• Three crashes in ten days leads Army to ground helicopters in the US
    15 replies, posted
[QUOTE]Active-duty aviators at 11 U.S. Army installations across the country were grounded Thursday after three helicopter crashes in 10 days killed eight aviators, the Army announced. Crews will stay grounded through Monday, U.S. Army Forces Command said. This is the first command-wide stand down of aviation assets in recent memory, said spokesman Paul Boyce. The grounding affects U.S.-based aviation units, including most of the Army’s combat aviation brigades, Boyce said. It does not include units in Europe, the Pacific or elsewhere around the world, he said. “My decision to ground our aircraft today is taken with the utmost seriousness,” said Gen. Robert “Abe” Abrams, commanding general, in a statement. “I have a duty to ensure that we are doing all that we can to prevent the loss of life and aviation accidents, and that is why we’re standing down to review our procedures and reaffirm our commitment to operating our aircraft safely and effectively.”[/QUOTE] [url]http://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2015/12/03/army-grounds-crews-after-3-deadly-helicopter-crashes-kill-8/76753792/[/url] This is fucked up.
Bet its from degenerate rednecks / teenagers flashing laser pointers at them. [highlight](User was banned for this post ("shitpost" - Orkel))[/highlight]
[QUOTE=Toro;49246975]Bet its from degenerate rednecks / teenagers flashing laser pointers at them.[/QUOTE] Man, it sure is hard to read an article isn't it?
[QUOTE=Toro;49246975]Bet its from degenerate rednecks / teenagers flashing laser pointers at them.[/QUOTE] I don't want to sound like a dick but did you read your own post before you pressed reply? That's literally the most remote theory anyone could have come up with. No I doubt our multi-million dollar aircraft have only one weakness; to lasers shined at them from the ground by teenagers causing a chatostrophic loss of control by the pilots making them drop out of the sky. Yeah lasers at aircraft are annoying distracting and potentially dangerous but I don't think there is a documented case of any plane or helicopter crashing as a result of a laser shined in the pilots eyes.
Huh, is there any parts commonality between Apaches and Blackhawks, or new maintenance regulations that just came into effect or something? I'm no engineer, but those are my first suspicions.
Apaches are reliable but INCREDIBLY maintenance intensive; Blackhawks are rotor-driven deathtraps that the military refuses to get rid of.
[QUOTE=27X;49247361]Apaches are reliable but INCREDIBLY maintenance intensive; Blackhawks are rotor-driven deathtraps that the military refuses to get rid of.[/QUOTE] A pilot once said to me, an airplane wants to fly, a helicopter doesn't. Push an airplane fast enough and it'll start want glide. On the other hand, a Helicopter beats the air into submission and relies on complex calculations to keep steady and not fall, tip, or spin. If something's wrong with an airplane, you can still glide it, if something's wrong with a helicopter you might get to pick your general crash site.
[QUOTE=Cocacoladude;49247165]Man, it sure is hard to read an article isn't it?[/QUOTE] [quote]All three crashes are still under investigation by the Army Combat Readiness Center.[/quote] Not supporting Toro's view, but it doesn't seem the article has the answer anyway.
[QUOTE=Mr. Someguy;49247414]A pilot once said to me, an airplane wants to fly, a helicopter doesn't. Push an airplane fast enough and it'll start want glide. On the other hand, a Helicopter beats the air into submission and relies on complex calculations to keep steady and not fall, tip, or spin. If something's wrong with an airplane, you can still glide it, if something's wrong with a helicopter you might get to pick your general crash site.[/QUOTE] Helicopters can autorotate. It is part of a helicopter pilot's training, and allows helicopters with no engine power to land just fine.
[QUOTE=Orkel;49247489]Helicopters can autorotate. It is part of a helicopter pilot's training, and allows helicopters with no engine power to land just fine.[/QUOTE] Didn't help here.
[QUOTE=Orkel;49247489]Helicopters can autorotate. It is part of a helicopter pilot's training, and allows helicopters with no engine power to land just fine.[/QUOTE] Friend of mine is on the helicopter crew for the marines (forget MOS), but he says hes been nearly killed a lot during training with new pilots and autorotation
I always thought helicopters were steady aircraft; NOT UNTIL I STEPPED INTO A CH-53
[QUOTE=Code3Response;49248226]Friend of mine is on the helicopter crew for the marines (forget MOS), but he says hes been nearly killed a lot during training with new pilots and autorotation[/QUOTE] Yeah pretty much anyone that enjoys being alive would rather be in a plane in a glide than a helicopter during autorotation.
The Forr Campbell one was one of mine. I responded to that crash. It was terrible. Smoking hole in the ground with two people I knew somewhere in the burning pile of twisted metal. Now some people from higher-higher are going to come down and review all of our maintenance practices as well as the pilot operations practices. It's been a bad two weeks for Aviation.
[QUOTE=Mr. Someguy;49247414]A pilot once said to me, an airplane wants to fly, a helicopter doesn't. Push an airplane fast enough and it'll start want glide. On the other hand, a Helicopter beats the air into submission and relies on complex calculations to keep steady and not fall, tip, or spin. If something's wrong with an airplane, you can still glide it, if something's wrong with a helicopter you might get to pick your general crash site.[/QUOTE] Not exactly true, helicopters have this thing called autorotation, where if the engines die, the blades have enough momentum that they still generate a significant amount of lift, allowing the pilot to glide to the ground, the issue is most of the time there probably isn't enough time to pick a good landing site or enough room to land, so you still are going to crash, but you don't just fall out of the sky when the engines die [editline]5th December 2015[/editline] I'd still pick a plane over a helicopter though
[QUOTE=QQnMarine;49249175]I always thought helicopters were steady aircraft; NOT UNTIL I STEPPED INTO A CH-53[/QUOTE] A helicopter is basically a flying washing machine held up in the air by its own spazzing. There's nothing steady about helicopters. Flying one is more like a rope balancing act than anything.
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