Boo!

[rotorwash]

BOO!

I recently talked to the guy who was my best friend ever until I met my wife, who has had to put up with me much longer then he ever had to. Anyway, he reminded me of a story that I had forgotten about, but it is absolutely true although neither he nor I can remember the names of the people involved. And I hope I have not posted this here before, if I have, please forgive me, old age, you know.

One of our aircraft on flare ship standby was scrambled one night to light up an infantry unit that was in contact. By the time they arrived, the contact was over, but the infantry was still nervous so they asked the flare ship to hang around for a while. Consequently, they spent the better part of the night boring holes in the dark sky, gradually lulling themselves into a relaxed stupor.

The crewchief decided he was bored and would liven things up just a bit, so he climbed out of the left side of the aircraft, carefully so he would not be noticed, and crept along the skid, crouching down below the pilot’s side window. Without putting his hands inside the pilot’s windows and giving himself away, the only thing he had to hang onto was the pilot’s door handle, so hanging on for dear life, he crouched with his foot on the skid toe and then quickly stood up and leaned across the windshield, popping up right in front of the pilot.

The pilot screamed and threw the aircraft into a skid to the right that almost unseated our hero. The only thing that saved him was a quick grab that got him a deathgrip on the windshield wiper, but nothing could save all of the Mk 24 Aircraft Flares stacked in the back of the aircraft, they slid out the left door.

The pilot was furious and still jabbering a mile a minute long after they landed, and was insisting on a firing squad at sunrise, but no one could quit laughing long enough to take him seriously. Besides how do you take an officer seriously when he has peed his pants.

 

[John A Silkstone]

Hi rotorwast, still love your stories, this one is very funny and I can't remember reading it before, but then again I'm a bit long in the tooth and forget things.

However, I do remember a time out in Cyprus with the UN. I got my men together and we went out to the helicopter to practice casavac drills. After the drill the pilot asked if we wanted a ride as most of the lads hadn’t been up in a chopper before, they were eager to go. Once up in the clouds the pilot told us to hang on as he was going to through his rotor malfunction drill (If that’s the right phrase?). After saying that, the chopper fell about 1000 feet before gaining moment again. I’d done this before, but it was still a bit frightening. One of my lads was sick and had to clean out the chopper on landing and two vowed never to go in a chopper again. Yet a couple of days later they were all talking about the fantastic time they had.

Silky

 

[rotorwash]

Yeh, Silky, the right term is "autorotation" but you pretty well got it. Mechanically, I will bore you by explaining how it works. The outer end of the rotor blade provides lift, the inner part is at a slightly different angle so it spins from air passing up through it. In case of engine failure, a clutch automatically disengages the transmission. At this point the pilot must reduce blade angle or the blades will stop turning, so he bottoms collective so there is no air resistance on the blades. Of course this provides no lift, so the aircraft is in a controlled plummet, but it does keep the rotor RPM at the max. When the aircraft gets close to the ground, the pilot pulls in collective increasing pitch and trades off rotor RPM for lift, allowing the aircraft to touch down and everybody walks away. There, aren't you sorry you asked?

If your boy threw up at a thousand feet, it is a good thing the aircraft was not going to land because it has to stand on its tail at the last instant before touchdown. I would guess your protocol is the same as ours, no practice autorotations to the ground with passengers on board, and in my case without crewchief.

The first aircraft I experienced this in was the old H-21 Banana that had two contra-rotating main rotors. When the pilot rolled off throttle, not only did the aircraft fall from the sky, it also tended to roll to the left. Ya gotta be nuts to fly those things.