Pushing the Limits. Similarities between the Kobe Bryant and Australian UH-1 crashes.

[skypig]

Identical in that they both could have landed earlier and not killed everyone.

Think about it hard - land, and suffer inconvenience and possible mild embarrassment, or kill yourself, and everyone else.
Which way would you err? Land when you might have been able to get through? or push on when you might not make it?
One mistake you can make more than once. (See ”inconvenience and possible mild embarrassment”)

[Jabberwocky]

Good points SkyPig. We are known for bagging others out but in all seriousness, we should not take the easy option to stroke our own egos and point the finger at others when they’ve made a safe decision. Other factors do come in to each and every mission and at the end of the day you’ve made a mistake, at least you have the option to try and not make it again if you’ve landed safely somewhere.

[Eric Hunt]

A couple of my more memorable landings to wait out the weather:

1. Heading to a farm in the Upper Hunter, the cloud and the ground decided to join up. I saw a large farmhouse with plenty of clear land nearby, so I put the bird down. The owner came out in the rain, we explained the situation and a vehicle came down from the destination 10nm away to collect the pax. The owner invited me into the kitten, sat me next to the log fire (middle of winter) and gave me a wonderful roast lamb lunch. An hour or so later, the cloud lifted enough for me to fly up to join the guests.

2. Heading to a farm on the Murrumbidgee River near Jugiong, same sort of thing, cloud, ground, can't get around it. I reckoned that landing next to the Hume Highway would give the guests the best chance of being picked up, so I picked another farm with clear land on the highway, landed, spoke to the owner, and they organised a vehicle to collect my pax. The huge coincidence was that the owner's name was the same as mine - from a branch of the family I didn't know existed. The time spent waiting for the cloud to lift was extremely interesting, learning more about the family tree.

[Icefather]

All good points..

Commercial pressures and “Get-there-itis” have been around since way back. But is your ego or need to get to wherever you are going or who you are working for, worth lives. I for one have a family I’d like to see.

I will not give anyone a hard time about making a precautionary landing due to weather.

They pay us to say no.

#LandandLive

[NZHelo]

“They pay us to say no”
Very interesting quote. Not that it should BUT how many times has that been questioned in your career? I know in mine a sh!t load and even so over the this fire season.

[Icefather]

“They pay us to say no”
Very interesting quote. Not that it should BUT how many times has that been questioned in your career? I know in mine a sh!t load and even so over the this fire season.

I’ve seen people question it and it’s not right.

I think of a recent event where in a Bell medium we had strong headwinds and s#!t wx, where the decision was made to turn around and return to departure location.. upon turn around we were doing a buck 40 (140 G/s) at 55% mast torque and if we were to continue the added trip to deviate for fuel and daylight remaining to complete the task wasn’t worth it.

The only thing that hurt was our ego as we felt like we hadn’t achieved anything

Job got done another day.

- Yeah they pay us to say no shouldn’t be the way, but it is :/ PIC has final say and if it’s not suitable for whatever reason no one can override him/her and if they do, find a new job. Else it could be you in front of their families and the coroner....

[Heliduck]

“Risk creep” is the root cause of most incidents, not only CFIT. A recent example - parks ground crew cut a pad in the bush, helicopter no.1 goes in to pick up half of them. The pilots report in the pad was “it’s great, could fit 2 helicopters in here!”. I flew helicopter no.2 in to pick up the remaining crew & the surface was right on the limit for lateral slope, not happy Jan. At the briefing the next day we were tasked to drop crews back into the same pad & I voiced my concern about the standard of the pad, pilot no.1 said it’s no problem. Outcome is that I look like the useless pr*#k for not wanting to land there & pilot no.1 is the top gun. In the back ground, the crew who cut the pad now think that the slope is acceptable because “pilot no.1 landed there no problems”, so next time they cut a pad the standard is just that little bit lower introducing a higher degree of difficulty & increasing risk.
In this case a slightly more level spot could be found by moving the machine all the way to the left of the pad prior to touchdown, which left about 200mm from the rotor tips to some saplings. I had the ground crew remove the saplings, but the entire experience left me feeling disappointed that the highest standard of safety wasn’t aimed for initially, but rather had to be fought for.
Most of us have done insertions in tight spots balancing the skids on a rock in a ravine, flown in the smoke to get a fire slowed down & done some skud running to get a job done, but because we accept that as the norm & don’t push for a higher standard we keep having incidents.
Think about that next time someone asks if you can do a job, & tells you that “Fred did it”.
Statistically, during the last 4 months on fires I would love to know how many times a pilot called ops to be shut down due to visibility vs ops being shut down by the authorities; that number would give us a good indication of risk acceptance from flight crews.

[FerrariFlyer]

The accident with Richard Green a few years ago bears some semblance to these two aforementioned accidents:

http://www.australianflying.com.au/late ... crash-atsb

Sadly, 'push on itis' is that little gremlin that sits on your shoulder and provides subtle pressure to try for a few more miles or minutes when really you shouldn't. It takes maturity and experience to know when that gremlin is talking and shut it down. Someone in a radio or ops room doesn't see what you do in the air so it can be difficult to diplomatically decline a job and return to base. However, the blame will still fall squarely upon you as PIC in the event of an accident regardless of what someone says to you from behind a desk!

I've had numerous occasions in The Torres Straits and Canada as a junior pilot where pressure was applied to keep going or give it ago or 'land there...Bob did last week' etc. I'm lucky I had some great mentors that provided sage advice where I elected to land early, remain on the ground until I was legal (and personally comfortable for my professional limits at the time) and thank goodness I didn't land in that spot Bob did as he had a tail rotor strike!

[skypig]

It can be difficult to define when one should “outland”. The many pressures to “keep going” are obvious.

One tip I would give to anyone interested is: If you have slowed down, reduced altitude, and are tracking at 90 degrees from planned/desired track - it is time to turn around (if it is “better” behind you.) Or land as soon as there is a safe spot.

Once landed, do not take off, unless the conditions have appreciably, and without a doubt, improved. (It often looks “safer” when parked)
It is breaking this “rule” that killed Richard Green and his passengers.

If there is any doubt - there is no doubt.

[homersimpson]

Easy to sit on the couch and talk about landing and saying no.
I’ve said no and turned back many times now, only to spend the flight back thinking about profit going down the drain and calling the wife to tell her I’ll be another day. Not a good feeling, but at least I’m still here to talk about it.
The pressure to push on is all too real.

[FerrariFlyer]

Easy to sit on the couch and talk about landing and saying no.
I’ve said no and turned back many times now, only to spend the flight back thinking about profit going down the drain and calling the wife to tell her I’ll be another day. Not a good feeling, but at least I’m still here to talk about it.
The pressure to push on is all too real.

Saying no is not easy in many instances however you are also a long time dead if you make the wrong decision and spud in. How many completely avoidable fatal accidents have we experienced over the years from the wrong decision being made and people pushing on! None of us want to be the next statistic.

Of course, there is a cost implication for turning around as well as the inconvenience caused. When compared to the worse scenario of a serious and/or fatal accident, in some cases it can completely finish off a company and have very substantial, long lasting cost implications for all concerned.

https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-02-25/ ... n/11996176

Many moons ago I got caught out late in the afternoon with poor weather, heavy rain etc and spent an uncomfortable night in an old, abandoned fishing camp replete with a trillion mosquitoes, some rusted out baked bean cans and not much else. Sure, my passengers and boss were not overly happy and none of us were comfortable that night however we were alive and flew home the next morning. It wasn't an easy decision but in hindsight it was the only decision to make. The relief was palpable when the decision to land was made and we touched down moments before an extremely long and heavy rain storm hit that reduced visibility down to meters!

[Eric Hunt]

The Boss wanted me to take him to Sydney one afternoon, with storms forecast. I told him it would have to be in daylight, as NVMC would not be available due low cloud, and IFR would be mixing it with jets. he said no worries, we will be out of here in time.

Well, he wasn't. I launched in gathering darkness, with storms all around, and had to get above 4000' while still VMC to talk to ATC about an IFR clearance into SY. Wx radar looked like it had measles, dodging clouds till finally got through to ATC. They said "No way we will let a helicopter come in IFR tonight, jets diverting everywhere, stay VFR and go away." Told the Boss, and returned through heavy rain to base.

Another chopper departed about the same time as I did, staying low and trying to get out of the valley. Cloud stopped him going forwards, turned around and he was boxed in. Landed next to a farmhouse, and just got the pax under the verandah when a hailstorm beat his Squirrel to death - smashed windows, rotor blades, dents and mess. Had to truck it out of there. So, lucky I had radar and was not quite in the same area. Flew them down the next day in blue skies.

[ChicoCheco]

I am just rookie, no turbine time, but had that "but he is doing it why can't we" from ungrateful ex-student with way too much ego and self-induced time pressure/deadlines.

Just because more experienced FI shoots autos in R22 on gusty day, doesn't mean myself and not so sharp student (PPL rated but not so great stick skills) should do so, risking overspeed from some gust kick and/or thermal bubble.

[hand in pants]

I'm wondering what happened to "self preservation", you know the thing where you sit there and go, "do I want to die or risk death just to do a job that only pays okay money". Most of the time I've not had an issue with saying "no". Yes it's embarrassing for both me and the company but everybody survives, everybody.

I think the two crashes were completely different. The S76 was commercial and the UH1 wasn't. Commercial pressure is always going to be there, regardless of who puts the pressure on, the boss, or you. And yes, you put plenty of pressure on yourself to get the job done, probably more than the boss does, he wants his aircraft back safely.

With 20/20 hindsight when you look at the UH1 crash, there were a great number of red flags that came up through the day that should have slowed or stopped the flight. They left later than was planned. Red flag number one. They were apparently delayed with re-fuelling at Coffs. Red flag number two. By now they were never going to make their destination before dark. Red flag number three. The weather forecast was no where near good enough for what they were going to do. Red flag number four. The pilot wasn't night rated. Huge red flag number five. The aircraft wasn't night rated. Red flag number six. The coastal route he wanted that night is clear of civilisation, no lights, no roads, no towns/villages, in other words just a black hole. Massive red flag number seven. And he still made the decision to keep going. I just don't understand.
I'd have given up at about Port Macquarie. Nice air conditioned motel room, steak dinner, couple of beers and a good nights sleep, up again at a civilised time of about 10:00ish, huge breakfast, two or three cups of coffee and away. Arrive safe, fat and happy.

[skypig]

I'd have given up at about Port Macquarie. Nice air conditioned motel room, steak dinner, couple of beers and a good nights sleep, up again at a civilised time of about 10:00ish, huge breakfast, two or three cups of coffee and away. Arrive safe, fat and happy.

While not quite as experienced as you mate, that does sound better than an uncontrolled plung into the dark ocean.

The more experienced Pilots turn back, while the less experienced Pilots “push on”.
Meanwhile, the most experienced Pilots are drinking coffee in the crew room, wondering why anyone took off.

My (mentioned before) tip:
Flag the possibility that the weather could prevent the flight when it’s booked (assuming it is booked in advance - say a wedding flight)
If the weather is marginal, flag the possibility of turning back, including consequences. Eg “If we can’t get over the hills, we will come back here. It will cost you an hour of Helicopter time, and you’ll be back here, and late.”
Should reduce the pressure to “push on”, when you know you shouldn’t.

When I was flying an IFR EMS program I would regularly knock back jobs on the basis that there was a fair chance we wouldn’t “get in” at the destination.
It was better for the patient that med crew were arriving a bit later by road, than starting again from our weather “alternate”.


“When in doubt, sit it out”

[Yakking]

The Boss wanted me to take him to Sydney one afternoon, with storms forecast. I told him it would have to be in daylight, as NVMC would not be available due low cloud, and IFR would be mixing it with jets. he said no worries, we will be out of here in time.

Well, he wasn't. I launched in gathering darkness, with storms all around, and had to get above 4000' while still VMC to talk to ATC about an IFR clearance into SY. Wx radar looked like it had measles, dodging clouds till finally got through to ATC. They said "No way we will let a helicopter come in IFR tonight, jets diverting everywhere, stay VFR and go away." Told the Boss, and returned through heavy rain to base.

I didn't realise ATC could decline an IFR flight plan! Was this a submitted flight plan that you were trying to enable in the air or were you just trying to upgrade to IFR without a plan? You could really be left in a pickle if you're flying along in deteriorating weather and you look to upgrade to IFR and ATC say no! How do you then land safely?

[Eric Hunt]

That's why I was staying VMC until I could talk to them. It was relatively common to submit IFR plan airborne, over the sat-phone, before going into the gloop. There was rarely time to put in a plan or revise the ETD before the pax turned up at unpredictable times.

They weren't refusing the plan, they were refusing to accept me in Sydney while jets couldn't get in and were diverting. I could have landed elsewhere, but it was better not to go IMC.