? to pilots, How common is taking off backwards?

[John90290]

 

Saw this video, pretty interesting to watch.

[West Coaster]

Pretty common in a tight area or on roof tops I think. The pilot faces into winds and gets a solid rate of climb going. The reason for backing up is that in case an engine quits, the pilot can drop the nose, dump the collective and gain some forward airspeed that can be bled off in the flare back onto the pad.

[Eric Hunt]

Looked like a Cat A takeoff to me. At any stage of the takeoff, the aircraft can either return on one engine to the pad, or after the Critical Decision Point, dive for some forward airspeed, reach single-engine climb speed, and climb away with 50' clearance from obstacles.

 

Used when the landing pad is the only safe area to land, not needed for runway departures or open fields.

[Witch]

Oh boy did you guys get fooled. The bird is actually landing. The video is being played backward.

 

I am a super genius.

 

Later

[flingwing206]

Oh boy did you guys get fooled. The bird is actually landing. The video is being played backward.

Then that's a he11 of an approach!

[John90290]

video is not run backward, note cars in background, they're not going backward.

[PhotoFlyer]

video is not run backward, note cars in background, they're not going backward.

 

It was a well coordinated effort. They payed for a dozen drivers to drive in reverse.

[Gomer Pylot]

Well, it's sort of a Cat A takeoff, but he went much higher and further back than necessary, at least IMO from seeing the video one time. Cat A takeoffs are uncommon in the US, more common in Europe. The CDP should be closer to 10 ft than several hundred ft.

[Flying Bull]

Hi Gomer Pylot,

 

yes, its more common in Europe to do CAT A TakeOffs.

About the height itself - its to be calculated in the sheets depending on weight and pressure/temperature - with some 10 feet you won't be able to land on the roof again, especially with all the EMS-stuff in that helicopter.

What is different to the normal CAT A - departure - one shouldn't stop the climp before transition into forward speed - just put the nose a few degrees down to acceleration attitude and the helicopter will climb through the hole departure.

 

Greetings Flying Bull

[joker]

You can't really say whether he has gone too far, without knowing what the rules of the country he's in and without knowing how much he's loaded.

 

CAT A means different things in different countries.

 

For example where I am, from a rooftop helideck, you are not allowed to go drop down below the level of the deck height in the case of an engine failure before CDP. Thus we use CDP @ 55'. That gives us 35' of clearance.

 

Our profile is a vertical CAT A though, not backwards. But that's different to aircraft and operator and most importantly single engine performance.

 

Or this could be CAT B take off, with some risk accepted in the event of a failure before CDP.

 

Joker

[brushfire21]

To the first poster, we landed an EMS rigged Agusta this last sunday on a bridge for a broken femur. After the patient was loaded and the flight crew was secured, the pilot took off backwards with a 5-10mph head wind. As soon as he gained a little altitude, he pitched the nose down, turned right and speed away. My two cents, for the original question.

[Goldy]

To the first poster, we landed an EMS rigged Agusta this last sunday on a bridge for a broken femur. After the patient was loaded and the flight crew was secured, the pilot took off backwards with a 5-10mph head wind. As soon as he gained a little altitude, he pitched the nose down, turned right and speed away. My two cents, for the original question.

 

 

Roger- did you remember to check for distal pulses on the femur patient ?

 

Just wanted to make sure you weren't so enthraled with the helo that you forgot why you were there !!

 

Goldy

[Djewsb]

Here is video of a backwards takeoff from the inside

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v8xcdnzh2cE

[Grant B]

It's easy. I do that all the time playing Joint Operations!

 

and while being shot at...

 

 

Some of the BF2 veterans have some good piloting skills too.. (somewhere in this vid)

 

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=57...46599&q=bf2

[brushfire21]

Roger- did you remember to check for distal pulses on the femur patient ?

 

Just wanted to make sure you weren't so enthraled with the helo that you forgot why you were there !!

 

Goldy

 

Thanks Steve!!!!!!! My attention was on the patient kinda. At barely 100#, early 30's and only wearing a bikini, it was hard to figure out what to pay attention too....... girl, copter, girl, copter, girl, copter, girl, copter....... I give up, how about her and me in the back after she gets fixed up

[Voluptuary5]

What’s a girl in a bikini doing to break a femur? Sounds like a good story to me…

 

-V5

[brushfire21]

Not sure how we got from copters flying backwards to chicks in bikini's, oh I know.... I hijacked the forum without wanting to.

 

The girl was wakeboarding over the 4th of July weekend, and the water, wakeboard and boat out weighed her and out muscled her. Bright side is she got a cool ride in a 109!

 

But seriously, its not a good day when the copter lands. Usually means things have gone south, and someone is having a bad day.

 

To get this thread going again on the proper subject of helo's flying backwards here is another EMS story for all of you.

 

Myself and a bunch of friends were out riding at a favorite sand spot in Nevada earlier this year. We came across a lite weight in her early to mid thirties who ended up going over a sand wall and tumbled down about 50'ft into a small ravine. Bike landed on her once and maybe twice as they rolled down. She ended up on her back and the quad was about 10ft away in the bottom of a narrow ravine (20'ft at the bottom and 125-150' at the top). Myself and another couple firefighters ended up getting her prepped. The copter arrived, did a high/low recon and came in and landed about 100'ft down wind from us in the ravine. The pilot did a confined space landing into the wind, and hovered-shuffled the copter to one side of the ravine so it gave plenty of room for patient loading. Not alot of room from the M/R to one side of the ravine, aprox 5-6'ft vertical and horizontal clearance (someone would not have been able to walk in the blades without getting tagged). After the patient was loaded and all members were on board and secured, the A/C lifted off into a hover, re-positioned to the center of the ravine and then continued to lift off backwards away from us and out of the ravine.

 

So now that the topic is back on topic about helicopters flying backwards, any further topics about girls will have to be posted in a new forum lol

 

PS, not trying to get into a pissing match about scene safety and why the pilot did what he did if someone asks or points fingers. I didn't land the copter or choose the spot (BLM ranger was LZ coordinator). If someone wants to have an intelligent discussion about it then I am open to it for the betterment of everyone.

[Witch]

Taking off backward? I've been doing it since day one. I can't get the thing to go forward.

 

Seriously, I have a tendancy to, when lifting off, slide backward. I'm not doing that so much anymore but at times the machine gets away from me and I have to fight it to get back into a decent hover.

 

I can fly sideways a little though.

 

Later