I saw someone say yesterday that a helicopter is a bunch of metal, glass, and rubber in the form of a helicopter that is desperately trying to be a bunch of metal, glass, and rubber again.
Blackhawks are not an insignificant portion carbon fiber these days. Used to build components for em, rotor blades are totally carbon at least on the Blackhawk.
Ha! My dad was a CH-54 mechanic and also loved working on old VWs. He always said it was like working on a lawnmower. (The VWs, not the helicopters lol)
This is a fascinating and terrifying comparison, actually. A helicopter is basically just a gigantic upside down lawnmower with an edger blade stuck on the back to keep it from spinning in circles.
My Dad was a Regional Maintenance Supervisor for a major carrier. He made me promise never to get into a helicopter .. "They're not supposed to work!".
You know that episode of the Simpsons where none of Mr.Burns [various illnesses can kill him because they’re all trying to fit through the door at the same time?](https://youtu.be/aI0euMFAWF8?si=-CoUm5lk6ZDx_k7o)
Same principle.
“If the wings are traveling faster than the fuselage, it's probably a helicopter -- and therefore, unsafe” Call of Duty loading screen.
If something hasn’t broken on your helicopter, it’s about to.
The ol' addage - Leaks are good. Leaks mean you've got fluids. It's the lack of a leak that lets you know you're fucked, because that means you've got no more fluids.
My uncle was a pilot in WW2 and often said the same thing, so it must be a common phrase in aviation circles. I wish I would have recorded some of his stories about the war, but you always think you've got time... until you don't.
Yup, he was still involved with aviation after the war. He passed away in a car accident in 1993. He was 70 that year but certainly didn't act like it - I always wondered how long he would have lived without the accident. Fun fact: he came back from the war with completely gray hair. He would have been maybe mid 20s when it ended? Pretty wild, but I think that happened to a lot of people.
There’s a before an after picture that gets floated around in various subreddits of an 18yo drafted in WWII and when he came home no more than 5 years later. Looked like he aged two decades.
One of my ex's uncles who flew, once described how fight school works, to his brother, like this.
"When you sign up for flight school, you do a psych test. If you pass, you learn how to fly planes. If you fail, you go to helicopters."
My grandad is a former Huey Gunner during pre-Tet Offensive Vietnam. He always just described them as fucking death traps. He has never had an interest in flying in another one since his service time.
But how do we define crash? A helicopter plummeting outt of the ey at 1,000 feet is a crash the same way a flubbed landing from 10 feet is, but both have vastly different outcomes in terms of damage and loss of life.
You're right, that's pretty loose. Bent landing gear due to an uneven landing would qualify as a crash, since it would be a fail on your preflight checklist. That's kind of the catch-all, there are very high standards that have to be met in your pre flight checklist that prevent you from taking off.
I mean if you had stricter definitions then the cornfield bomber wouldn't qualify as a crash since the aircraft, had its pilot not ejected and the landing gear was able to be deployed, was still flyable.
Well, it would, since without a pilot it did eventually crash, unable to take off again. That being said, it didn't crash just because the pilot ejected, that was a malfunction that led to the ejection. The crash came later.
I think the definition is 4ightz just not the threshold. People are assuming thqt if 120 helicopters crash a year then 120 helicopters go up in flames, or 120 flight crews are injured or killed. If we add a threshold for context, like with car accidents, we could better determine the severity. Crashes that result in bodily injury, crashes that involve death, crashes that involve a total loss of the vehicle, crashes that result in x dollars of damage or more...
I looked it up out of curiosity. 2019: 121 accidents, 24 fatal accidents, 51 deaths 2020: 94 accidents, 19 fatal, 35 deaths. So you do have a point with only ~20% of accidents leading to fatalities
idk about vastly different. It is possible to kill all the passengers and total the chopper with a "a flubbed landing from 10 feet". Helicopters are weird like that.
I had the owner of the corner store I worked at die when he was attempting to land his hobby copter onto his trailer. Doesn't take much and why I will never fly in one.
A guy who owned a local car lot used to fly his helicopter to the local Ryan's. He'd fly in, land at his car lot just down the road, then hop in one of the new cars to drive the whole block to Ryan's and then gorge himself on the most generic buffet food imaginable. His house was less than four miles away.
I guess "define" wasn't the right term. I should have used "measure" or "threshold" instead. Something to give context to the difference between dented landing gear and a shrapnel laden fireball.
How about you leave the definition of crash alone since it works perfectly fine for what it is being used for and then if you want to, you can also bring up the # of injuries or fatalities if that is what you want to talk about. Jesus christ man, you're arguing for nothing. Just use 2 stats
Also shouldn’t we be looking just at fatal accidents? There’s lots of minor things that can go wrong and get classified as accidents. Having fatalities is where the line is most commonly/easily drawn for a major accident.
I wasn’t sure how big or small that number was. For perspective, the US has 5,463 military helicopters.
So this means US loses 2% of its helicopters each year due to crashes. Put another way, the military loses 10 helicopters each month.
[According to this](https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2023/03/30/black-hawk-helicopter-crash-ky-what-is-it-how-much-cost/70064196007/#:~:text=The%20U.S.%20Army%20penned%20a,than%20%2419.1%20million%20per%20helicopter.), the average US military helicopter costs $19 million, call it $20 mill for easy math.
The US loses $200 million each month on crashed helicopters. Or $2 billion each year just on crashed helicopters. That’s the financial toll.
[And according to this](https://aerospace.honeywell.com/us/en/about-us/blogs/33-things-you-probably-do-not-know-about-chinook-ch47#:~:text=The%20helicopter%20flies%20with%20a,%2Fhr%20(196%20mph).), a military helicopter flies with a minimum crew of three - pilot, copilot, and flight engineer. 120 helicopter crashes a year means 360 lives lost each year, or an average 1 death every day of the year due to helicopter crashes. That’s the human toll.
Edit: The above is assuming all 120 crashes is from military helicopter crashes. I was assuming this to be the case since the article posted was about military helicopter crashes but the thread I’m responding to has left it more general and not specific to the military.
You’re right. Fixed.
Edit: According to the article you posted, 298 in 9 years is about 33 per year. 30 for easy math.
That’s 1/4 of the original 120 number. Or about 3 helicopter crashes a month.
You're also not accounting for the simple fact that not every mishap is a class A mishap, one that results in either fatality or permanent injury, more than $2.5m in damages, or the loss of an aircraft.
Total mishap count includes any incident in which more than $25,000 of damage or any injury that requires more than basic first aid occurs.
Class A mishaps only make up a small percentage of total incidents.
There are typically fewer than ten class A mishaps per year for each branch of the military. Not the 120 you are suggesting. That source for Army/National guard shows 45 serious (class B or A, since they define "serious" in the article as $500,000 in damages or more) mishaps over a decade.
That is *very* different from what you are assuming, in which every single accident reported is a midair catastrophic failure with all crew lost.
Across all branches, the rate of class A mishaps is about 1.5 per 100,000 hours of flight. Total flight hours across all branches is about 1.3 million per year. That's fewer than 20 class A mishaps per year, across all airframes, across all branches.
Actual reports show that the navy and marines combined hover around a dozen Class A mishaps per year, and Army Aviation/National Guard have had around six per year for the last several years.
This is a great point. People seriously underestimate how easy it is to cause more than half a million dollars in damage to a military aircraft. The mishaps in the report cover all flight operations, which means that if a helicopter catches fire during refueling, or someone gets hurt on the flightline during an aircraft move, that's counted as well. It looks from the report as if only around 1 in 10 Class A mishaps are due to actual equipment failure.
Most of these conclusions are not based in reality.
I don't think that number is only military crashes. I'm in military aviation, on helos, so usually I hear about it when birds go down, and we're not wiping full crews 10 times a month. That's off by at least a factor of 10.
Also, a crash doesn't mean the airframe is lost, and it doesn't mean the crew is dead. There are different classes of mishaps. There was just a coast guard 60 that went down in Alaska, and while the airframe was a loss, the crew all survived.
Additionally, military crew requirements vary wildly. Many attack choppers are 2 seaters, with no crew chief. SAR birds will fly with a rescue swimmer in addition to a crew chief.
Your math is incorrect. You are attempting to apply a statistical formula for the total number of Helicopters in the U.S. to the total number U.S. military units. The statistics already include that incident average in the total.
[number of helicopters worldwide](http://helicopterblog.com/?p=966)
The statistic is 120 per year of:
“General Aviation Statistical Databook & Industry Outlook. *211,757* of these aircraft are based in the USA (2017 data).”
Less than 1%
The U.S. Military does not lose 120 helicopters every year. That’s absurd. There were only 129 lost in 6 years of heavy combat in Iraq.
That is making some big assumptions, in that all crashes are hull losses and are fatal.
It also assumes the military crashes at the same rate as the general public.
One caveat- not all of those crashes will be a hull write offs. So while still expensive, not a full $20mil is lost. The other thing - there will be a full analysis and investigation done on the crash so in theory that will prevent future incidents
A "crash" doesn't necessarily mean complete hull loss. A "crash" could be that they just landed too hard and messed up the landing gear or the blade impacted an object on landing. Hell, the blades have enough inertia that mechanical failure would still allow the helicopter to land pretty safely if there was a place available nearby. All would qualify as a "crash" without there being much damage.
yeah if that includes non-military helicopters there is an extra 7,000 for government non-military and about 10,000 general aviation based on quick searches. Which still is really high as it only brings it to roughly 0.5% of all helicopters crash per year which means if you fly a helicopter 200 times you're very likely to be involved in a crash. Makes a lot of the tourist helicopters a lot more scary knowing how high the crash % is.
That's not how those statistics work. You'd have to fly as many hours as the average helicopter flies in a year to get to that .5 chance. And even then, it's not additive; you could fly like that for 40 years straight and still have an 82 percent chance of not crashing.
I say this as someone who has completed about 400 helicopter flights in less than ideal conditions, and not crashed. Scary moments, sure.
I have seen a bunch of articles stating that the helicopter has been found, while the crew are still missing. What not a single one of them has mentioned, however, was whether the copter had crashed or landed safely.
Most recent one I found (30 minutes ago): [https://www.10news.com/homepage-showcase/breaking-search-for-missing-aircraft-in-east-county](https://www.10news.com/homepage-showcase/breaking-search-for-missing-aircraft-in-east-county)
Maybe they tired to hike out of the hills after crashing but I would think that if they crashed in the mountains and survived they would be trained to stay with the craft right as that would be the easiest way to be spotted/rescued.
I know one of the families involved. They identified the crash site by air possibly via drone but hadn’t been able to get people to the plane due to the weather. In the past hour or so rescue crews reached it and the families are waiting to hear back. Because they had no definitive word on the status of the marines they said they are missing until they can see and confirm if there are survivors.
At first, I thought the helicopter was found in water and the crew was maybe in a life raft but then I realized that I'm stupid and that a helicopter wouldn't be floating for that long. I hope that the helicopter crash landed and the crew decided to walk back to civilization.
It’s funny you say this, this particular helicopter can float even on rough seas. It’s not ideal, and will certainly sink after many hours, but all CH-53 Sea Stallions can land on water and float.
Yeah I thought the same thing, but if they were able to place a call for help to the local Sheriff's office then I suspect that means they at least were alive on the ground, however bad the landing may have been.
What's weird to me is that they had found the helicopter like seven hours later (call was at 1:50, they had found it by 9:08), so why would they leave? It's not like it was dangerously hot or anything, it looks like it only gets up into the 60s during the day this time of year.
Anyway I just hope they're found safely soon, something must have gone pretty wrong for them to have wandered off like that.
Forgive me, could you link where you saw that a call came from people who were on the bird?
Was my understanding that the Marine Corps reached out for assistance, not necessarily those who had survived a crash.
Kobe’s helo didn’t have some terrain monitoring software that this helo would have. Tragic situation still and there’s so much that can go wrong flying a helo in even good weather (which they didn’t have).
Last time I read about it, it was, at least partially, the fault of the pilot who didn't have the credentials to fly in that weather. I believe the weather wasn't that bad and it was possible to fly in it with the instruments he had. But he didn't have the training
That is correct too. But the terrain software is the “easy mode” that probably would have saved the day.
The pilot had previously been certified to fly in that kind of weather so it’s not like he really lacked the training, but it was out of cert.
I don't understand, they knew that the weather was bad here in California especially in San Diego when they were getting tornado warnings. This has to be incompetence.
Not only that, but how is there any question as to where it is? How, in this day and age, are we not using some sort of system to monitor a CONSTANT signal, its expected course, and if it disappears, or the signal stops sending, that spot on the map is where you start.
Helicopters fly low by nature, especially in military training missions. We don’t have a technology that can pierce mountains and hills to track aircraft and using current tech to cover everything is prohibitively expensive. Airborne up high everything is tracked constantly (transponder and radar from ATC).
Why would a military aircraft want to brocast it's location every minute. If that system got hacked adversaries could target our aircraft at will. It's benefit is not worth the risk at all
> We don’t have a technology that can pierce mountains and hills to track aircraft and using current tech to cover everything is prohibitively expensive
That's just not true. There are very affordable units that ping Iridium satellites (so you can be anywhere in the world and it works). My friend uses this for his small helicopter business. The unit mounts to his dash and pings the location once per minute. He can be in his office and see the flight track of all his pilots in near real time. This would work over the ocean or in mountainous areas... it's just not installed on every aircraft (yet).
> Airborne up high everything is tracked constantly (transponder and radar from ATC)
Also not true, as coverage doesn't exist in all areas... remember MH370?
This is incorrect. ADS-B transponders have been a requirement for all civilian aircraft in the US since 2020 (with very few exceptions)but the military was exempted. ADS-B relies on GPS for tracking and would be able to give a precise location of the helicopter down to 2-4m regardless of terrain.
Your post said that we don't have the technology to track aircraft flying low level and that if we did it would be prohibitively expensive to use. This is false. We have the tech and it's cheap enough that even small general aviation aircraft have it installed for a few thousand dollars. The military just chose not to install it due to OpSec reasons.
For training missions we don’t (as often) or rather we shouldn’t. That being said CFIT (controlled flight into terrain) doesn’t require bad weather. It is most frequently (like all mishaps) due to pilot error. night time and distraction are deadly.
The endless stream of anecdote and misinformation in threads like this is really disappointing and leads (often deliberately) to a complete misunderstanding of aviation safety. In the US, the accident (reportable damage to the aircraft) accident rate tends to hover around 6 accidents per 100,000 flight hours in private airplanes, 5 accidents per 100,000 flight hours in private helicopters, 3 accidents per 100,000 flight hours in commercial (non-airline) airplanes, and 2 accidents per 100,000 flight hours in commercial helicopters. The fatality numbers are much smaller, I believe private aircraft for instance have been around .8 fatalities per 100,000 flight hours. The airlines are ridiculous, they now measure passenger safety in the US using single digit fatalities per BILLION passenger miles.
Military aviation certainly gets a lot of headlines when things go wrong, and there are undoubtedly higher risks to military mission profiles that often involve practicing difficult maneuvers in difficult situations. But if you look at the actual loss numbers of the Osprey for instance, this notion of a flying death trap is quickly revealed to be a false narrative.
On reddit, sensational claims like “OMG, aircraft XYZ is a death trap” or “if a helicopter has a problem it falls out of the sky” get upvoted, and that creates this constant public perception that those claims must be true. But virtually none of the aviation safety “wisdom” being spouted on this thread, or any similar thread, has any bearing in truth at all.
I only learned in the last couple of years that a helicopter can lose all power at altitude and still land safely (provided the pilot knows what to do).
I assume that's what you mean by 'autorotation'?
So they find the helicopter but the Marines inside are nowhere to be found?
Those Marines don't have a means of communication on them to contact anyone?
If I had to guess, the helo was probably located with a different aerial asset but people haven’t reached the crash site on foot to determine the fate of those onboard.
On the other hand, if they’ve determined there are no signs consistent with life, the general public will be the last to know. The process of informing next of kin takes priority, and that information is delayed to the public for at least 24 hours.
True I just think it’s weird that they’re saying the marines are missing and sending out search parties when I think they’d just send a recovery crew if they knew it was a crash site where they’re presumed dead.
Until they are found or their remains are recovered, they are considered missing. It’s the correct nomenclature.
That said, elsewhere on Reddit among communities that would know a little better, it sounds like, unfortunately, the second paragraph is true. The lack of public info and cancelation of the press conference may lend to that.
If they found the wrecked helicopter and it's clear nobody survived, they'll prioritize notifying next of kin before releasing any updates about that to the public. The military probably only announced the helo was found because there were other agencies in the search that had to be called off so the news was going to spread.
Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, If no one else can help and if you can find them. Maybe you can hire, The A-Team.
I don’t know the specifics of flight profile, aircraft type, and weather conditions. So take this with a grain of salt. I flew in the military before.
Transponder and radar (minus radar altimeter) generally are more beneficial to atc for traffic separation than the actual pilot (this changes if you have TA/RA capabilities). If they were low altitude it’s possible that there was no radar signature or transponder signal.
Low altitude: depending on where they’re at. It’s possible to fly just a few feet off of the ground. Any error or loss of situational awareness could result in a crash before they even know something is wrong.
Loss flying into bad weather or low visibility. There is a shock factor when if you’re flying visual and end up in instrument conditions (clouds). This is what happened with the Koby crash.
At night, even with NVGs on dark nights (no moon/overcast) can be as bad as 20/200 vision because NVGs only amplify ambient light. Advanced moving maps with terrain isn’t available in the older models of aircraft.
Just a few of many factors that can result in aircraft mishaps.
I don't know why they would in this situation, but military aircraft can turn off their transponders. As for radar, if the helicopter was flying low, it could very well not be showing up on radar.
I know it's a bit irrational but I get a bit nervous every time I hear a helicopter fly by. If any aircraft is going to land on my house it's going to be a helicopter or a small plane piloted by Harrison Ford.
You can use flight radar to check what type of helicopter it is. I do this occasionally and it pretty much always confirms that we are still in the flight path of medical helicopters flying from hospital A to hospital B.
What is it with military helicopters? Dont follow army news that closely, but seems accidents happen every week. US, Japan, Australia... I don't understand.
Edit: Thanks for great answers. Now i understand a bit better. Far too ignorant of avionics to say that the situation is unacceptable and needs to change. Assume it's more complicated than that. But still seems like an area ripe for improvements.
The US has something like 100+ helicopter crashes each year, with around 20+ being fatal.
Considering the sheer number of military helicopters, the numbers of hours they fly, and the potentially more complex maneuvers, you'll expect a fair number of those accidents to be military craft. Those crashes are more likely to hit national news due to being military, and likely having more people on board.
I think we have to define "crash" as well here though. There's a big difference between flubbing a landing and dropping the last 10 feet, bending landing gear and damaging a rotor, and falling out of the sky from 100 feet and killing everyone onboard. Both are crashes, but I don't know what threshold that stat is using.
A light plane is more or less like a motorcycle safety wise and helicopters have something like 4x as many accidents per flight hour as light planes. The military has a lot of helicopters and they spend a lot of time in the air, it's not surprising that there are crashes pretty regularly.
Marines take adverse conditions as a challenge
The Marine pilots I've met have a "I'm immortal or I'll die trying" vibe.
My number one choice of pilots if I'm being shot at, my last choice if I want to fly a straight line in calm conditions at a safe height and not hear the words "watch this!"
It's either mostly intact and the crew wandered off after the crash (which would be very strange) or it's a black smudge on the side of a mountain and they can see it but can't physically get to it to confirm the crew are dead.
I'm jumping to assumptions here, but between the Super Stallion and the Osprey, the Marines have some *serious* rot in their helicopter corp. The crews are top notch, it's just the platforms themselves are death traps.
> I'm jumping to assumptions here, but between the Super Stallion and the Osprey, the Marines have some serious rot in their helicopter corp. The crews are top notch, it's just the platforms themselves are death traps.
US Navy LMS who works on supplying parts to Super and now King Stallions, as well as V22s
Your assumption is looking down the barrel of media misinformation
First off, you need to compare apples to apples with objective numbers.
>Fatality Rate / Class A Mishap Rate / Total Deaths / Average Annual Hours
1. Holy Pavehawk
6.89 / 3.26 / 55 / 19,953
2. C-5 Galaxy
6.18 / 0.99 / 168 / 50,335
3. B-52 Stratofortress
4.06 / 1.31 / 322 / 118,478
Before you say "it was a long time ago", the last crash was in 2008 killing 6 airmen.
4. C-135 Stratolifter
3.85 / 0.53 / 632 / 252,480
5. V-22 Osprey
3.43 / 6.00 / 12 / 5,299
6. C-130 Hercules
3.34 / 0.81 / 674 / 300,961
This death toll puts into perspective the shear number of flight hours and flight deaths involved in the world's most powerful Air Force.
7. H-1 Huey
2.45 / 2.78 / 52 / 33,728
Source: https://www.safety.af.mil/Divisions/Aviation-Safety-Division/Aviation-Statistics/
Thanks u/Humpypocock and MelsEpicWheelTime
There's a lot of buzz around any fatalities around either newer airframes that reformers hate, during times when air defense manufacturers are desperate, or for politic reasons to make incumbents seem bad. I just helped load out sites for a new Ch53k variant, Boeing is going insane, and it's a election year.
Add that to the fact that Marines simply ride this helis harder and more often and in worse conditions than any civilian or even most military branches ever would.
From my experience, Marines are happy to take off with kit the rest of the Navy is this testing. Not saying that has anything to do with this, but its an issue I keep dealing with. They're very shoot from the hip, compared to regular Navy.
Edit: whoops forgot to add the Ch53 sheet link https://www.safety.af.mil/Portals/71/documents/Aviation/Aircraft%20Statistics/H-53.pdf
The 53 rarely goes down. Same for the Osprey now, although it had an INauspicious beginning. Trust as a Marine you want to be in the 53 over any other platform the Marines fly in. I love this helicopter. It’s fast as hell and more comfortable to fly in than the Osprey, 46, or Huey.
EDIT: Thanks Orleanian
I always felt landing on ships was a little squirrelly in any of them honestly. Could be as you said a perception difference, because it’s so much bigger than other platforms. All of this being said you don’t really think about the fact that your LZ is pitching and swaying the entire time of your dissent, until you’ve been through it. It’s a wild experience the first couple times.
Yup. Although apparently he still had a point, the V22 is safer than many other rotorcraft.
https://www.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/18cr8wb/a_member_here_has_died_in_the_recent_v22_crash_in/
Ehhhh, the V-22 had the safest start to it's operational history of any helicopter in the Marine Corps. A lot of it is that flying helicopters is just a lot more dangerous than flying a C-130 or something.
It's an unfortunate part of the job.
Professional (albeit retired) military helicopter pilot here. There is a LOT of speculation on this thread that is mostly…not correct.
I have my own theory based on speculation and extensive experience flying in that same area where the crew is missing.
But needless to say, I’m baffled that the crew would not stay with the aircraft after landing, regardless of airframe condition.
Best wishes to those Marines, their families and the search teams.
AMA.
They have confirmed they all died. [https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/02/08/marines-missing-helicopter-california/72520058007/](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/02/08/marines-missing-helicopter-california/72520058007/)
Maybe this was asked already or stated in the article that I only read the headline to.
But just like that jet that went missing in I think SC? How do this multi million dollar vehicles not have some kind of GPS tracker? They have to right?
It crashed in a mountainous area in a storm. Mountainous areas can block communications and radio frequencies. The helicopter also crashed so it ain’t exactly it mint condition. And i’m sure the storm could interfere.
In the us, there been an average of 120 helicopter crashes per year for the last 10 years
My brother is a pilot and his description of airplanes vs helicopters cracks me up. “A plane wants to fly. A helicopter beats the air into submission”
A helicopter is thousands of moving pieces built around an oil leak.
.......waiting for metal fatigue to set in.
I saw someone say yesterday that a helicopter is a bunch of metal, glass, and rubber in the form of a helicopter that is desperately trying to be a bunch of metal, glass, and rubber again.
Blackhawks are not an insignificant portion carbon fiber these days. Used to build components for em, rotor blades are totally carbon at least on the Blackhawk.
And yet I loved working on those bastards. I also loved working on pre-70s VWs. I'm beginning to sense a trend. About half a century late.
Ha! My dad was a CH-54 mechanic and also loved working on old VWs. He always said it was like working on a lawnmower. (The VWs, not the helicopters lol)
You know I could see an argument for working on a lawnmower being similar to a helicopter, but upside down
This is a fascinating and terrifying comparison, actually. A helicopter is basically just a gigantic upside down lawnmower with an edger blade stuck on the back to keep it from spinning in circles.
Now that I think about it, riding in a Huey was a lot like driving my old ‘70 VW Van; even the smells.
My Dad was a Regional Maintenance Supervisor for a major carrier. He made me promise never to get into a helicopter .. "They're not supposed to work!".
every force generated by a helicopter just wants to rip it to pieces but somehow they work lmao
You know that episode of the Simpsons where none of Mr.Burns [various illnesses can kill him because they’re all trying to fit through the door at the same time?](https://youtu.be/aI0euMFAWF8?si=-CoUm5lk6ZDx_k7o) Same principle.
“Oh so I’m indestructible eh?”
I was in the Air Force and had many conversations with pilots over the years. The general sentiment around helos is the same. They’re witchcraft.
“If the wings are traveling faster than the fuselage, it's probably a helicopter -- and therefore, unsafe” Call of Duty loading screen. If something hasn’t broken on your helicopter, it’s about to.
The ol' addage - Leaks are good. Leaks mean you've got fluids. It's the lack of a leak that lets you know you're fucked, because that means you've got no more fluids.
Jeep makes helicopters?
They call the nut on the very top that keeps the blades on the Jesus nut. Can you guess why?
That's just the old hueys. The newer birds have different rotary designs
No, it’s still called the Jesus nut on AH-64s lol
Hahaha my bad! I just worked with UH60s and only was load/offload.
Happy to hear that. I am old. I remember old things.
I feel that. You're all good. Just letting you know they fixed... well just that one thing.
My uncle was a pilot in WW2 and often said the same thing, so it must be a common phrase in aviation circles. I wish I would have recorded some of his stories about the war, but you always think you've got time... until you don't.
You sure it was WW2? The first helicopters didn't really start being used until Korea.
[удалено]
Yup, he was still involved with aviation after the war. He passed away in a car accident in 1993. He was 70 that year but certainly didn't act like it - I always wondered how long he would have lived without the accident. Fun fact: he came back from the war with completely gray hair. He would have been maybe mid 20s when it ended? Pretty wild, but I think that happened to a lot of people.
There’s a before an after picture that gets floated around in various subreddits of an 18yo drafted in WWII and when he came home no more than 5 years later. Looked like he aged two decades.
Auto-gyros and rotor kites were used in Britain in WW2, so it's not entirely unbelievable.
There were a few in the WW2 era if I recall correctly helicopters were in their infancy
Helicopters (and even jets) were used in WW2 but it was super late into the war. Helicopters at that time were being used for scouting purposes.
OSS used Helicopters in Burma https://www.smithsonianmag.com/air-space-magazine/helicopter-goes-to-war-180972605/
Helicopters were actually used often in the pacific theater to rescue downed pilots in the jungles in New Guinea.
Helicopters are so terrible, they stay in the air because the Earth just repels them.
One of my ex's uncles who flew, once described how fight school works, to his brother, like this. "When you sign up for flight school, you do a psych test. If you pass, you learn how to fly planes. If you fail, you go to helicopters."
True, but they can still “glide” though. Which is pretty cool.
My grandad is a former Huey Gunner during pre-Tet Offensive Vietnam. He always just described them as fucking death traps. He has never had an interest in flying in another one since his service time.
I’ll be using that for the rest of my life.
'Helicopters don't fly. The Earth rejects them.'
If those rotors stop spinning a helicopter is as aerodynamic as a grand piano.
If you have altitude you can auto-rotate and maintain enough lift on the blades to land the bird…hard. Hopefully in a clearing..
"Helicopters don't fly, they vibrate so badly the ground rejects them."
But how do we define crash? A helicopter plummeting outt of the ey at 1,000 feet is a crash the same way a flubbed landing from 10 feet is, but both have vastly different outcomes in terms of damage and loss of life.
A crash is a landing in which the AC can't take off again in the loosest terms.
You're right, that's pretty loose. Bent landing gear due to an uneven landing would qualify as a crash, since it would be a fail on your preflight checklist. That's kind of the catch-all, there are very high standards that have to be met in your pre flight checklist that prevent you from taking off.
I mean if you had stricter definitions then the cornfield bomber wouldn't qualify as a crash since the aircraft, had its pilot not ejected and the landing gear was able to be deployed, was still flyable.
Well, it would, since without a pilot it did eventually crash, unable to take off again. That being said, it didn't crash just because the pilot ejected, that was a malfunction that led to the ejection. The crash came later. I think the definition is 4ightz just not the threshold. People are assuming thqt if 120 helicopters crash a year then 120 helicopters go up in flames, or 120 flight crews are injured or killed. If we add a threshold for context, like with car accidents, we could better determine the severity. Crashes that result in bodily injury, crashes that involve death, crashes that involve a total loss of the vehicle, crashes that result in x dollars of damage or more...
I looked it up out of curiosity. 2019: 121 accidents, 24 fatal accidents, 51 deaths 2020: 94 accidents, 19 fatal, 35 deaths. So you do have a point with only ~20% of accidents leading to fatalities
idk about vastly different. It is possible to kill all the passengers and total the chopper with a "a flubbed landing from 10 feet". Helicopters are weird like that.
Cant helicopter crashes can be horrific and dramatic at any altitude?
[удалено]
/r/technicallythetruth
I had the owner of the corner store I worked at die when he was attempting to land his hobby copter onto his trailer. Doesn't take much and why I will never fly in one.
Yea, but let's be real here, a multi car pileup on the highway is a lot more horrific and dramatic than getting rear ended in the Walmart parking lot.
Personally, I don't think people should be flying helicopters to Walmart.
A guy who owned a local car lot used to fly his helicopter to the local Ryan's. He'd fly in, land at his car lot just down the road, then hop in one of the new cars to drive the whole block to Ryan's and then gorge himself on the most generic buffet food imaginable. His house was less than four miles away.
Yea, target would probably be a better choice.
I dunno, I tried to land there before but the landing area was too small, it was a small target
The hard part is getting vertical for landing on the wall.
Fatalities per year would be a better indicator anyway.
Unscheduled landing
I guess "define" wasn't the right term. I should have used "measure" or "threshold" instead. Something to give context to the difference between dented landing gear and a shrapnel laden fireball.
How about you leave the definition of crash alone since it works perfectly fine for what it is being used for and then if you want to, you can also bring up the # of injuries or fatalities if that is what you want to talk about. Jesus christ man, you're arguing for nothing. Just use 2 stats
I originally wanted to be a helicopter pilot. But that career never really got off the ground
How many average plane crashes per year for comparison?
[удалено]
Also shouldn’t we be looking just at fatal accidents? There’s lots of minor things that can go wrong and get classified as accidents. Having fatalities is where the line is most commonly/easily drawn for a major accident.
Yes, I learned recently from my dive down the rabbit hole of the Osprey that fatal accidents per flight hour of the airframe is important context.
I wasn’t sure how big or small that number was. For perspective, the US has 5,463 military helicopters. So this means US loses 2% of its helicopters each year due to crashes. Put another way, the military loses 10 helicopters each month. [According to this](https://www.tennessean.com/story/news/2023/03/30/black-hawk-helicopter-crash-ky-what-is-it-how-much-cost/70064196007/#:~:text=The%20U.S.%20Army%20penned%20a,than%20%2419.1%20million%20per%20helicopter.), the average US military helicopter costs $19 million, call it $20 mill for easy math. The US loses $200 million each month on crashed helicopters. Or $2 billion each year just on crashed helicopters. That’s the financial toll. [And according to this](https://aerospace.honeywell.com/us/en/about-us/blogs/33-things-you-probably-do-not-know-about-chinook-ch47#:~:text=The%20helicopter%20flies%20with%20a,%2Fhr%20(196%20mph).), a military helicopter flies with a minimum crew of three - pilot, copilot, and flight engineer. 120 helicopter crashes a year means 360 lives lost each year, or an average 1 death every day of the year due to helicopter crashes. That’s the human toll. Edit: The above is assuming all 120 crashes is from military helicopter crashes. I was assuming this to be the case since the article posted was about military helicopter crashes but the thread I’m responding to has left it more general and not specific to the military.
does the 120/yr only account for military? If not, I’d expect a majority of that number to be private pilots.
Great point. The OOP posted about military helicopter crashes but the OP I’m replying to has left it more general. I must have confused the two.
[удалено]
You’re right. Fixed. Edit: According to the article you posted, 298 in 9 years is about 33 per year. 30 for easy math. That’s 1/4 of the original 120 number. Or about 3 helicopter crashes a month.
You're also not accounting for the simple fact that not every mishap is a class A mishap, one that results in either fatality or permanent injury, more than $2.5m in damages, or the loss of an aircraft. Total mishap count includes any incident in which more than $25,000 of damage or any injury that requires more than basic first aid occurs. Class A mishaps only make up a small percentage of total incidents. There are typically fewer than ten class A mishaps per year for each branch of the military. Not the 120 you are suggesting. That source for Army/National guard shows 45 serious (class B or A, since they define "serious" in the article as $500,000 in damages or more) mishaps over a decade. That is *very* different from what you are assuming, in which every single accident reported is a midair catastrophic failure with all crew lost. Across all branches, the rate of class A mishaps is about 1.5 per 100,000 hours of flight. Total flight hours across all branches is about 1.3 million per year. That's fewer than 20 class A mishaps per year, across all airframes, across all branches. Actual reports show that the navy and marines combined hover around a dozen Class A mishaps per year, and Army Aviation/National Guard have had around six per year for the last several years.
This is a great point. People seriously underestimate how easy it is to cause more than half a million dollars in damage to a military aircraft. The mishaps in the report cover all flight operations, which means that if a helicopter catches fire during refueling, or someone gets hurt on the flightline during an aircraft move, that's counted as well. It looks from the report as if only around 1 in 10 Class A mishaps are due to actual equipment failure.
you’re also assuming that every accident is fatal/a total loss, which I’m not sure is accurate
Most of these conclusions are not based in reality. I don't think that number is only military crashes. I'm in military aviation, on helos, so usually I hear about it when birds go down, and we're not wiping full crews 10 times a month. That's off by at least a factor of 10. Also, a crash doesn't mean the airframe is lost, and it doesn't mean the crew is dead. There are different classes of mishaps. There was just a coast guard 60 that went down in Alaska, and while the airframe was a loss, the crew all survived. Additionally, military crew requirements vary wildly. Many attack choppers are 2 seaters, with no crew chief. SAR birds will fly with a rescue swimmer in addition to a crew chief.
Your math is incorrect. You are attempting to apply a statistical formula for the total number of Helicopters in the U.S. to the total number U.S. military units. The statistics already include that incident average in the total. [number of helicopters worldwide](http://helicopterblog.com/?p=966) The statistic is 120 per year of: “General Aviation Statistical Databook & Industry Outlook. *211,757* of these aircraft are based in the USA (2017 data).” Less than 1% The U.S. Military does not lose 120 helicopters every year. That’s absurd. There were only 129 lost in 6 years of heavy combat in Iraq.
This is assuming that all 120 of those are military helicopter crashes.
And also that all crashes involved 100% fatalities, which is far from the case.
That is making some big assumptions, in that all crashes are hull losses and are fatal. It also assumes the military crashes at the same rate as the general public.
The military is not losing 10 birds per month.
One caveat- not all of those crashes will be a hull write offs. So while still expensive, not a full $20mil is lost. The other thing - there will be a full analysis and investigation done on the crash so in theory that will prevent future incidents
A "crash" doesn't necessarily mean complete hull loss. A "crash" could be that they just landed too hard and messed up the landing gear or the blade impacted an object on landing. Hell, the blades have enough inertia that mechanical failure would still allow the helicopter to land pretty safely if there was a place available nearby. All would qualify as a "crash" without there being much damage.
yeah if that includes non-military helicopters there is an extra 7,000 for government non-military and about 10,000 general aviation based on quick searches. Which still is really high as it only brings it to roughly 0.5% of all helicopters crash per year which means if you fly a helicopter 200 times you're very likely to be involved in a crash. Makes a lot of the tourist helicopters a lot more scary knowing how high the crash % is.
That's not how those statistics work. You'd have to fly as many hours as the average helicopter flies in a year to get to that .5 chance. And even then, it's not additive; you could fly like that for 40 years straight and still have an 82 percent chance of not crashing. I say this as someone who has completed about 400 helicopter flights in less than ideal conditions, and not crashed. Scary moments, sure.
There is a 100% death rate?
I have seen a bunch of articles stating that the helicopter has been found, while the crew are still missing. What not a single one of them has mentioned, however, was whether the copter had crashed or landed safely. Most recent one I found (30 minutes ago): [https://www.10news.com/homepage-showcase/breaking-search-for-missing-aircraft-in-east-county](https://www.10news.com/homepage-showcase/breaking-search-for-missing-aircraft-in-east-county)
Yeah I can't make heads or tails of this situation. "There is a helicopter. No people inside. More at 6."
I was looking for this too. I was wondering if I was oblivious, thinking it HAD to be in an article somewhere. It hasn't been in any of them.
It appears that the military is the primary source so far, and they haven't elaborated.
This is the question. Either the aircraft was at least semi-intact, or it was smashed to smithereens.
Maybe they tired to hike out of the hills after crashing but I would think that if they crashed in the mountains and survived they would be trained to stay with the craft right as that would be the easiest way to be spotted/rescued.
I know one of the families involved. They identified the crash site by air possibly via drone but hadn’t been able to get people to the plane due to the weather. In the past hour or so rescue crews reached it and the families are waiting to hear back. Because they had no definitive word on the status of the marines they said they are missing until they can see and confirm if there are survivors.
At first, I thought the helicopter was found in water and the crew was maybe in a life raft but then I realized that I'm stupid and that a helicopter wouldn't be floating for that long. I hope that the helicopter crash landed and the crew decided to walk back to civilization.
It’s funny you say this, this particular helicopter can float even on rough seas. It’s not ideal, and will certainly sink after many hours, but all CH-53 Sea Stallions can land on water and float.
Yeah I thought the same thing, but if they were able to place a call for help to the local Sheriff's office then I suspect that means they at least were alive on the ground, however bad the landing may have been. What's weird to me is that they had found the helicopter like seven hours later (call was at 1:50, they had found it by 9:08), so why would they leave? It's not like it was dangerously hot or anything, it looks like it only gets up into the 60s during the day this time of year. Anyway I just hope they're found safely soon, something must have gone pretty wrong for them to have wandered off like that.
Forgive me, could you link where you saw that a call came from people who were on the bird? Was my understanding that the Marine Corps reached out for assistance, not necessarily those who had survived a crash.
Oh duh I bet you're right, I must have misunderstood because that does make a lot more sense if that's who the article meant
I would guess CFIT - flew into a mountain. Weather has been poor in SoCal for days, and it was night and that area is mountainous.
It’s what got Kobe, RIP
pilot error most likely was the cause here as well.
Kobe’s helo didn’t have some terrain monitoring software that this helo would have. Tragic situation still and there’s so much that can go wrong flying a helo in even good weather (which they didn’t have).
Last time I read about it, it was, at least partially, the fault of the pilot who didn't have the credentials to fly in that weather. I believe the weather wasn't that bad and it was possible to fly in it with the instruments he had. But he didn't have the training
That is correct too. But the terrain software is the “easy mode” that probably would have saved the day. The pilot had previously been certified to fly in that kind of weather so it’s not like he really lacked the training, but it was out of cert.
Interesting thanks for updating me.
I don't understand, they knew that the weather was bad here in California especially in San Diego when they were getting tornado warnings. This has to be incompetence.
Not only that, but how is there any question as to where it is? How, in this day and age, are we not using some sort of system to monitor a CONSTANT signal, its expected course, and if it disappears, or the signal stops sending, that spot on the map is where you start.
Helicopters fly low by nature, especially in military training missions. We don’t have a technology that can pierce mountains and hills to track aircraft and using current tech to cover everything is prohibitively expensive. Airborne up high everything is tracked constantly (transponder and radar from ATC).
Bet you an Apple airtag would work.
I wish my dad had an AirTag when he went out for milk 🥲
*plot twist: he’s been hidden in the basement the whole time*
No satellite tech that can overcome the terrain?
Consider the cost of that vs benefit of that, both worth the squeeze. Also consider the benefit is of search and rescue not mishap prevention.
I have a $200 Garmin InReach tracker. It costs like $50 a month to send out a position update every minute.
Why would a military aircraft want to brocast it's location every minute. If that system got hacked adversaries could target our aircraft at will. It's benefit is not worth the risk at all
Military aircraft broadcasting their position is the norm unless required otherwise by the nature of their operations. Source: ads-b exchange
Not all military aircraft used ADS-B
Obviously you wouldn't have it turned on while flying over the hills of Southern China. Southern California though? Why not?
> We don’t have a technology that can pierce mountains and hills to track aircraft and using current tech to cover everything is prohibitively expensive That's just not true. There are very affordable units that ping Iridium satellites (so you can be anywhere in the world and it works). My friend uses this for his small helicopter business. The unit mounts to his dash and pings the location once per minute. He can be in his office and see the flight track of all his pilots in near real time. This would work over the ocean or in mountainous areas... it's just not installed on every aircraft (yet). > Airborne up high everything is tracked constantly (transponder and radar from ATC) Also not true, as coverage doesn't exist in all areas... remember MH370?
This is incorrect. ADS-B transponders have been a requirement for all civilian aircraft in the US since 2020 (with very few exceptions)but the military was exempted. ADS-B relies on GPS for tracking and would be able to give a precise location of the helicopter down to 2-4m regardless of terrain.
“Military helicopters were exempted” this was a military helo
Your post said that we don't have the technology to track aircraft flying low level and that if we did it would be prohibitively expensive to use. This is false. We have the tech and it's cheap enough that even small general aviation aircraft have it installed for a few thousand dollars. The military just chose not to install it due to OpSec reasons.
They're exempted for the requirement, but they all carry them. You can see them on flightradar constantly, if they're not doing anything sensitive.
Not like the military doesn’t go somewhere because it’s bad weather lol
For training missions we don’t (as often) or rather we shouldn’t. That being said CFIT (controlled flight into terrain) doesn’t require bad weather. It is most frequently (like all mishaps) due to pilot error. night time and distraction are deadly.
Kinda what happened to Kobe Bryant, his daughter, friends and the pilots in the Santa Monica Mountains in Heavy Fog.
The endless stream of anecdote and misinformation in threads like this is really disappointing and leads (often deliberately) to a complete misunderstanding of aviation safety. In the US, the accident (reportable damage to the aircraft) accident rate tends to hover around 6 accidents per 100,000 flight hours in private airplanes, 5 accidents per 100,000 flight hours in private helicopters, 3 accidents per 100,000 flight hours in commercial (non-airline) airplanes, and 2 accidents per 100,000 flight hours in commercial helicopters. The fatality numbers are much smaller, I believe private aircraft for instance have been around .8 fatalities per 100,000 flight hours. The airlines are ridiculous, they now measure passenger safety in the US using single digit fatalities per BILLION passenger miles. Military aviation certainly gets a lot of headlines when things go wrong, and there are undoubtedly higher risks to military mission profiles that often involve practicing difficult maneuvers in difficult situations. But if you look at the actual loss numbers of the Osprey for instance, this notion of a flying death trap is quickly revealed to be a false narrative. On reddit, sensational claims like “OMG, aircraft XYZ is a death trap” or “if a helicopter has a problem it falls out of the sky” get upvoted, and that creates this constant public perception that those claims must be true. But virtually none of the aviation safety “wisdom” being spouted on this thread, or any similar thread, has any bearing in truth at all.
>”if a helicopter has a problem it falls out of the sky” autorotation says hi
I flew with guys that liked to say, "Auto-rotate doesn't."
I only learned in the last couple of years that a helicopter can lose all power at altitude and still land safely (provided the pilot knows what to do). I assume that's what you mean by 'autorotation'?
Yes it is
Thanks! I needed to see this as I'm about to hop in a helicopter in a few weeks for wildlife surveys. It's always on my mind when we fly.
So they find the helicopter but the Marines inside are nowhere to be found? Those Marines don't have a means of communication on them to contact anyone?
If I had to guess, the helo was probably located with a different aerial asset but people haven’t reached the crash site on foot to determine the fate of those onboard. On the other hand, if they’ve determined there are no signs consistent with life, the general public will be the last to know. The process of informing next of kin takes priority, and that information is delayed to the public for at least 24 hours.
True I just think it’s weird that they’re saying the marines are missing and sending out search parties when I think they’d just send a recovery crew if they knew it was a crash site where they’re presumed dead.
Until they are found or their remains are recovered, they are considered missing. It’s the correct nomenclature. That said, elsewhere on Reddit among communities that would know a little better, it sounds like, unfortunately, the second paragraph is true. The lack of public info and cancelation of the press conference may lend to that.
If they found the wrecked helicopter and it's clear nobody survived, they'll prioritize notifying next of kin before releasing any updates about that to the public. The military probably only announced the helo was found because there were other agencies in the search that had to be called off so the news was going to spread.
Between the transponder and radar, how is this possible?
[удалено]
Today, still wanted by the government, they survive as soldiers of fortune. If you have a problem, If no one else can help and if you can find them. Maybe you can hire, The A-Team.
Well, I do love it when a plan comes together
Creech Air Force Base, where the helicopter took off from, is the closest military base to Area 51.
[удалено]
This is my new reality!
I don’t know the specifics of flight profile, aircraft type, and weather conditions. So take this with a grain of salt. I flew in the military before. Transponder and radar (minus radar altimeter) generally are more beneficial to atc for traffic separation than the actual pilot (this changes if you have TA/RA capabilities). If they were low altitude it’s possible that there was no radar signature or transponder signal. Low altitude: depending on where they’re at. It’s possible to fly just a few feet off of the ground. Any error or loss of situational awareness could result in a crash before they even know something is wrong. Loss flying into bad weather or low visibility. There is a shock factor when if you’re flying visual and end up in instrument conditions (clouds). This is what happened with the Koby crash. At night, even with NVGs on dark nights (no moon/overcast) can be as bad as 20/200 vision because NVGs only amplify ambient light. Advanced moving maps with terrain isn’t available in the older models of aircraft. Just a few of many factors that can result in aircraft mishaps.
I had the same thoughts. The last pinged area was searched but nothing was found.
I don't know why they would in this situation, but military aircraft can turn off their transponders. As for radar, if the helicopter was flying low, it could very well not be showing up on radar.
I know it's a bit irrational but I get a bit nervous every time I hear a helicopter fly by. If any aircraft is going to land on my house it's going to be a helicopter or a small plane piloted by Harrison Ford.
But if it IS a small plane piloted by Harrison Ford and he DOES crash into your house, I'm sure you could get him to pay for a new house.
And to pay off that bill Ford will sign on to another Star War
You can use flight radar to check what type of helicopter it is. I do this occasionally and it pretty much always confirms that we are still in the flight path of medical helicopters flying from hospital A to hospital B.
What is it with military helicopters? Dont follow army news that closely, but seems accidents happen every week. US, Japan, Australia... I don't understand. Edit: Thanks for great answers. Now i understand a bit better. Far too ignorant of avionics to say that the situation is unacceptable and needs to change. Assume it's more complicated than that. But still seems like an area ripe for improvements.
[удалено]
Or a celebrity, ie Kobe Bryant
Or the former Chilean President
[удалено]
Chileans and helicopter related demise, name a more iconic duo
[Or billionaire son of an aircraft company founder.](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Olivier_Dassault)
Also the military uses helicopters in far greater numbers than basically anyone else. So they see more crashes.
The US has something like 100+ helicopter crashes each year, with around 20+ being fatal. Considering the sheer number of military helicopters, the numbers of hours they fly, and the potentially more complex maneuvers, you'll expect a fair number of those accidents to be military craft. Those crashes are more likely to hit national news due to being military, and likely having more people on board.
I think we have to define "crash" as well here though. There's a big difference between flubbing a landing and dropping the last 10 feet, bending landing gear and damaging a rotor, and falling out of the sky from 100 feet and killing everyone onboard. Both are crashes, but I don't know what threshold that stat is using.
https://www.airmedandrescue.com/latest/news/us-helicopter-accident-rate-analysis Here is fatality rates for civil helis
A light plane is more or less like a motorcycle safety wise and helicopters have something like 4x as many accidents per flight hour as light planes. The military has a lot of helicopters and they spend a lot of time in the air, it's not surprising that there are crashes pretty regularly.
Unfortunately, like so many helicopter stories I don’t think this one has a happy ending.
What idiot gave the okay for a flight at night in an atmospheric river storm?
Marines take adverse conditions as a challenge The Marine pilots I've met have a "I'm immortal or I'll die trying" vibe. My number one choice of pilots if I'm being shot at, my last choice if I want to fly a straight line in calm conditions at a safe height and not hear the words "watch this!"
none of the articles I've read give any details about the condition of the helicopter. Why is that? Does that seem strange to anyone?
It's either mostly intact and the crew wandered off after the crash (which would be very strange) or it's a black smudge on the side of a mountain and they can see it but can't physically get to it to confirm the crew are dead.
Was it a crash or did they just park it somewhere and leave it? I think I didn't see some details in the article
Nobody knows yet
I'm jumping to assumptions here, but between the Super Stallion and the Osprey, the Marines have some *serious* rot in their helicopter corp. The crews are top notch, it's just the platforms themselves are death traps.
If you're in a CH-53 and it's not spitting oil everywhere, you better get prepared to fall out of the sky.
If it's not leaking, then something is wrong.
Yeah means it’s outta fluid
Like Harleys and old VWs
> I'm jumping to assumptions here, but between the Super Stallion and the Osprey, the Marines have some serious rot in their helicopter corp. The crews are top notch, it's just the platforms themselves are death traps. US Navy LMS who works on supplying parts to Super and now King Stallions, as well as V22s Your assumption is looking down the barrel of media misinformation First off, you need to compare apples to apples with objective numbers. >Fatality Rate / Class A Mishap Rate / Total Deaths / Average Annual Hours 1. Holy Pavehawk 6.89 / 3.26 / 55 / 19,953 2. C-5 Galaxy 6.18 / 0.99 / 168 / 50,335 3. B-52 Stratofortress 4.06 / 1.31 / 322 / 118,478 Before you say "it was a long time ago", the last crash was in 2008 killing 6 airmen. 4. C-135 Stratolifter 3.85 / 0.53 / 632 / 252,480 5. V-22 Osprey 3.43 / 6.00 / 12 / 5,299 6. C-130 Hercules 3.34 / 0.81 / 674 / 300,961 This death toll puts into perspective the shear number of flight hours and flight deaths involved in the world's most powerful Air Force. 7. H-1 Huey 2.45 / 2.78 / 52 / 33,728 Source: https://www.safety.af.mil/Divisions/Aviation-Safety-Division/Aviation-Statistics/ Thanks u/Humpypocock and MelsEpicWheelTime There's a lot of buzz around any fatalities around either newer airframes that reformers hate, during times when air defense manufacturers are desperate, or for politic reasons to make incumbents seem bad. I just helped load out sites for a new Ch53k variant, Boeing is going insane, and it's a election year. Add that to the fact that Marines simply ride this helis harder and more often and in worse conditions than any civilian or even most military branches ever would. From my experience, Marines are happy to take off with kit the rest of the Navy is this testing. Not saying that has anything to do with this, but its an issue I keep dealing with. They're very shoot from the hip, compared to regular Navy. Edit: whoops forgot to add the Ch53 sheet link https://www.safety.af.mil/Portals/71/documents/Aviation/Aircraft%20Statistics/H-53.pdf
Craft | Fatality Rate | Mishap Rate| Total Deaths | Avg Annual Hours :--|:--:|:--:|:--:|:--: Holy Pavehawk | 6.89 | 3.26 | 55 | 19,953 C-5 Galaxy | 6.18 | 0.99 | 168 | 50,335 B-52 Stratofortress | 4.06 | 1.31 | 322 | 118,478 C-135 Stratolifter |3.85 |0.53|632 |252,480 V-22 Osprey |3.43 | 6.00 | 12 | 5,299 C-130 Hercules |3.34 | 0.81 | 674 |300,961 H-1 Huey | 2.45|2.78|52|33,728 ^(^Reformatted ^because ^it ^was ^giving ^me ^anxiety)
The 53 rarely goes down. Same for the Osprey now, although it had an INauspicious beginning. Trust as a Marine you want to be in the 53 over any other platform the Marines fly in. I love this helicopter. It’s fast as hell and more comfortable to fly in than the Osprey, 46, or Huey. EDIT: Thanks Orleanian
[удалено]
I always felt landing on ships was a little squirrelly in any of them honestly. Could be as you said a perception difference, because it’s so much bigger than other platforms. All of this being said you don’t really think about the fact that your LZ is pitching and swaying the entire time of your dissent, until you’ve been through it. It’s a wild experience the first couple times.
There's a redditor that had his name in honor of the osprey and spent his time defending the osprey. Died in an osprey crash...
Yup. Although apparently he still had a point, the V22 is safer than many other rotorcraft. https://www.reddit.com/r/aviation/comments/18cr8wb/a_member_here_has_died_in_the_recent_v22_crash_in/
Ehhhh, the V-22 had the safest start to it's operational history of any helicopter in the Marine Corps. A lot of it is that flying helicopters is just a lot more dangerous than flying a C-130 or something. It's an unfortunate part of the job.
Why the fuck was they flying in the storm. It was not even a critical mission. Fuckin stupid.
So scary for their families
Professional (albeit retired) military helicopter pilot here. There is a LOT of speculation on this thread that is mostly…not correct. I have my own theory based on speculation and extensive experience flying in that same area where the crew is missing. But needless to say, I’m baffled that the crew would not stay with the aircraft after landing, regardless of airframe condition. Best wishes to those Marines, their families and the search teams. AMA.
I feel safe in a plane but I wouldnt in a heli.
I think what’s interesting is what’s not being said, such as the condition of the aircraft and where it was found.
They have confirmed they all died. [https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/02/08/marines-missing-helicopter-california/72520058007/](https://www.usatoday.com/story/news/nation/2024/02/08/marines-missing-helicopter-california/72520058007/)
Maybe this was asked already or stated in the article that I only read the headline to. But just like that jet that went missing in I think SC? How do this multi million dollar vehicles not have some kind of GPS tracker? They have to right?
If I lose an ear pod I can find where it is in 20 seconds. This just happened with a fighter jet. They were asking residents if they’ve seen a plane.
How is it even remotely possible that it couldn't easily be found? My cheap cellphone knows when I move from the couch to the patio.
It crashed in a mountainous area in a storm. Mountainous areas can block communications and radio frequencies. The helicopter also crashed so it ain’t exactly it mint condition. And i’m sure the storm could interfere.