A Day at the Races (To Forget)

[Rotorwork]

Another Lucky Escape.

 

Fly Safe

 

R W

 

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/pilots-lucky-escape-after-chopper-crashes-at-westpac-centre/story-fni0fit3-1226751993594

 

A PILOT commuting racegoers to and from Flemington has walked away with minor injuries after her helicopter spectacularly crashed at Collingwood Football Club's Olympic Park base.

 

The chopper, used to transport cashed-up punters and celebrities, plummeted to the ground after she lost control not long after take off at 6.30pm today.

 

The helicopter, which did not have any passengers on board it, spun and damaged a car before crashing back onto the oval.

 

The pilot was treated at the scene for minor injuries after walking away from the wreckage of the helicopter.

 

She was taken to the Alfred Hospital by ambulance for observation.

 

Witness James Sharman said he heard the crash from his East Melbourne apartment.

 

"I was just on the balcony and I heard a big bang and I didn't know what it's was. It's good to know no one was hurt," the 27-year-old said.

 

Three fire crews doused the helicopter with foam to smother the fuel leak and a small fire and were remaining on the scene.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

Bell Longranger............

 

 

[Rotorwork]

What a Photo

 

 

 

[kaz3g]

Dynamic rollover?

 

www.casa.gov.au/fsa/1999/apr/apr_roll.pdf

 

Kaz

 

 

[facthunter]

I know they do a great job but they don't die quietly . I've never been a real fan, Sorry. Nev

 

 

[Head in the clouds]

Dynamic rollover?www.casa.gov.au/fsa/1999/apr/apr_roll.pdf

 

Kaz

Looks like it.

 

Probably a trip or skids sunk into soft ground. Because of the weight distribution it's always the back of the skids that gets buried and if you don't lift up very carefully while also wiggling the pedals one skid can release and the other stay stuck, any drift tendency during that condition and you're done for.

 

Another possible is a trip also causing DR, it's happened more than once when operating from sports fields and similar venues when a skid has been caught against nothing more than a pop-up sprinkler. Nearly always at the end of a long day when the pilot's tired and thinking about getting home ...

 

Great photo!

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

WOW, that's the engine and gearbox at the end of the main- rotor shaft, already separated from the fuselage. It's a flexible mount, but they are attached pretty good as it's a Bell. Pilot would have felt something for sure ......never wanted to be near a chopper when it's throwing bits of main rotor blade !..........Maj.....

 

 

[mechfx]

Saw on the news a piece of the craft damaged what looked like a Porsche Cayenne parked nearby............Ouch.....

 

Glad the pilot is OK

 

 

[facthunter]

The pilot would have got chucked about. Nev

 

 

[motzartmerv]

Bloody things have some energy in those blades dont they.. Nice to see she walked away. Gotta love AVTUR

 

 

[David Isaac]

.... Gotta love AVTUR

Sure do buddy, as you and I both know, a damn site safer than that bang water we use .....

 

 

[facthunter]

Once it is burning there is not much difference. There are some variations of Jet fuel. JP4 was considered more dangerous. To get a fire going, even lube oil is good if it drips on a hot pipe. The vaporisation of avgas means a spark may ignite the vapour from a large distance particularly downwind, where 20 metres may be dangerous, with something like a cigarette glowing. Nev

 

 

[Rotorwork]

Update from the Herald Sun,

 

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/pilot-emma-bobridges-spectacular-escape-from-helicopter-crash/story-fni0fit3-1226752330396

 

IT was a miracle escape from a spectacular crash but for the experienced pilot inside the helicopter just one word came to mind: "bugger''.

 

That was all Emma Bobridge could mutter after crawling free from the wreckage of the Bell chopper that crashed at Olympic Park on Saturday, according to witnesses at the scene.

 

"She was calm and sedate and said she was fine,'' photographer Ewen Hill said following the crash.

 

"She walked herself to the ambulance paramedics to be treated and seemed pretty disappointed. She was so calm and unaffected.''

 

Mr Hill had been walking in the park as the chopper came down and said he was on his way to help get Ms Bobridge out of the wreckage when she emerged by herself.

 

He said it appeared that one of the helicopter's skids became caught on the landing mat as it tried to take off, causing it to lose balance and ultimately come crashing down.

 

The impact spread debris 30m and Ms Bobridge was forced to scramble out.

 

Another witness said it took just 17 seconds from the time the helicopter had tried to take off to when Ms Bobridge crawled free.

 

But he said the tense wait for her to emerge felt like "an eternity''.

 

 

Pilot Emma Bobridge.

 

Ms Bobridge, 45, was released from The Alfred hospital.

 

Amazingly, the experience pilot suffered only minor hand injuries despite the helicopter plummeting to the ground as it was taking off from the Collingwood Football Club's Olympic Park Base.

 

Australian Transport Safety Bureau investigators were on the scene trying to piece together how the helicopter came to plummet.

 

They were hoping to speak to Ms Bobridge and other witnesses.

 

The pilot had been ferrying punters from the Flemington racecourse, including Channel 7's racing commentator Francesca Cumani.

 

Choppair owner Michael van der Zypp said " the most important thing is that everyone is OK''.

 

 

[Sky Gazer]

Update from the Herald Sun,http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/victoria/pilot-emma-bobridges-spectacular-escape-from-helicopter-crash/story-fni0fit3-1226752330396

He said it appeared that one of the helicopter's skids became caught on the landing mat as it tried to take off, causing it to lose balance and ultimately come crashing down.

 

....

 

Amazingly, the experience pilot suffered only minor hand injuries despite the helicopter plummeting to the ground as it was taking off from the Collingwood Football Club's Olympic Park Base.

 

.

How could you possibly come PLUMMETING down when you still have one skid on the ground?

 

 

[Guest Maj Millard]

Bloody things have some energy in those blades dont they.. Nice to see she walked away. Gotta love AVTUR

Quite a difference to the Robinsons where the avgas is in tanks either side of the gearbox. In the Bell Longranger the Avtur is stored in a laced- in bladder underneath the rear passenger seat, well away from any mechanical side of things.

 

Ah the news hounds just love that word plummet don't they !!.....we are lucky they didn't report it as a Cessna or Ultralight...............Maj....

 

 

[facthunter]

Newspapers have plenty to answer for Any resemblance to reality is co-incidental and is unintended.( But we have been down that road before, haven't we?) Think I'd replace the landing mat with something less dangerous. Magic carpet perhaps? Nev

 

 

[Head in the clouds]

Think I'd replace the landing mat with something less dangerous.

I thought people had stopped using them decades ago, they're a real hazard as this incident shows. Their theoretical purposes are to protect the turf of well-groomed areas and mainly to prevent the skids sinking as I described in post #6. I've got a good bit of video taken during a fishing safari I ran in the 1990s. I'd left a Jetranger on a reasonably firm tidal salt flat among the mangroves but it rained for an hour while we fished and when we got back the back of the skids had sunk in about 200mm and the stinger (skid on the bottom of the tailboom which protects the bottom of the tailrotor) was so low it was stuck in the mud too.

 

I dug a trench under the tailrotor, got the pax well away, from where one of them filmed it, and ever so gently eased it out of the mud wiggling the pedals constantly to break the suction. Even so there's great risk of one skid pulling out rapidly before the other. The worst part of the day was cleaning the machine up after five very muddy fishermen went on their merry way.

 

As for landing mats, the problem there is that skids have teeth on the lower surface to prevent the helicopter from rotating while spooling up or down on the ground on slippery surfaces, oily or icy mainly. Those teeth cop a real pasting over time particularly from gravel, bitumen and decomposing concrete. Each set of teeth is attached to a four legged plate which is riveted to the skid at the end of each leg. It's really common for one of those rivets to get worn or broken off and leave a high tensile leg poking out in the breeze, just the sort of thing to catch on a landing mat, and landing mats have to be pegged down securely to prevent them being blown/sucked up into the blades during landing. It's a recipe for disaster and requires very careful attention to being certain that you're free in low hover before lifting into high hover. Very easy to get it wrong.

 

 

[Guest ozzie]

I've seen triangular "spades" fitted to the rear of the skids that are designed to prevent the skids from sinking in snow and mud.

 

 

[Jaba-who]

Its Not only mud that can be a problem. I once got within milliseconds of rolling over a Robinson at cairns airport. Machine had been sitting several days on a bitumen helipad during very hot weather. Skid shoes (plates about 7 mm thick rivetted to underside at front and rear of skids) had sunk into the bitumen. Went out late in afternoon when bitumen had cooled and solidified - "glued" skids to the ground.

 

Pulled pitch slowly both held for a bit then one side broke free and other side held fast.started to roll and by the time I dumped collective I am sure can only have been a degree or so off dynamic rollover. -very scared stuff.

 

 

[facthunter]

Crazy palm trees rooted to the ground. Yikes.. Nev