerous than a multi-rotor craft like an octacopter simply because of the design --- a single engine failure causes a crash, whereas an octacopter would require two or more motor failures and/or rotor failures --- it's the same reason commerical airliners can operate on a single engine in case one or two engines fail --- can't do that with a single-prop plane

 

[Mavic-Master88]

Your brain uses what you see and what is being sensed by your inner ear to establish orientation. Remove outside visual clues, add motion in close proximity to terrain and it's a formula for disaster. In this case, even with an instrument rating, the pilot may not have had time to adjust from using outside visual clues, transition to instruments, establish orientation and make a proper decision about what to do to prevent flying into the terrain.

I'm not a pilot but why is orientation in a heli so complicated? Just make sure the heli is "level" (ie, no pitch or roll) and ascend to a safe altitude until you can make a decision on what do next --- hovering is a perfectly good option if you're in a heavy fog bank and lose visual clues

 

[Cymruflyer]

I'm talking all things being equal except the RC aircraft --- so let's suppose an experienced RC pilot flying a nitro copter for 30 hours and then flying a Mavic 2 Pro for 30 hours under the exact same weather conditions --- common sense says the heli has a higher probability of crashing --- simply because of single-engine and single rotor as opposed to four motors and four rotor blades

Well now, in aviation it is not that simple. If you have four engines and one of them going out will cuase you to crash, you now have four times more risk of having an engine failure, than if you had just one engine! Your logic only works if you have a multi engine aircraft that is still capable of flying should one or more of those engines fail.

 

[Mavic-Master88]

Well now, in aviation it is not that simple. If you have four engines and one of them going out will cuase you to crash, you now have four times more risk of having an engine failure, than if you had just one engine! Your logic only works if you have a multi engine aircraft that is still capable of flying should one or more of those engines fail.

Yes I am referring to an octacopter --- 8 separate motors and 8 separate rotors --- I believe up to 2 motors can fail and the octa can still maintain stable flight --- possibly up to 4 motors can fail if the other 4 are robust enough to maintain lift --- the odds of two motors failing would be very small

 

[Mavic-Master88]

Here is the future of SAFE heli flight --- virtually impossible to crash !!

Human-transport octocopter

 

[Cymruflyer]

That's why this crash is pointing to mechanical failure --- the pilot had 20+ years of heli experience and the first thing he would do in low-visibility conditions is go HIGHER, not lower as the rapid descent data suggests --- his instincts would tell him to gain altitude and get above the cloud deck and then make decisions from there

There are many cases of pilots going from VFR into IFR and going by feel rather than believing their instruments and crashing, causing their deaths. Another rule that is always drummed into a pilot is to trust your instruments, not your feeling. You would be quite surprises to feel how your body is telling you the aircraft is in a certain attitude but your instruments are telling you something very different, when you do not have any visual cues to go by.

Of course I am not hypothesizing at anything in the Helicopter crash being discussed, we need to wait to see what the investigation concludes on that one. ATC already told the pilot to climb after he requested assistance and as far as I know, he was in the process of carrying that out, when he crashed.