I almost got my bird smashed about 6 or so weeks ago at night at MZJ, an uncontrolled field we fly out of that is a huge airliner storage field. Was in my helo at about 2000L time. Was practicing some runway slide-on landings at night with a new pilot. The only traffic was an Army NG helo that was sitting on the taxiway at the opposite end of the field doing some hover work. I was working up and down the 6800 foot runway doing various maneuvers to one end, then turn around and do more maneuvers to the other end. That way I don’t have to waste time flying a pattern in between each. As we are sitting on the approach end of runway 30 facing up-runway, I’m getting ready to brief the new guy on what kind of liftoff I want him to do and how to do it, simulating a 100 foot obstacle. All of a sudden, on the CTAF frequency, someone transmits “Pinal Unicom, Boeing 737, turning 1 mile final runway 30, Pinal” What the heck? I take the controls, lift off to a 3 foot hover while making a left in-place pedal turn to look behind us, and sure enough, I’m staring at the landing lights of a 737-800 that’s coming to 1/2 mile final for 30. I quickly reposition us forward and off the side of the runway into the grass, while the 737 calls “Pinal Unicom, Boeing 737, short final runway 30”. And it flies on by and lands. Exits at the end and taxis to parking. A foreign bird with no airline name on it, coming in for storage or maintenance.
What’s weird is that at MZJ, the big jets normally only go in and out of the field in the daytime. Occasionally, they’ll depart at night to leave. But they never arrive at night. Ever. Mainly because MZJ is only 6800 feet, sits in a big black hole environment, has no instrument approaches to it, and has no VASI or PAPI to either runway, nor any approach lighting system or REILS. And only low intensity runway lights. I’ve never seen civil jets arriving at night for at least a couple of decades. But, by the letter of the FARs, the 737 crew did nothing wrong. As being an uncontrolled field, they aren’t obligated to make any radio calls at all. It’s not required, even though it’s obviously good practice to do so. No X miles out call, no downwind call, no base call……just the turning 1 mile final call as their first radio call; whereas I and the NG helicopter had been making position calls even though we weren’t working near one another, with him calling out his hover ops on the taxiway, and me calling out my working up and down the runway.
That could’ve been a sucky situation. I could’ve easily ended up like the USAir 737 and the Skywest Metro at LAX in 1991. No one even knew the Skywest plane was involved until the crash rescue firefighters found a propeller under the wreckage of the 737 and wondered what it was doing there. They would’ve found a rotor blade or three and a mast and skids under that jet after it ran me over had he not made any radio calls. By the time I would’ve noticed that I was being illuminated by his landing lights behind me, it would’ve been too late.