Bell 206 down in the Hudson

azmedic said:
Coming across several media reports saying the CA radioed in saying he was low on fuel. Must have been on company frequency because nothing was mentioned on the ATC audio…and I feel like being low on fuel doesn’t cause the mast to separate from the cabin..


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The media seems to be latching onto this. I think anyone with even basic aeronautical knowledge takes this more as "hey I'm going to come back to fuel before I head out again" vs "I'm declaring min fuel or emergency fuel." Just giving a heads up to their ops.
 
Murdoughnut said:
Three of them were littles, sadly.
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Even still, 3 adult bodies in that is a lot. Capacity on it isn’t that great even with the larger fuel cell.

I don’t imagine these tour aircraft flying anywhere near as heavy because of the need to defuel if Martha and Bert from Madison show up pushing max gross.


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Maurus said:
Out of curiosity if a passenger randomly slammed on a pedal could that be enough to cause a break up?
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Most of these that I’ve seen have front crew single station controls. It’s approved on the aircraft and actually lowers insurance to fly non rated passengers in the front.

If not doing flight training all those extra controls buy you is weight and risk.

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Inverted said:
Unless the new video circulating is a different helicopter from a different time, there appears to be footage of the accident helicopter basically doing aerobatics before the thing fell apart...
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There is that video that is making its rounds, however it is a different helicopter from a different time.
 
Maurus said:
Out of curiosity if a passenger randomly slammed on a pedal could that be enough to cause a break up?
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As Lawman said, most of these tour helos don’t have redundant flight controls on each side of the front. Generally, the cyclic, collective and pedals are easily removed, so as to both not burden a passenger, as well as no additional flight controls to get binding, FOD, or bumped.

Still, a random pedal movement wouldn’t cause something like this to happen. With wet boot soles, for example, it’s not unheard of for boots to slip on the pedals while flying, resulting in one getting shoved forward inadverently. it’s annoying at best, but not damaging or destructive in and of itself.
 
Lawman said:
Even still, 3 adult bodies in that is a lot. Capacity on it isn’t that great even with the larger fuel cell.

I don’t imagine these tour aircraft flying anywhere near as heavy because of the need to defuel if Martha and Bert from Madison show up pushing max gross.


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It was a Long Ranger not a Jet Ranger. The L-IV is a very capable aircraft. A post on Reddit claimed the same company nearly had an accident a few days prior due to a scissor link failure.

Alex.
 
Autothrust Blue said:
It’s a point where we should drop opposition and fight better fights.
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To clarify, I do not think CVR transcripts should be released. The TSB has very, very strict rules on CVR data. It is considered extremely privileged.

I think the same for ADS-B data. There were a LOT of unintended consequences by making that "open source".
 
Richman said:
To clarify, I do not think CVR transcripts should be released. The TSB has very, very strict rules on CVR data. It is considered extremely privileged.

I think the same for ADS-B data. There were a LOT of unintended consequences by making that "open source".
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Same for maritime VDR voice transcripts.

“We won’t tell you exactly what the quartermaster and Fourth Mate were talking about, but let’s just say their intimate relationship had terminated some weeks prior and they were on watch when the grounding occurred.”

I was more referring to how just about every other first world nation has longer CVR retention/length requirements; knowing what was happening on the flight deck of that American 777 would have been quite useful when they fouled the runway.
 
Damn the crash videos are a rough watch. :(

I’ve never understood helicopters despite MikeD’s best explanations. To me it’s still black magic. Mast bumping, there should be no scenario the rotor blades meet the tail boom because of something you did. There should be more clearance. But this accident looks like something worse, a jesus nut type situation gone bad. I’ve always thought helis are just looking for a reason to fall out of the sky, and the pilot is the only one constantly has to make inputs to save that from happening. And even that’s not good enough. Well this one screw gave way, so the whole transmission and the rotor blade just went. Um, what?!?

So sad :(


My wife isn’t an aviation person, but she came across this news article, showed me a picture of the family before they left, and made a comment how they are just like us (similar kid ages) seemed visibly upset about this accident.
 
Autothrust Blue said:
Same for maritime VDR voice transcripts.

“We won’t tell you exactly what the quartermaster and Fourth Mate were talking about, but let’s just say their intimate relationship had terminated some weeks prior and they were on watch when the grounding occurred.”

I was more referring to how just about every other first world nation has longer CVR retention/length requirements; knowing what was happening on the flight deck of that American 777 would have been quite useful when they fouled the runway.
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I disagree with the TSB. I don’t need to hear the actual voices, but a full transcript helps to understand the picture of what transpired.

In the Colgan crash, the NTSB initially didn’t release all of the CVR transcript. Later they released the whole 2 hr transcript and that showed tons of comments on pay, schedules, how Colgan treated them like trash, etc.
 
Cherokee_Cruiser said:
Damn the crash videos are a rough watch. :(

I’ve never understood helicopters despite MikeD’s best explanations. To me it’s still black magic. Mast bumping, there should be no scenario the rotor blades meet the tail boom because of something you did. There should be more clearance. But this accident looks like something worse, a jesus nut type situation gone bad. I’ve always thought helis are just looking for a reason to fall out of the sky, and the pilot is the only one constantly has to make inputs to save that from happening. And even that’s not good enough. Well this one screw gave way, so the whole transmission and the rotor blade just went. Um, what?!?

So sad :(


My wife isn’t an aviation person, but she came across this news article, showed me a picture of the family before they left, and made a comment how they are just like us (similar kid ages) seemed visibly upset about this accident.
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It’s not known what failed yet, if anything component-wise did. That won’t be known until the various component separations can be determined regarding which was the initiating event, and thus, which were the resultant events and when. Then, determination of the why for the initiating event can be examined. Until such time, no definitive causal factor statements can be made; only factual events pointed such as the tailboom separating, the main rotor system departing, etc.
 
MikeD said:
It’s not known what failed yet, if anything component-wise did. That won’t be known until the various component separations can be determined regarding which was the initiating event, and thus, which were the resultant events and when. Then, determination of the why for the initiating event can be examined. Until such time, no definitive causal factor statements can be made; only factual events pointed such as the tailboom separating, the main rotor system departing, etc.
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All I’ve seen is a helicopter flying relatively straight and level, and then helicopter tumbling out of control. The main rotor blade breaks and seems to be intact, the entire length span.
 
That's what is weird about this one. From the picture, it looks like the blades were intact but still attched to the upper housing of the transmission! Time will tell but this one absolutely sucks! RIP.....
 
Speaking of catastrophic aircraft failure, I just got back from a cruise out of FLL. My last one from FLL was my first cruise ever with family when I was in college. I still remember the departure date of our Royal Caribbean cruise - Dec 19, 2005 from Fort Lauderdale. The only reason I remember that specific date is that was the day the wing snapped off the Ocean Chalks Mallard that departed Fort Lauderdale. :(
 
dustoff17 said:
That's what is weird about this one. From the picture, it looks like the blades were intact but still attched to the upper housing of the transmission! Time will tell but this one absolutely sucks! RIP.....
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Not the first time a main mast has separated inflight. Rare, but has happened. Last major one was the Norwegian Super Puma headed out to an oil platform. Entire main rotor system separated from the helicopter inflight due to metal fatigue. The fuselage instantly plummeted to earth, fatal to all onboard. Creepy was the separated main rotor system, still spinning as it slowly descended to the ground where it landed intact.


View: https://youtube.com/watch?v=49OoG3KqBTo&pp=ygUZTm9yd2F5ICBzdXBlciBwdW1hICBjcmFzaA%3D%3D
 
dustoff17 said:
That's what is weird about this one. From the picture, it looks like the blades were intact but still attched to the upper housing of the transmission! Time will tell but this one absolutely sucks! RIP.....
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Cherokee_Cruiser said:
All I’ve seen is a helicopter flying relatively straight and level, and then helicopter tumbling out of control. The main rotor blade breaks and seems to be intact, the entire length span.
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Semi-rigid rotor systems don’t really come apart in terms of blade(s) separating, barring some serious preexisting damage of some kind. These two-blade systems are extremely sturdy from the blades to the blade grips to the crossover structure. Their weak point, which is still fairly sturdy but weakest in comparison, is the mast.
 
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