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Lesson 31 – 15th September 2009 – 1005 – 1 hour – Total so far – 33 hours 22 mins

Wednesday, September 16th, 2009

Another great lesson today.

We started with a discussion about what to do. It was clear I need to get my solo hours up as I’ve only got about 2.25. The prospect of going to X and back without landing didn’t really appeal to me, so I suggested a trip to Carlisle and back to land away and Steve said that was ok. Sadly, the weather precluded the trip, but it’s an exciting thought for the future :-)

Instead we did some more instrument work (I need to get instrument hours up too) and some confined area landings which made out for an excellent and fun lesson.

Steve came out with me today to see how I was checking her over. That was good because it was some reassurance that I was doing 90% correct, but also reaffirmed and refreshed some of the names of helicopter parts and their function and things to check. I was quite surprised to find out that this isn’t tested in the General Flying Test (GFT). But, I expect it’ll be needed for the commercial test, so all is not lost and this is essential stuff anyway.

We started her up and we’re off to Foxtrot to hold for a 07 departure. Quite busy for departures so we held in the light aircraft warm-up area. Here I was presented with the choice of hover practice or putting her down. I felt the need for some landing practice, so whilst we waited, we did some landing/liftoff combos, probably about 3 or 4. I did a 10/10 one which always leaves me feeling warm inside, and a couple of 6/7′s. We were then asked to line up and wait.

No sooner had we “lined up” we were given the go and off we jolly well..….

Once at level flight, Steve had me don the instrument goggles so I could only see the instrument pedestal. He asked me to …..

  • Hold a heading
  • Climb 300 feet
  • Descend 300 feet
  • Turn 90′ to the left
  • Turn 90′ to the right
  • Do a 180′ descending turn

All on the way to the confined area.

It all went well.

Then we approached a different, more confined area than previously.

The wind was a Northerly wind, but the area was naturally west-east, which meant it was a bit of a challenge. The wind was also quite light about 5 knots, so given the direction that was probably a plus.

We did the powering back to 53knots level to find the available MAP. We had 6.5 in hand. This reminds me, before I forget, a joke from yesterday. We had the same amount of MAP available yesterday (6.5 inches).

Steve :- So, you have 6.5 inches in your hand, I mean “in hand”

LONG 5 SECOND PAUSE as dp is concentrating so hard.

The joke hits. Late laughter ensues !

Steve finds the time it took for the joke to work funny. I’m laughing at the joke etc etc…..We have a laugh for sure !

Anyway, back to today. After doing the S’s checks and with our 6.5 inches IN HAND, we were spoilt for choice for the approaches. We initially tried a west to east approach to make the most of a gap in the trees and the more lengthy runway-like shape of the confined area, but at the decision altitude, it didn’t feel right so I suggested going around. The wind was more northerly than forecast.

With the wind being so light, Steve suggested a southerly approach as there were less trees on the last few yards of the approach. This made it a downwind approach which always gets my heckles up, but Steve (as always) was bang on. The lack of trees (small shrubs instead) allowed us to get lower and use the confined area for more of a flare. It worked well.

So, once in the confined area in the hover, we did the “move to the right, turn right” routine and then taxi’ed to a point close to the edge of the area. We had enough power for a towering takeoff and Steve had me pick a 12pm, 3pm reference. Once I had them, we pulled 24.5 MAP and we shot up. Once clear of the trees, we transitioned away. It should look great on the video.

We did another orbit and approach and picked a different location in the confined area for the towering takeoff. For the second one, I started the transition a little early, but you live and learn.

We then headed back to EGNT. Steve did an “Engine Failure Engine Failure etc” on the way back. Did the “entering” fine, totally forgot the Mayday call which come to think of it, I forgot yesterday too. It was a 180′ auto, and the field I picked wasn’t as good as the one Steve had picked, so we changed to his one. It was a big field of newly harvested wheat awaiting the farmer to come round with his combine.  Steve said to go to “powered termination” so we went right down to 5 feet or so. The flare went really well and the pop of the collective and subsequent recovery are a bit of a blur, but there was a lot of yawing, but we made it back into a hover. Still need lots of work on the powered termination and the Mayday call. But, I’ll get there. Steve looked back as we transitioned off and said we’d made a mess of all the nicely rowed hay and that the farmer wouldn’t be best pleased and we should give it some wellie. It made me laugh. We had made a big circle of hay. Hope it shows on the video.

We then headed back home.

I made the call to rejoin the Zone quite late (my bad), so we started doing an orbit as there was so much radio chatter going on, I couldn’t get a word in edge ways. But, half way through the orbit, we were cleared to join.

The trip back was uneventful. The landing was a 6/10.

Next lesson is Friday and I may be going solo to Carlisle (weather and machines permitting). Looking forward to the most expensive bacon buttie you can buy. That’s not because the cafe is expensive at Carlisle….It’s a poor helicopter costs joke.

While I remember, I’m already starting to put my training head on. When I used to be an IT trainer, I used to have to think of ways to get concepts across to students in an easy to visualize/remember way. Subconsciously, I’m already starting to think about how to get helicopter concepts across. I’m sharing this in case it will help others with a problem I had. Occasionally, we fly in the HP model of the R22. It lifts off and lands differently to the non-HP variant because of it’s more forward CoG. I was sharing this with Steve as it helped me get my head around the difference. To experience the difference, try the following…..

  • Take your shoes off and put them together in front of you while you sit down, toes facing away.
  • Grab both shoes with one hand in such a way that when you lift them gently and slowly off the floor, the toes of the shoes are the last thing to leave the floor.
  • You now have your own R22 HP.

As you lift them off the floor each time, analyse the angle of the shoes.  When the heels are 1 inch off the ground and the toes still touching, how would you get the shoes level again, what movement of your hand (cyclic stick) would be needed to get the (shoes) heli level.

Also, you can mirror the double landing of the R22 HP. Lower the shoes until the toes are touching, think about what movements are needed as you get the heels down, to stop the helicopter moving backwards. Hard to explain in a blog post, but have a play.

Here’s the video from yesterday’s confined area…….Today’s will be tomorrow.

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Lesson 27 – 24th August 2009 – 1450 – 60 minutes – Total so far – 28 hours 4 mins

Monday, August 24th, 2009

Well, my head was buzzing and in overload after this lesson.

It wasn’t so much a lesson, although I did learn stacks, rather a mini trial practical test with the senior instructor (soon to be examiner) Scott.

To say I wasn’t ready for the onslaught that is Scott is probably an understatement. A very different style to Steve, but not in a bad way. Steve had said that I’d benefit from some time with another instructor and as per usual, he was right.

Steve has a very easy going relaxed way. He never comes on the controls these days unless he’s demonstrating a maneuvre and is subtle when I cockup, staring at a button I’d forgot to click, or something along those lines. Scott, on the other hand, was very full on. But, it really challenged me and I liked that. It gave me a new perspective and I certainly learned a lot. There was one downside, I got flustered which translated into what I thought was a poor performance.

I’ll not remember everything that happened in the hour, but I’ll try……

Scott wanted to be there when I started her up. I’m glad about this, because I think I’ve been doing the startup procedures in a bit of a non-standard way. Note to self…..

Consult the Flight Manual to work out how much manifold pressure I can pull continuously and at max, given temperature and pressure altitude.
Before starting, turn the radio off.
After starting and checking starter motor has disengaged, flick all the switches on (incl clutch)
Scott gets the clearance when he’s ready to go, whereas I’d been doing it while waiting for the clutch to fully engage.

So, with the engine started, I lifted off. I don’t think he helped at this point, so that was a good sign. Post liftoff checks were done. All fine so far.

Taxi to Foxtrot ensued, and then I called that we’re ready for departure. Cleared to depart north, I headed off (as I normally do), but Scott later pointed out that I should have done some pre-departure checks. I was too flustered to remember what they were. I’ll have to ask next time.

Normally, I don’t forget trim and transponder at 500ft, but it was 800ft before I remembered. God help me for the real test !!

He suggested FREDATT checks (Fuel, Radio, Engine, Direction, Altitude, Trim and Transponder) at 500 feet, which normally I’ve only been doing approaching the airfield on return.

So, we did them. He asked me what altitude I was going to fly…2300 feet I told him.

Which I kept initially, but I think I lost it later on.

Once out of the zone, we did a set of maneuvres. REAL BASIC STUFF !!! STUFF I SHOULD BE ABLE TO DO WITHOUT A PROBLEM. First off, was a turn. 15′ degree rate of turn in one direction through 360′. Well, I gained or lost (can’t remember) 200 feet during the turn. Come on David, get a grip !!!

Scott explained a few things and then I did the same turn but in the other direction. This time, it was much better, but there could have been less error.

Oh, before I forget !! I had been using the slip ball for seeing if we were in balance or not. Scott explained that it doesn’t work !!! And it’s not a problem with the helicopter, it’s because the heli is set to show balanced when on the ground, but an R22 flies left skid low, so it doesn’t read correctly in flight !! So, I need to get used to using the string on the bubble. Note to self…..

Pedal to the window with no string in !!!!

So, of course, that threw me completely, because all this time I’d been using the balance ball thing. In fact, in hindsight, that was the thing that probably made me flustered for the whole thing, because all my flying was requiring this new skill of “watching the string” ! ;-)

We then did some climbs and descents. For the climbs, I went over the manifold pressure I should have a few times, until I understood that I shouldn’t go over 23. For all the descents I remembered Carb Heat 50% of the time. 50% of the time would definitely be a fail !!! You need to rememeber it 100% of the time. The risk of icing today was particularly bad, because we went through rain a few times !!

Another interesting thing he said was if there is any rain, no questions, apply Full Carb Heat !!

We then did an autorotation to lose height ie a gradual lowering of the collective. I remembered Carb Heat this time !! :-) That went fine. But of course, I was watching the string which caused me to have to think too hard to worry about everything else (rotor rpm), but thankfully either Scott did rotor rpm, or I did it without thinking. Can’t remember, I was too flummoxed ! ;-)

Apparently, an auto is not complete until you look upwards (for the climb away) and cancel carb heat (NOTE TO SELF!)

We then did an autorotation for range as if the engine failed (75 knots). Faster lowering of the collective and maintaining 75knots went ok, but then I was thrown when he asked me to keep the throttle closed. I’ve never done any throttle work in the autorotation before, but pleased I got a chance to do it. It’s started me thinking on new trains of thought.

I think we then did another one. They felt ok.

By this stage, it was time to return and the rain was falling heavily over EGNT.

Scott made lots of R/T calls because I couldn’t understand things. I really must get my own headset. It was much worse today, and I’m normally comfortable with the Newcastle R/T so either the headset’s at fault (or more likely I was too flustered).

We were asked to hold at the northern airport boundary for 2 inbounds. And then we were asked to nip in before another big jet. Scott asked what would I do if asked to expedite when I was solo. I had previously expedited solo, so I suspected that that wasn’t the right answer and I was right. Don’t expedite solo !! Shame, ‘cos it’s lots of fun, but I knew where he was coming from !

Taxi next to the bowser and then I was gagging for another perfect landing like the other day, but it was messy. Not a 30-second messy dp special that I have previously done consistently, but it wasn’t like the beauties that I’d managed at Carlisle and Eshott.

I did a couple of attempts, but aborted them. Scott then demo’ed one and explained something which has now been lost in fluster land, but it stayed with me enough to do a half decent final landing based on whatever he’d said.

After we’d shut it down, he took me around the helicopter asking me what bits and bobs were. That was very interesting. I think I got 1 or 2 things right, but the other 6 were half-decent guesses that were wrong !! ;-) WHY DIDN’T HE ASK ME WHAT THE THING THAT GOES ROUND ON THE TOP IS ? OR THE FAN THING AT THE BACK END !? He probably didn’t know himself I expect ! :-)

So, all in all, a huge learning experience, but I left feeling a bit bamboozled. It’s that feeling where I know I’ve learned LOADS, but it’s not all sunk in yet. I’m pretty sure that, tomorrow, things will keep coming back to me, with a “oh yes” kind of moment as they sink in.

Thoroughly enjoyable and extremely valuable lesson in terms of things learned, but not showing my best skills ‘cos of being flummoxed. But, no pain, no gain. If I hadn’t learned the countless things I did, I may have flown better because I wasn’t flummoxed, but not have been a better pilot because of it (if that makes sense). I know what I mean ! :-)

But, to end on a positive, and to my big surprise, as the whole lesson felt like I was doing things wrong, Scott was very complementary. He asked me how many hours I’d done, and said I was “well ahead of the game and flying excellently” or something like that.

Video to follow when time permits

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Lesson 23 – 6th August 2009 – 1440 – 50 minutes – Total so far – 25 hours 14 mins

Thursday, August 6th, 2009

Gorgeous weather today. I had, in my mind, an idea of what today’s lesson was going to be, namely some low level work (quick stops, autos and the like). It wasn’t to be, but I thoroughly enjoyed the alternative.

Steve suggested to maximise the weather and get a solo cross country in – Alnwick and back. Winds were mostly easterly and light – Runway 07 in use.

I plotted the course, and Steve went through the routing and features, which was helpful. 14 gallons of fuel required to allow for delays, taxi’ing, and I left with about 19 on board, so I was good to go.

I decided to use my iphone as the nav plan. It allowed me to easily time the legs and see when I should be arriving at the end of each leg.

Once we’d filled her up, we moved her well away from the bowser and other aircraft – a wise move !!! Actually, we’d have been ok for the liftoff, not so sure about the return bit though, but more on that later.

Permission to taxi to Foxtrot was granted with the clearance and I was asked to hold, which I did into the light wind. My first thought was to put it back down again on the ground, but then I thought that a bad idea as it’s good hover practice. After about a minute of waiting, I realised that I’d cocked up one of my checks. The door was open (my door). So, I had to put it down to close that. Silly me – done it before too. Need to ensure I do the checklists and don’t get carried away with the excitement of being solo.

With the door shut, Tower were on the blower asking me to perform a northerly departure straight away as they had an inbound. I was ready and I was off :-)

2300 feet was the intended altitude and i’ve realised that if I want to hold a certain altitude and I concentrate on it, I can do it, but when I want some sight-seeing or to check the map, then it can drift off.

With only me in it, I was maintaining more than the 75knots on 21 manifold pressure, more like 80-85 knots, so I arrived early at Morpeth, and similarly early at Alnwick. It took about 15 minutes to Alnwick. Quite a calm, non-turbulent flight.

Once at Alnwick, I travelled west for a bit over the golfball radar thingamajig, and then back to Alnwick. Then I took up the heading back to Morpeth, and mosied on back.

On the way back, I noticed that the Oil Pressure had gone into the red. Steve had gone through what to do in loads of scenarios before I left.

Steve :- If the clutch light comes on and stays on for 8 seconds or more, pull the clutch fuse out, and land immediately

He went through a similar spiel for every possible scenario you could think of.

Apart from this one, sod’s law !!!!

But, I was high up, circa 2500 feet, and I had the time to think it through logically. My thought process went something like this….

David thinking :- ok, it’s something to do with the engine, so if that stops, it won’t stop the rotor going because of the sprag clutch. ok, ok……erm……Pressure is high, too much oil, nah, there was only 4.7 litres in. What’s the oil temperature ? It’s fine ! Oh, that’s good, maybe it’s a faulty instrument

At this point, I gave it a good bang. And nothing happened. But then about 20 seconds later, it came out of the red, and into the yellow, top of the green.

And relax……….

To be fair, I didn’t relax, and was on high alert for an engine failure just in case. I kept a very beady eye on the Oil Pressure. It did go back in the red again, but because the oil temperature was fine, I wasn’t overly concerned.

Steve had told me to ensure I was at least 2000 feet over Eschott (another smaller airfield). I was keeping my eyes peeled, and saw a light a/c (Cessna) which was quite close, but we’d seen each other, or at least I’d seen him/her, so there never felt like there was any danger there. Hopefully, that will be on the video that I’ll put up tomorrow.

I reported back to Tower once at Morpeth and was asked to join left base, which I did. I was number 1 to land, reporting finals. Before I had chance to report finals, I was cleared to land, but asked to expedite the landing as someone was on 4 miles final (behind me).

So, I kept the speed on and it ended up being a fast approach, 80/85 knots. I’d forgot to cancel carb heat, not drastic with just me on board, thankfully.

I ended up doing quite a high flare, with very little collective pulled and a 15 feet high taxi (should be 2 to 5 feet) to get out of the way of the incoming. Steve suggested that i was quite within my rights to say “negative” to the request to expedite my landing. I am definitely too polite at times.

Now, this is where it got messy (in my book). I knew where to park, Steve had told me and the taxi and turn went fine, but then I started doing my “fart around for a minute” landings. I think the fast “transition to taxi” had made me tense. I could sense I was holding the cyclic very tightly, never a good sign and not something I generally do any more, but obviously, I did today.

Well, as can be seen by the video that I’ll put up, it wasn’t pretty to look at, but it was safe. I was up and down like something that’s up and down a lot !!

Eventually, I was down. For a second, I thought I’m going to do that landing again, so I can end on a good note, but then I remembered the oil pressure issue and thought better of it.

So, really enjoyable flight. Next flight, next friday. I’ve booked one for wednesday too, but there’s an appointment with kp on wednesday, so I’ll need to cancel that one.

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Lesson 21 – 25th July 2009 – 1455 – 1 hour – Total so far – 22 hours 59mins

Saturday, July 25th, 2009

Well, I was gutted last night when I learned that the Carlisle trip (planned for today) wasn’t going ahead for various reasons. I found out when I was half-way planning the routing, just to make things even more frustrating. But, all is not lost, with a great lesson taking its place.

Sunderland International Air show is going on today at the seafront, so Newcastle Airport was hectic traffic-wise with all the departing show traffic. But, Steve said he could do a lesson nonetheless, so I went to EGNT.

He was still out on a trial lesson, so while I waited I planned the routing for a trip I wanted to do. Steve had said that the next lesson would be some navigation to a certain spot. I was keen to do some more autorotation practice, so I had planned a lesson in my head, that involved a navigation to Esh Winning (where we live), and then on the way back, I’d hope we’d do some autorotation practice.

I put the idea to Steve and he was very happy with the plan. He told me to book out via Blaydon VRP, which I did and then went out to check over the helicopter.

It was great being out on the General Aviation (GA) Apron as all the fast jets for the airshow were there. There were F16s, RAF Hawks, Apache Helicopters, a Chinook taking off, some aerobatic planes taxi’ing. It was awesome. I took some video footage today of the GA Apron, and hopefully will post the edited highlights tomorrow. I also video’ed the whole flight today with a helmet cam, but that will need heavy editing, so again, hopefully tomorrow, that’ll be up.

So, I went out to check out the heli. It was VERY close to the bowser (about 10 feet from the rotor blade, and VERY close to a beautifully decal’ed Hawk (probably about 10 feet too). As I was doing the checks around the heli, the pilot was in the Hawk, prepping it for departure. He’d started up and taxi’ed off before I’d finish my checks. I think word has got around about my hovering skills ;-)

Busy on R/T today. I asked for startup, and was granted that straight away. Whilst I was waiting for things to get upto speed, I called for clearance, but was asked to “Standby”. 5 minutes later, Steve arrived, and still no callback, so Steve suggested a reminder call, and it worked, and we had clearance to go.

Once upto speed, call for taxi. I didn’t think Steve would let me liftoff so close to the bowser, but he did. Thanks Steve. I was pleased when we were clear of it. We taxi’ed past 4 fighter jets (2 on the left, 2 on the right), an Apache Longbow helicopter (I think) and a light a/c who’d taxi’ed ahead of us. And we hovered next to Foxtrot. Typical polite dp, I just hovered next to Foxtrot, thinking the light a/c was first and he should go first, but Steve just said to tell Tower we’re ready for departure and sure enough, we were given immediate takeoff clearance. Footage to follow……

For the first time ever, we headed south ! Exiting the zone overhead Blaydon (Visual Reference Point). And then following the headings I’d worked out to get us to Esh Winning. Although I did set the headings and fly them, I was too much in awe of seeing the geography of the south of Newcastle to properly do the navigation. I had forgotten to time the legs, and was just navigating (with Steve’s help), by the 2 (bloody) big aerials between Newcastle and Esh Winning.

It took me 40-45 minutes to drive to the airport, it took 13 minutes to fly it in a helicopter. Straight line travel is awesome !

I’d warned kp that I was due (and what time), and she’d tipped off Tommy and Eileen (our neighbours) so when we overflew Esh Winning, I could see Tommy and Eileen in the drive, but couldn’t see kp and Michelle and Freddy who were visiting. I purposely had flown a safe height (probably about 800 feet agl), so they were just dots, but because I was looking for kp in the front garden, I didn’t see them waving in the back – I was too much concentrating on the flying.

We did a 30 degree turn out of Esh Winning and headed to the Windmill Farm at Tow Law, where we started the first of many autorotations. The first one was a simple (no turns) job. I was pleased that I controlled the rotor rpm correctly, and would have made a field into wind fine.

The next one was a 90′ turn autorotation. Again, that went fine, and then I think we did a 180′ turn auto somewhere near Kielder reservoir. That went fine too.

It wasn’t all good though. Although I had done what I told myself I MUST do, AVIATE then COMMUNICATE. I had totally AVIATED correctly, but had forgotten to do the Mayday call. But Steve did it each time, so it gradually sinks in to me !!!

I’ll get that next time.

A lot of learning to fly helicopters is getting so comfortable with something that it requires zero thought, that you can then concentrate on something else. For example, hovering used to take 150% of my CPU cycles to do it badly and now I can do a half decent job on 20% of my CPU cycles. In fact, at times, I’m not even thinking about it, which is great.

Once i get to that stage with auto’s, I’ll be able to do the Mayday call no bother.

So, all the autos went well. These were all autos with powered recoveries at about 300-500 feet.

Once we were getting close to the Newcastle Zone, we stopped doing them and I made the call for rejoin instructions and we were told to hold overhead the Tyne Bridges, which we duly did. The reason for the delay was the most sophisticated fighter a/c ever built (Typhoon) was on final approach and for some reason he had priority landing ;-)

With him down, we flew onto left base leg for Runway 25, and then unusually Steve said something to Tower. I couldn’t hear what he said, just as he can’t hear what I say to tower, because of the headset setup G-MAVI has. We can hear each other without having to push any buttons (live setup I think he calls it), but it means we can’t hear what each other say on the radio.

It turns out he’d got permission to do an autorotation final approach to a powered recover at 5 feet and I’D be doing the whole thing. So exciting !!

I’d asked Steve before we left, if he’d mind if I call out what I’m doing and when I’m going to flare. Normally Steve does a running commentary, saying “Not Yet, Not Yet, Not Yet, Flare” as we come in without engine power.

I thought if I did it, Steve would feel more able to relax knowing that I WAS going to do the flare at the right point.

So, as we were coming in with a very fast descent rate, I was calling out “Not Yet, Not Yet, Not Yet, Nearly going to Flare, Flaring Now” or something like that. I did the flare and the flare (I thought) was good. We ended up with zero ground speed and zero vertical speed, so all was left was the final cushion. So, as Steve says, it was then time for “Pop”, pull the collective up and recover to a 5 feet hover. Well, there was a bit too much yaw, but that was my bad. Overall, I was really pleased with it. Steve later told me that the rotor rpm went a bit high. I have NO idea why it did this, so will have to ask next time.

This was the first time I’d done the whole thing from entry to recovery with no Steve input. As Steve later said, it’s a good autorotation if you can walk away alive and he said we would have done. Good enough for me.

The final bit was the best bit. The GA apron was still chocka block and the Hawk was back, meaning I had 10 feet (if not less) either side of me to get the heli down. Steve let me do it, credit to him. I went in nose first, and then had to do a 180′ yaw. It felt very close for the tail close to the fence and the bowser. Not sure if it will feel that close on the video footage. We’ll see…. But, I did the turn and landed it. It was a hard landing, but Steve said it was safe and it felt safe. But I didn’t fancy farting on for one of my 30-second kiss-of-a-touchdown landings with so little room for error.

So, great lesson. Loved it and the first one was some video to watch back.

Next lesson is more navigation, but more thorough next time. We going to (or I should probably say I am going to) navigate to Seaham, Durham Tees Valley airport (passing overhead), then Hexham then Newcastle.

Not sure when this week, but I’m already looking forward to it !

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Lesson 17 – 10th July 2009 – 1400 – 1 hour – Total so far – 19hours 33mins

Friday, July 10th, 2009

Today was Exercise 16 and 17. (Simulated Engine Off Landings and Advanced Autorotations).

CAA Inspection going on at the flying school today, so quite a busy place. It was the HP R22 today again as G-MOGY is due her 2200 hour overhaul and G-MAVI is having some engine work done.

We wheeled her over for fueling, and Steve let me do it. I’d remembered from last time to get the rotor in line, but as we pushed it, the wind caught the rotor and it started turning, so tip number 2 —-> Hold your shoulder in such a way the tail rotor doesn’t move, and if it doesn’t move, the main rotor can’t move.

Once fuelled up and pushed back, Steve left to check her out as I did all the checks, started her up etc…..

Runway 25 when we left, right turn to Morpeth after the car park. Magnetic compasses have a tendency to overread or underread depending on which direction you’re turning through, but I can never remember which direction they under or over read. Steve gave me a good way of remembering it…..

Nippy North, Sluggish South.

Nice one ! So, if you’re turning onto a northerly (or near northerly) heading, then stop the turn when it reads 330/340 and then the compass should settle to about North. It worked !

We went upto 2400′, and we’re tootling along quite happily. I was scanning the instruments and noticed we had ZERO oil pressure. I immediately told Steve and his response :-

Steve :- 20 Seconds

dp :- ? (puzzled look)

Steve :- It took you 20 seconds to notice that the oil pressure had dropped to 0.

He was pleased that I had noticed fairly promptly, so I was pleased. He’d pulled a fuse out.

I’ll have to watch him in the future. I suspect other such tricks up his sleeve.

Once we were close to the plateau, we did the Hasel checks (Height, Area, Security, Engine, Lookout), apply carb heat and we were doing Advanced Autorotations. So, a typical auto goes like this…..

  1. Lower Collective fully, Throttle engine down
  2. Lots of Right Pedal to counter lack of usual torque
  3. Cyclic Back so nose doesn’t drop too much and to maintain 60kts
  4. Control RPM (stop it getting into the red (too high or too low)
  5. Wait until the ground is 50′ feet away
  6. Flare (until Zero ground speed)

Now, then at this point, Steve always says “Pop” and I thought he was throttling up the engine again AND at the same time pulling the collective. So, when it came to my turn to do the whole maneuvre, the first bits went fine and we positioned for our forced landing, and then Steve had said I would be doing the final POP.

He constantly talked to tell me when to do it, and at the appropriate time, I flared, and opened up the Throttle and pulled the collective. It turns out, I wasn’t supposed to do any throttle work. The correlator sorts that out automatically. So apparently, (I was too busy to witness it), our revs went “quite” high !! And the subsequent hover was a bit erratic for about a second.

So, we did it again, and this time, I just did the collective, no throttle and I think there’s a 80% chance we would have lived, maybe 20% chance the helicopter would have been in good nick. I was too high and hadn’t flared strongly enough for the low wind speed that there was today.

The next one was better still. 95% chance of survival and 40% chance of a good helicopter remaining. No doubt, we’ll do plenty more.

What we then went on to do was advanced autorotations. In a nutshell, the standard auto detailed above has quite a shitty descent rate, probably moving 10 m forward for every 100m you’re dropping, so not much of a glide.

But, by altering the speed you fly, you can get more or less range.

Medium Range = Speed up to 75kts
Short Range = Speed to anything as low as ZERO knots, remembering to allow time to speed back up again as the speed will be required for the flare.

There’s also a maneuvre you can do to increase range even further. It sounded VERY risky to me, and that is to reduce rotor RPM to about 90%, giving more lift. Less than 90% and you’re in the danger zone and you risk the blades folding up, and then it’s death for sure, hence my worry. So, we did one of these, but all I was bothered about and focussed on was the rotor rpm. We were on or slightly above 90% and we’re getting a good gliding angle (by helicopter standards). I am sure as we flared, the low rotor rpm horn went off and that always puts the shits up me. But Steve wasn’t phased.

Anyway, we did various different advanced autorotations and then a fake landing and then we flew back. Runway 25, but the wind had changed and it was Runway 07 for landing. Another bit of non-standard flying which was fun back to the parking spot as there was a Dash a/c behind us on final approach, and then my landing today was MUCH improved over Wednesday when I made a right arse of it. I’d had a word with myself and didn’t fart on as much.

So, good lesson. Next lesson booked for Monday, and it’s more solo work. I’m flying to Morpeth and back on my lonesome after doing it once with Steve, so look forward to that.

I also managed to transfer Steve’s video footage that he kindly took with his phone camera of my first helicopter solo liftoff and landing. Here it is….

So, here’s the liftoff. Not very pretty at all !!! Major Yaw to the left on liftoff. But then the clearing turn is “ok”, could be worse, definately could be better.

It’s a bit grainy, but he got an excellent shot of me with the biggest smile I have ever seen on my face after I had landed for the final time on the first day of solo’ing. Here is that clip……

Thanks to Steve for getting the footage ! :-)

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Lesson 17 – 8th July 2009 – 1500 – 1 hour – Total so far – 18hours 33mins

Wednesday, July 8th, 2009

Great Lesson – it was quite a jam-packed lesson with lots of different things covered.

First off, I went out to check the helicopter out. It was the HP R22 model  (G-BZBU). This is a lighter version (one less fuel tank) and the battery is in the front, so the CoG is farther forward. This is the one where you feel like you do 2 takeoffs/landings for every normal 1 ie land the front of the skids, then the back and same in reverse for takeoff, but today I really noticed how much more power we appeared to have available because of the lower weight (less fuel).

I made a ballsup of the R/T today. As usual, I go out and check the heli out and start her up and get it so we’re ready for the off and then Steve joins me. But, I had forgot the callsign of the helicopter. All aircraft in the UK have a callsign something like G-ABCD and I knew that this helicopter was G-BZBU, but all the flying school’s aircraft have a more friendly name like “Northumbria ZERO ONE”, so when it came to asking for startup, it went something like this……….

dp :- Newcastle Tower, good afternoon, Northumbriaaaaaaaaaaaaaa. erm…erm……………. (I didn’t know the callsign and had to use the full name) “Golf – Bravo Zulu Bravo Uniform” at the Flying School with Information Juliet request startup.

Thankfully tower was very helpful !!

Newcastle Tower – “Golf – Bravo Zulu Bravo Uniform”, you have been booked out as Northumbria ZERO TWO. Information Juliet is correct. Startup approved”

dp :- “Startup Approved, MANY thanks. Northumbria ZERO TWO”

While everyone else is sounding dead professional, I come on sounding like a numpty. Ah well, live and learn.

Steve seems to be getting more confident in my liftoffs as he is crossing his hands on his knees now, whereas before he wisely always had a hand near the collective or the cyclic. Don’t get me wrong, he still often does at times, but not for the takeoff today, even though we were between a R44 and the fuel bowser. Taxi to Foxtrot and then we (I) basically hover-taxi’ed to a holding area next to the runway, awaiting an inbound a/c who was exiting at Foxtrot. There was one light a/c ahead of us wanting to depart too. Whilst we waited, Steve got me to practice a landing in the “HP” R22, just to feel the difference. I could kinda feel it, but to illustrate it better, he took control and very skilfully lifted off the skids and pivoted on the front of the skids. Quite amazing. It was like watching a ballet dancer go up on to the toes of her feet. He went up and down a few times, all the time pivoting on the front of the skids. I was impressed. Once done, we stayed on the ground awaiting another helicopter passing Foxtrot. Strictly speaking it was the light aircraft’s turn to take off first, but they couldn’t go because there was an inbound 737, but Newcastle Tower asked us if we could exit heading due North (past the control tower) going directly ACROSS the runway and not along it’s length (which runs from 070 to 250 degrees)

dp:- Affirm (with a big grin)

And we we’re off. We headed upto 2400′ and once out of the Control Zone, upto 3000′.

Today, we started off by doing Vortex Ring – Settling with Power. In a nutshell, a fixed wing aircraft can stall (fall out of the sky) if it goes too slow and the angle of attack of the wings is too high. The airflow gets very turbulent and the a/c loses lift because the airflow isn’t laminar (smooth) enough.

A very similar thing can happen in a helicopter. If a helicopter goes less than 30 knots (or more accurately has no transitional lift), and has a descent rate more than 300′ per minute, AND there is power being applied, you effectively stall a LOT of the rotor producing lift, and the helicopter, like a plane starts falling at a much higher descent rate. The more you pull power, the more you are pull dirty air through the rotor, the faster you drop. It sounded very hairy from the book, but at 3000′, you have quite a lot of time to fix it. The fix is easy (at that height), basically cyclic forward so the speed comes above 30 knots and then power and recover.

We did about four of them, and they were all event free. The controls go all mushy, there is a big yaw, and you drop like a stone, but you can’t feel it so much at that height. Cyclic forward, get speed, then power and recover.

So, with those over and with all the height we still had left, we did an autorotation down to the plateau. We were so high, I needed to do some turns to get rid of some extra height. The improvement today was that I completely did the entering. I think I’ve done this once before, but today, I really did the whole “entering into” autorotation. I also did the flare, but Steve did his final POP (as he calls it) and pulled the collective and then I continued the hover. We just did one of them. I’ll be pleased when I do one completely, ‘cos this is SUCH an important skill to have.

Once that was done, Steve asked me to fly to the centre of the plateau and for the first time, I didn’t fart on and hover at a snail’s pace. It felt like I “really” flew it there. It felt real good. A nice turn to finish and back into the hover. It felt sweet :-) A special moment for all the right reason. In a way, it felt like the first time I’d flown the helicopter by the seat of my pants, solely feeling how it flies. Hard to describe in words. Normally when I fly, everything we do, like an approach is a set sequence of events that you do in a set order. But, this was just FLYING A HELICOPTER – loved it. Once back in the hover in the centre of the plateau, we did a (fake) landing and then we did a takeoff and a practice obstacle avoidance. So, in a nutshell, Steve took control flew us at about 60kts (quite fast, when you’re so low) at a mound of earth and then at the last second (all very safe!) sharp cyclic left and up and PULLED collective. The result was a very sharp turn. Quite a few “G” being pulled.

Of course, Steve, the comedian he is, had to get a few jokes in. “Imagine that mound is a Merlin Helicopter” (he said) (referring to the near miss we had a week or so back !). AND OF COURSE, me concentrating so hard, I didn’t get the joke until about 10 seconds after he had said it. But then we were laughing at that as well :-)

So, Steve showed me one and then I did the second one. I felt Steve come on the collective, probably ‘cos he thought I wasn’t pulling enough of it (or too much), but I got the idea and was happy with the maneuvre.

Then we went straight at the mound but this time for a QUICK STOP (as they’re called). In a nutshell, this involves stopping the helicopter very quickly into a stationary hover. That was lots of fun. I was happy with that, but my turn comes another day. He just wanted to show me that one.

Once done, back to the airport and we were fortunate again for being a helicopter. Because there was an inbound Airbus. The Tower asked if we had a visual – we did, and then they offered us an expedited landing clearance ahead of the Airbus. Now, in the past, Steve has done this expedited landings, but he let me do it. Another seat of the pants bit of flying, so much fun !!!!!!

I need to get out of the fixed wing mentality. In a normal plane, you line up with the runway, and land on the runway, and most of the time, in a helicopter you do the same, but at times like these, when we’re expediting in front of a fast approaching airbus, I don’t need to “land” (transition) on the runway, so although I did a fast approach (about 80kts), I needed Steve to suggest use the grass next to the runway, but he was great and let me do the whole transition to the hover and then taxi clear, well in time for the Airbus landing.

This is where I’m disappointed with the result of my flying. I hover-taxi’ed to the parking spot. It was between the R44 and the fuel bowser. I positioned us nicely in the middle, spot turned it so it was lined up correctly, all good so far and then it all seemed to be MESSY !!! I think I’m being too much of a fanny when it comes to the touching the ground bit. I am trying to get ZERO movement in any direction whatsoever, but the end result is I am demanding (of myself) the absolute perfect hover before touching down. Well, of course, I would get to within an inch of the ground, detect a smidgeon of movement sideways and then abort, rinse and repeat, rinse and repeat ! I was up and down like a Yoyo ! It must have took me 30 seconds to do the last ONE FOOT. Will have to ask Steve next time about this.

Credit to Steve, he didn’t butt in and sort it, which is great, ‘cos that would have left me frustrated. Anyway eventually, I got it down, but wasn’t too pleased with the landing. It was safe, but not as sweet as I would have liked.

All in all, great lesson. Lots of variety. Loved it, shame about the crappy ending, but that’s my bad, and I’ll have a word with myself before next time.

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Lesson 16 – 29th June 2009 – 1500 – 1 hour – Total so far – 17hours 33mins

Monday, June 29th, 2009

Today’s lesson – more solo’ing. And thanks to Steve (the instructor), we got loads of video of it.

The lesson was basically in two halves. It consisted of 18 minutes of dual instruction with Steve and then the remaining 42 minutes of me on my lonesome.

With Steve onboard, I lifted off between 2 other helis, always an anxious moment, and then hover-taxi’ed to the Hover Square and did some taxi’ing to a point next to a concrete slab embedded in the grass where we put her down. We then did some liftoffs, and landings, with some 360′ turns, and after a couple of them went ok, we did some practice “engine failure in the hover”s. This is where Steve took over and I followed him through. They are very fast maneuvres, where Steve cuts the power and then uses loads of right pedal, a little cyclic and then some collective to cushion the landing, but all in the space of 2 seconds.

I find them very daunting, and when it came to my turn, I was piss poor. I did some right pedal (I remember that much), and I know I touched the collective in some way, but I am pretty sure Steve took over and saved the day. So, after 3 of them, 1 of which I “did”, Steve left the helicopter and it was my turn to practice some take offs, landings, hover turns, hover taxi-ing, etc…

So, the instructions were clear. I had to imagine a rectangle on the ground (75m long, 20m wide) and liftoff, 90′ turn, fly to the 20m corner, 90′left turn, fly to the 75m corner, 90′left turn etc etc until I was back at the concrete slab where I was to land next to the slab. And rinse and repeat.

Steve kindly offered to film it with my camera so he got some great footage.

My liftoffs are feeling much better and although I wouldn’t say I’ve cracked them by a long shot, I do feel they are controlled and relatively stable. My 90′ turns are a bit messy, my hover-taxi’ing is iffy, not very straight lines, and my landings, well, improvement needed FOR SURE. I seem to have a mental block on “touching down (landing)”. I remember (from my fixed wing days), I always wanted to go for the lightest kiss of a landing, and would flare endlessly, until I virtually stalled the a/c onto the ground albeit from 2 inches up.

Without realising it, I seem to have this mental subconscious attitude of doing a similar thing in the helicopter. I asked Steve later, if I was being too much of a fanny, but he seemed to suggest that there’s nothing wrong in getting it spot on. So, in some of the video, the landings last quite a while ;-)

I really enjoyed the lesson. It’s a wonderful feeling being on your own, and in control of your own life. Once you lift off, you really are on your own, and noone can help you. Steve told me to keep the hover high, and I thought I was. To me, they felt 5-10 feet off the ground, but after the first flying of the rectangle, Steve gave me a sign to say “Higher”. In my head, I went higher, but they still appear quite low to me when I watch them back. Bear in mind the grass is probably 2 feet tall, so it’s not as dangerous as it looks, well, I didn’t think so.

I think the wind situation made the whole thing a lot easier too. The winds being variable (direction) at 3 knots.

So, absolutely cracking 1 hour of flying, and to top it all off, the landing at the end was between 2 helicopters and was the kiss of a landing that I had longed for. Always a nice way to end.

Here’s where I parked G-MAVI (the middle one)…….

dpparking

So, the video……

First Liftoff

First Landing

Second Liftoff

Second Landing

Third Liftoff

Fourth Liftoff

Final (and worse) landing (must have been getting tired)…

While, I remember. When two aircraft have a near miss, there is a facility the CAA provide to report it. It’s called an Air Prox(imity) report.

They tend only to be filed if one party believes another party is at fault, but at the moment, it seems that all parties (Merlin, Us, and Newcastle Radar) are happy it was one of those rare things where noone was at fault.

The Flight Lieutenant of the Merlin was happy not to file one. Steve feels the same and Newcastle Radar seem to be happy that all parties were a victim of faster than anticipated weather changes.

However, the Wing Commander (the boss of the Flight Lieutenant who was piloting the Merlin) was sitting in the back seat and he has a different opinion apparently. So, we’ll have to see what happens, but the Merlin had 2 instrument rated pilots on board and instruments that allow it to fly in cloud, so an argument could be made that they should have been flying IFR (by their instruments in or above cloud). Interestingly, after this incident, they subsequently went IFR upto 3000′.

We’ll see.

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First Solo – An exciting day – YOU BET !

Saturday, June 27th, 2009

Lesson 14 – 26th June 2009 – 1115 – 1hr 00mins – Total so far – 14hours 45min
Lesson 15 – 26th June 2009 – 1300 – 1hr 48mins – Total so far – 16hours 33min

Well, today has been one of the most exciting days of my life and a huge learning experience, and not for the solo flight.

The day started off with a full cross country plan of the route to Carlisle. We worked out the headings to fly and how long to fly them. Scott came to help at one point, with a view how to plan it for the final exam to tick all the boxes. I went to do the checks and put some oil in G-MAVI. We had fuel for 2 hours and were good to go.

Once I’d started her up and got us nearly ready for the off, Steve came out and we did the final checks and we were on our way. Hold at Foxtrot, 07 takeoff, left turn after the fire station, and our first track of 310′ to the North of Ponteland (2 minutes). The weather was great at this point, although not quite great enough to fly the 1800′ we had planned, so we were down at 1400′.

Next was a 6-mile 272′ track to Stagshaw Masts and that went fine too. Finally the 17 mile 263′ track to Carlisle. I lost the heading by a few degrees quite a few times, but at our half-way point we were bang on where we should be, and with a nice tail-wind, we made Carlisle 25 minutes after departure from Newcastle. We then proceeded to do 35 minutes of circuits and autorotations, with me doing the last couple of circuits totally without input from Steve. I was pleased with my liftoffs, they had really improved, and they felt very smooth, and my circuits were generally ok. Not perfect 90′ turns and also, I forgot Carburettor Heat once and Steve gave a few coughs, and when they weren’t subtle enough, he looked down at the Carb Heat knob, and as I was concentrating so hard, I still didn’t get it, but when I did I was laughing !

So, with the circuits done, we taxi’ed to the fuel pump and while Mr Fuel Pump man filled her up, we went for a bacon buttie in Carlisle’s excellent little cafe. Cracking little airport Carlisle, scenery and wildlife (in the form of birds) are amazing !

Once we were refreshed, we checked the weather for Newcastle and it seemed to be getting worse, so Steve contacted another student who was going to come to Carlisle (Rupert) for some lessons to abort his lesson, so we could do what we had to do and then return before it got too bad. Weather-wise at that time, it was good for a return to Newcastle.

So, started Lesson 15, a Lesson I will never forget and probably the lesson I have learned the most valuable lessons from. Steve too I think.

So, I’m doing all the flying unless I say otherwise. Liftoff from the pump, taxi past Bravo to the grass hover triangle and then a few more circuits where Steve kept schtum. All good. One more autorotation (just in case the engine failed), I only entered it, Steve controlled the rotor speed and the final powered recovery. And then one last thing, before I went solo, we practiced an engine failure in the hover. We did about 3 of these, but Steve did them all, while I followed through. The way it works, we’re in the hover, Steve cuts the throttle, we apply pedal to counter the loss of torque and then a final pull on the collective to cushion the landing. Pedal-Something-Cushion. Pedal-Maintain stability-Cushion, something like that. Steve’ll remind me when I see him next.

So, with that done, it was solo time. I was as excited as a pig in sh+t. Gagging for it. So excited, I had forgot that the camera I had brought to ask Steve to record the moment for the blog was under the seat I was sitting on. Thankfully, Steve said he’d record it on his phone, which he did. So when I get the footage, I’ll post it on the blog. I reviewed it afterwards and some of it was great. He got my final landing and approached the copter with his camera video’ing and got the biggest smile on my face I have ever seen. The grin never ended. Can’t wait to see it again.

The solo’s were uneventful. Steve had said to do a circuit and if I felt comfortable with it, to do another couple if I wanted. He said not to worry about the spot turns, and just do 90′ turns to check we were clear, but I wanted to do them. He warned me that the heli would handle differently because of the different CoG. It did, the nose tended to lift up more if i recall correctly. I think the first liftoff was the worst, I seemed to spin round about 70 degrees, before I caught it, but once I’d sussed the differences, I was really pleased with how the 3 circuits went. A couple of the landings I did I was over the moon with, but the first one felt different (again, because of the CoG difference I suppose).

I didn’t forget Carb Heat once – result !

There were 3 helicopters doing flights around the airport at the time I was doing my solo. One taxi’ing, one inbound from the west.

Some nice R/T from when I was doing my solo bit….

Tower    :- Callsign, Approach from the west, caution the Robinson Helicopter doing his first solo left hand circuits to the left of (Runway) 07.
Callsign :- Approach from the west and good luck to the solo pilot. He’ll thoroughly enjoy it (or something like that).

Of course, I had to say thanks….I was genuinely chuffed…

dp :- Many Thanks, Northumbria01.

When I took off for the last circuit, I gave Steve a sign to say this was the last one. Each time, I’d picked a landing spot well away from Steve (who was in the Hover triangle), for safety, but also ‘cos I knew he would then know I was going up again. For the last one, I landed about 50m away from him. Thumbs up to Steve to show that I had the controls and it was safe to approach, and at this point, I became more aware of the surroundings. Once Steve was in, I noticed the fire engine was out and I pointed this out to Steve.

Steve :- Yes, that was for you.

And he was serious. Standard practice for first solo apparently.

So, with Steve back in, we headed off to the East and back to Newcastle and the most memorable flight of my 250 hours flying, bar none.

At Carlisle, the weather was ok. Cloudbase was about 1000′, if not a little higher. As we headed East, it got progressively lower and lower. Each time, we would have to fly lower and lower to maintain “Clear of Cloud” and “Visibile with the surface”. At some points we were flying at 3 to 500 feet. Forward visibility wasn’t brilliant at this stage, but it was a good 2 or 3km, which is fairly decent and very flyable in. One of the beauties about flying in a helicopter is that you can fly as slow as you want to stay safe. So, when we’d go through a patch of 1km forward visibility, we could slow to 50kts, or even slower.

Stagshaw Masts was in cloud, so we tried to head north of it, but the cloudbase was too low, so Steve (rightfully) felt it best to come through Hexham and follow the low ground in the valley, so we could keep under the cloud. I am flying at all times at this point, with Steve instructing me heights and speeds to fly.

We picked up the A69 at Hexham and followed that, both of us keeping a beady eye out for pylons. Suffice to say, we saw a few. Steve told me to fly directly over the pylon at an angle, so we knew we were over the wires. Good tip !!

So, here comes scary moment number ONE. 3 incidents occurred on the way back, they get increasingly scary. This was the least scary….

At one point, we were about 200 feet above the pylons, but starting to lose forward visibility because we were skirting the cloudbase. It’s important to remember that I am doing the flying at this point, for when scary moment number two comes. So, once over the pylon and having crossed it at an angle of about 60 degrees, I started to descend to increase the visibility. Once the visibility was back to “ok” and we could see again, we both sighed with relief and continued on. A second later, the pylons reappeared, they had changed direction and were crossing our path again !! This was scary moment number ONE. We had to skirt the clouds again to safely get past the pylon.

But, we made it and things seemed to improve after that, the forward visibility was fairly good at about 2-3km. As we continued to follow the A69, it seemed to worsen a little and come down to about 2km.

Now, although I am doing all the flying at this point, Steve had took on all the R/T, which was a welcome relief from my workload. But, because we are so low, we are only occasionally appearing on Newcastle Radar. So, quite often, Steve would report our position when they asked where we were. They were very helpful actually, relaying latest weather at Newcastle etc……

Scary moment two – So, we’re flying along with the visibility ok, but with us flying at 3 to 400 feet to get that visibility. All of a sudden, our helicopter is pulling 3G and turning to the left. Steve had instinctively grabbed the controls pulled full collective and yanked us right over to the left. I looked to Steve’s side and see a green military Merlin helicopter coming from the left, that is within FIFTY feet flying at 90′ to us but on a collision course. Instantly, without thinking I also pulled my collective lever up fully thinking we’d need more than Steve could pull (silly really). It was the closest miss I have ever had while flying. 50 feet may seem like an exaggeration. I can assure you it was not. As we were banking SHARPLY away, the Merlin helicopter was putting in a half-hearted turn to the left. It felt like Steve had seen it before they had seen us. Here’s what a Merlin looks like….(Thanks to Scott for pointing out that the first Merlin image (now removed) was NOT a Merlin, but a Sea King.) To give you some idea how close we were, it looked bigger than this when we saw it !! And coincidentally, the turn the Merlin pilot was pulling was in the same direction as this, but a little less severe.

merlin3

That was scary moment no. 2. Sighs of relief doesn’t really do justice to the relief that we had after that. But, the scariest moment was yet to come.

What made this last incident funny, was the R/T that followed. This was pretty much the conversation that ensued AFTER that incident.

Newcastle Radar   :- Merlin Helicopter, we have a Robinson Light Helicopter who has just appeared on our radar in your vicinity.
Merlin Helicopter :- Yes, we have seen the helicopter, I think we gave it quite a fright.

Steve and I were laughing. They would have had the shits put up them JUST as much as we had !

Even though this moment was hairy, it didn’t really phase us too much, at this point, we were starting to discuss putting down in a field somewhere as our real concern was the weather. We were SOOOO close to Newcastle, but it just seemed to be getting worse and worse. If you’re reading this blog entry, you might recall a recent flight where the weather at Newcastle was gorgeous and everywhere APART FROM Newcastle seemed to be having horrible weather. This time it was the reverse, it seemed that Newcastle was the epicentre of the bad weather, but we only know this in hindsight. The ATIS (a radio service telling us the weather), was saying the weather at Newcastle was ok to proceed. No LVPs (low visibility procedures) were in force. LVPs would have stopped us going any further.

So, we push on, and as we do, we seemed to be skirting cloud more and more at lower and lower heights above the ground. But, we were still in sight of the surface and clear of cloud, although, AT TIMES, lower than we would have liked. We were having to fly slower so that we could avoid pylons if they appeared. I was back on the flying at this point and followed the A69 all the way to the A1. As we approached the A1, it seemed to be improving, and we were both a little relieved ! We were able to fly at 500 feet, and at 50-60kts. As we turned north, following the A1, we were 2 miles from the airport and within sniffing distance of a cup of coffee.

Scary Moment 3.

Suddenly, from following the A1 by sight at about 400 feet, we could see virtually nothing. We had entered cloud. We could JUST make out ground beneath us, but not the detail of the ground. It was quite frightening. For the first time, I was anxious and I could hear same in Steve’s voice.

Steve :- This isn’t good.
dp    :- Let’s just do a 180′ and pick up the A1 again

Steve took over the flying and really took command…….

Steve :- Full Carb Heat (we had entered cloud, therefore more moisture in the air, more chance of carb icing)

dp :- Full Carb Heat Set

He then flew a 180′ on the instruments and to our great relief, 20 seconds later, we could see the surface again.  Within a further 20 seconds, we saw a green patch of land and there was no doubt that we had to put down. Steve landed us next to the A1 and a housing estate at Blakelaw. Steve got out as soon as we were down to stop the inevitable crowd of onlookers from endangering themselves by approaching this weird flying thing that doesn’t normally land on their grass next to their houses. He also rang the flying school, while I shut the heli down.

Suffice to say, in Steve’s words….

Steve :- David, we’ve shared a special moment together up there

I knew exactly what he meant. He need say no more.

Once the copter was shut down, I got out and we chatted about what we could have done differently. Things like this happen in aviation. I had similar experiences in my microlighting days. Sh+t happens. The most important thing is to learn from those experiences and work out what we could have done differently.

What did we learn ? Well, the weather at Newcastle (when we left and a good part of the way there) was ok for us to approach and land safely. But the trend was a bad one, it was getting worse and worse.

At the same time, we were getting closer and closer. And so, you get this “nearly there, nearly made it” kind of mental attitude. In hindsight, we should have paid more attention to the trend and less attention to how close we were. That’s what we learned. Would we do the same again ? I am 100% confident that neither of us would let the situation get so bad in the future.

We were down on the ground, and we were safe. Or so we thought…… ;-)

It turns out Blakelaw isn’t the most safest place from a crime perspective to park a £100k helicopter.

Before the blades had even stopped turning, people were coming from everywhere. It was just before the schools finished for the day, so once they were done, we were bombarded from all angles with school kids of all ages. Then the parents, passers-by etc etc….

If I had a 1p for every time someone asked one of these questions…..

Question 1 – Why have you landed here ?
Question 2 – When are you taking off ?
Question 3 – How fast does it go ?
Question 4 – Is it yours ?

etc etc….To be fair, even though Blakelaw might not have the lowest crime rate in the Tyne region, everyone who approached was friendly, but we did have to keep our eye on the kids.

At one point, when it was pouring down, Steve and I took shelter in the helicopter. All of a sudden, the helicopter starts bouncing up and down. Some kids were at the back of the copter, pulling down on the stinger (a black bar to stop the rotor hitting the ground).

We both jumped out and “asked” them not to do that. After that we were a bit more attentive.

So, very friendly people, but quite a few of them warned us NOT to keep the helicopter there over night, as it would be on bricks the following morning.

One bloke who lived in a nearby house, offered us the use of his bathroom and brought out some coffee for us, which was lovely and welcome. But where was the BRANDY !?!?!??!

About an hour after we had landed, Scott came out, and then a little later, the big boss Neil came out and we pretty much spent the whole afternoon (from 2.50pm until about 8pm) standing in the rain considering options. Discussed were taking off and flying 200 metres to the local car dealership and asking them to put it inside, or the local bus depot. But, after visits to both, they weren’t viable options.

So, it was left as waiting for the best visibility possible and then Scott and Steve took off and flew the final 2 miles to Newcastle, with me driving back in Scott’s wife’s car.

It was good we had all made it back in one piece.

So, a memorable day (to say the least). A VERY valuable one to me (and Steve probably) from a learning perspective. My first solo faded to insignificance from a learning perspective, but I didn’t mind. Flying a helicopter on your own is easier than with Steve’s weight on board anyway. He weighs a LOT ! ;-)

It wasn’t just us affected by the weather. I had recently got in touch with an old friend from my RAF days (Hamish Mitchell) (http://www.scotlandonfloats.com/). He is an Air Traffic Controller for the upper airways, but also runs a floatplane company in Scotland. He was flying from Norfolk back upto Scotland with his floatplane and we had arranged to meet at Kielder Reservoir, where he was going to land and we were going to have a cup of something and catch up. But, Kielder refused him permission to land, so we were going to meet up at Carlisle airport instead. But, by the time he was as far north as Carlisle, the weather had got so bad, he had to fly to the west of the Lake District and from the email I got, he was pleased to be back home too !!

So, an incredibly interesting, exciting and valuable day. The kind of day, money can’t buy and one I’ll never forget.

Roll on the next flying lesson !

Here’s a piccy of where we landed at Blakelaw. Note the visibility.

heligathering

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