Osprey crash at Bellows.

[Roger Roger]

It seems to me that somewhere along the line this went from being nasty about an inanimate object to being nasty to other posters.

I think a lot of what we are seeing is legitimate input from vastly different viewpoints. The osprey isn't the first airplane in history that the engineering, mx, and pilot folks have had differing opinions of and it won't be the last.

 

[deadstick]

I read elsewhere the 22 has an automated system alerting to VRS, and the recovery is the same as for conventional r/w aircraft. A couple of other items posted (by, I believe, a 22 pilot) were that the 22's VRS threshold is 800 fpm and that in a high hover it should be able to transition and fly away after an engine failure, but at low altitude you get what we saw in the video.

 

[The Fez]

And in our UH-60s and HH-60s, we fly with no seats in the back; just clipped into a floor ring for security. Pretty much ensures, at best, we'll just be injured in a crash..

I've heard the Martin Baker seats we have in back are supposed to "stroke". I'd look it up, but my -1 is in my locker at the squadron...and I don't intend on spending any unpaid time there today.

From the video, it's hard to tell if the Osprey was settling with power or suffered an engine failure. Could easily be a combination of both. With some more pre-accident footage, we could see what they were doing in a 200' hover. I not sure if Marine -22's are hoist equipped, but a 200' hover is the AF -22 hoist altitude due to down wash characteristics.

 

[Nark]

The "M" -60 has the Martin-Baker seats that stroke for the crew chiefs. The pax are still hooped, with folding seats.

I think this is precisely why we need an O-7 approval for seats-out pax flying. If we do a hard landing, or worse, the pax are screwed. They'll have 0 absorption from the impact, vs us and the crew chiefs.

The hawk is designed to crash vertically (well not really, but really). It has a lot of built in protections to allow for survivability of the crew. Not the case for lateral/longitudinal impacts.

 

[Lawman]

The "M" -60 has the Martin-Baker seats that stroke for the crew chiefs. The pax are still hooped, with folding seats.

I think this is precisely why we need an O-7 approval for seats-out pax flying. If we do a hard landing, or worse, the pax are screwed. They'll have 0 absorption from the impact, vs us and the crew chiefs.

The hawk is designed to crash vertically (well not really, but really). It has a lot of built in protections to allow for survivability of the crew. Not the case for lateral/longitudinal impacts.

Hey progress

 

[ComplexHiAv8r]

Update; http://www.staradvertiser.com/news/...was_due_to_pilot_performance.html?mobile=true

 

[dustoff17]

So trying to land in a dirt and sand environment caused a compressor stall?

Good thing they don't use the Osprey someplace that is really sandy like Iraq or Afghanistan.....oh, wait....

 

[Ian_J]

Coming from a fixed wing guy with very limited helo knowledge. What's the recovery for settling with power? It's common enough for me to know of the phenomenon, so it has to practiced in the sim? Is there enough time/power to dump the nose over for a run on landing? Or are you just F'd?

If you follow your first instinct and pull more collective, you just make things worse. More pitch = more downwash = even greater descent rate

The recovery is to push the nose down and fly forward out of the downwash, which is easier said than done when it happens at 100 AGL.

That's kind of what I was thinking. I've had simulated engine failures at 50-100 feet in a SE drilled into my head enough to know to push the nose over and accept what you get for a landing surface. I hope if it ever comes to it, that's what I'll do. I would think helo guys have the same thing drilled into them, so much so it's muscle memory. Like a lot of things in aviation, if you pick left and should've gone right you're dead. If you pick right and should've gone right you're a hero. Sometimes you're just screwed.

Like USMCmech was saying its training yourself to fight your first instinct. Lots of dudes have the bad habit of treating that collective like an escape handle, which works early in training when your light weight all the time. First time I tried to do an Out of ground affect approach to a hover in full combat kit I scared the hell out of myself because it ran out of power and we were still descending towards trees but I had power and airspeed to have options out of it. Early recognition is the key "an ounce of prevention" and all.

It's a lot like teaching new fixed wing guys in a stall/engine failure not to try and pull more pitch to arrest falling. And like you said sometimes you've gotta pick whether you wanna take the punch in the face of the stomach. Whenever your in a hover there is an "avoid region" for your weight and DA. Basically it's a zone where no matter if you did the failure response perfectly it's still gonna hurt, your just aiming for survivable. Problem for Military helo aviation is the old school high hover battle position or sling load/fast rope/hoist provide basically lives in that zone. It's only when your just cruising that problems aren't going from non existent to end of the world with little to no in between.

We don't really so much practice it as its a part of every approach we do. Steeper/slower/more power intensive an approach is the more you go into it prepared but really it's the procedurally every day approaches these always seem to happen during. Kinda the idea of you only get bit when your not paying attention.

Or, there's an entirely different way to recover from settling with power.

http://www.aviationtoday.com/rw/per...ng-Through-the-Vortex_85872.html#.VlR9JF7Md8c

snip...Rather than forward cyclic and reduce collective (as I have been teaching and evaluating for years), he actually increased the collective to climb power, added the appropriate left pedal to keep the nose straight and applied right cyclic. The combination of tail rotor thrust and right bank moved the aircraft to the right and almost immediately out of the vortex ring. I was amazed. After a little practice, I was making recoveries from a fully developed vortex ring state with only 20 to 30 ft of altitude loss.

 

[Lawman]

So trying to land in a dirt and sand environment caused a compressor stall?

Good thing they don't use the Osprey someplace that is really sandy like Iraq or Afghanistan.....oh, wait....

Think it's got more to do with the amount and saturation/condition of the sand in question.

Wet beach sand vs moon dust.

 

[dustoff17]

Think it's got more to do with the amount and saturation/condition of the sand in question.

Wet beach sand vs moon dust.

The report might be a bit more believable if it was a combination of sand, dirt, pumice, but to state that stirred up sand caused the failure is a bit elementary. From my experience, dry sand kicks up a hell of a lot more than wet (or moist). The Osprey has flown all over in numerous sandy conditions and it didn't fall out of the sky......

 

[BobDDuck]

So trying to land in a dirt and sand environment caused a compressor stall?

Good thing they don't use the Osprey someplace that is really sandy like Iraq or Afghanistan.....oh, wait....

I was out on the beach at Sherwoods (about a mile down from where they crashed) when this happened. They'd flown several approaches already and were well above the treeline when crossing the beach each time. Where they were actually landing is in the middle of the base so I have no idea what the ground conditions are like there, but there aren't many places in Hawaii where there is sand inland for the beach.