Flight Training Phase 2A

Training At RotorWay

The plan was to spend time at John Spurling's fly in and leave my heli there and head off to RotorWay for Phase II training. After RotorWay I would return to John's place in Tulsa and spend a couple days flying with him before heading back to Knoxville.

This was an exciting time for me. John Spurling's Fly In and my Phase II training at RotorWay back to back lol.

Saturday afternoon at 5:30 pm Tulsa time I was off and running once again to RotorWay.  This was my 2nd trip to Arizona but this time I was half way there so it wasn't nearly as long of a trip.

I drove until 4am that night and made a stop in a rest area just outside Santa Rosa, New Mexico, to get some shut eye.  I slept until 9:30 am and I was off and running again.

My total trip time one way was H25:M39 with H9:M07 stop time for fueling and sleep time. Even at half way there, it was a long long trip lol.

I arrived at RotorWay Sunday afternoon at 4:30 Phoenix time and filled up with fuel before going to RotorWay to set up camp.  I had a little fun at the gas station.  I kept sliding my credit card in the slot at the pump and it kept telling me to go inside.  I went in and the cashier said my credit card was being declined, Kewl huh!  After a short call to the credit card company I was back in the saddle again lol.  Seems the charges were coming in so fast that they had decided that my credit card had been stolen lol.  RV's do burn a bit of fuel, I guess I can kinda sorta see their side....NOT! 

Anyway at 5:15pm I was in RotorWay's Motor home port and began setting up camp for the week.

Monday morning October 15, 2001, 7am Phoenix time

I walked in the door of the flight school at 7am sharp and the first thing Bill said is your late lol.  According to him class started at 6am.  He already knew I was there and that the letter I received from them said 7am but razzed me anyway lol, it was kinda embarrassing.  Anyhow no big deal and we headed into the class room to begin Phase II Flight training.  We went over flight control inputs and flying patterns and that's when I learned I was Bill's soul student for the week lol.  One fella cancelled at the last minute for this week so Steve the other instructor took the other two guys and Bill just had me.  That was great except we didn't have more then about 10 to 20 minutes of a break between flights.  An hour in these things felt like 5 and it was tough going all week.  This was the 2nd glitch in the program, first I was late and then being Bills only student for the week.  The 1st wasn't any big deal but the 2nd meant Bill had alot of extra time to kill which translated into a real drilling for me all week lol. 

830 am : 

Well here we go, outside to the ship.  After the standard RotorWay preflight we were off to Memorial Airport.  Bill let me pick the heli up into a hover and start the ship into forward flight before he took over the controls.

Bill was allowing me to follow through on the controls as he explained what was happening.  This wasn't going to be as easy as I had figured that's for sure lol. Like learning to hover, flying the thing was just about as intense.  Maintaining altitude and air speed is a trick in itself and coming into land is a real deal lol.  At about 50 feet AGL you need to roll on a little throttle and right hand pedal and it all goes to hell.  If your late doing it you drop to the ground and spin left before you know it.  We flew the pattern several times and I flew the heli back to Stellar and landed the ship.  The radios were still crappy, Bill had to decode every radio call we heard. All I could hear was garbled chatter but I did manage to catch at least 1 out of every 5 words lol. We took a break for about 30 minutes and we went back up again.  I got to fly the whole way this time to Memorial and we flew patterns, did steep approaches, steep descents, and the regular long descents.  One time, flying the pattern on the final left leg turn, it got real interesting. 

Final leg, 1700 foot MSL,  something popped and I felt something strike me across my back.

  We smelled antifreeze (not good)  and Bill took the controls and commented "Well your going to get to see a real auto now" and down we went.  In a split second we picked out a suitable landing spot but alas we never made it there.  As we descended, all going by the book, the engine cut out then it rolled onto FADEC 2 and ran for a few seconds and it cut out again and then back in and out for the final time.  The coming on and off line really added to the problem, when the engine cut out the ship yawed right calling for major pedal input.  When it came back on major left yawing calling for major pedal input again to keep it coming in straight.  Just before we hit the ground we were in a left twist from all the engine inputs and we came in hard onto the soft desert sand and the ship slammed in suddenly coming to a stop and then rolled straight up on its nose (Wow, Oh Sh**, etc., etc.)  I grabbed the upper windshield post to hold onto for the roll over because all I could see was the desert floor in the windshield.  All of a sudden Bill slammed the cyclic aft and in a moment the ship stopped its forward roll over motion and then rocked backwards down to the ground banging the tail and then the front came back to earth and it was over.  Cool, I really didn't know what to do at the time, bail out, sit tight or ?  I turned to Bill and said "You're the man" lol.  Looking out the windshield as the blades were winding down we could smell antifreeze and oil but no smoke or anything else.  Bill shut the ship down and we got out to see what's what.  Steam was rising out of the doghouse and that was about it.  There was a large puddle or stain if you want to call it that in the sand about three feet out from the nose of the ship from all the antifreeze that dumped out of the nose while we were up on the tips of the skids.  Back at the tail end there were two holes in the sand, one from the stringer and one from the tail rotor.  The tail rotor was trashed, the blades were tore up on the last three inches or so and the tail rotor shaft was about 25 degrees forward imbedded into the front tail rotor shaft cover.  The right hand 1/4" tension rod had snapped allowing it to move from the tail rotor blades digging their way forward in the sand.  Bill went and whipped out his trusty cell phone he had stashed under the seat and called Tom Smith who came out to witness the wreck.  A short time after Tom arrived Mark and another fellow showed up with a truck and trailer to transport the ship back to RotorWay.  Tom gave Bill and I a ride back to RotorWay in his truck and Bill and I went back to class.  We studied radio calls inbound and outbound from airports Stellar and Memorial.  Class ended at 2:30pm.

What happened:

We lost a belt on the ACIS unit, which must have whipped around a few times and it in turn opened the pitcock bleeder valve on the right hand top and the engine allowing all of the antifreeze to escape the system soaking the right hand seat back and somehow causing FADEC 1 to completely quit and FADEC 2 to become intermittent.  Which by the way Tom Smith said couldn't happen lol. That very same week just happened to be when they were getting ready to send out an edition of RotorWays Sport Helicopter and as a result of this incidence they included this bulletin with it.

I never noticed something about this bulletin until February 2003 when I was posting here on the site. Its dated September 21, 2000.

That means that at the time of Bill and I's incendent on October 15, 2001 at Rotorway this advisory was just over 1 year old.

I don't know about the rest of you folks out there but Donna and I never received it, leaving us to wonder if there are more things lurking about like this one laying ahead of us. One thing thats for sure is, if Rotorway had that valve safty wired, like they we're supposed to, Bill and I would have most likely had an uneventfull trip down to the ground and maybe I wouldn't have had such a hard time doing auto's, <sigh>

Advisory Bulletin A-35

Monday Evening

That evening in anticipation of calling Donna and giving her the news of the day I fiddled around fixing a few things on the motor home.  One which was the toilet holding tank, I had to remove the toilet, found a flange had broken off the top of the holding tank making it unrepairable.  After thinking about it for a little bit I went in and asked Tom Smith if he had anything that would stick to a plastic holding tank and he gave me some Dow Corning 735 oil resistant sealant.  It's the same stuff they use to glue the valve cover gaskets to the valve covers.  Anyhow it worked great!  After that nice job was done it was time to call DaMama and tell her of my eventful day lol.  She took it very well, a hell of alot better than I did which left me wondering whether or not I had a life insurance policy lurking around somewhere I didn't know about lol.

Tuesday, October 16th, 5:00am

Up at 5am and feeling froggy lol.  I guess the day before finally hit me and I sat down and wrote out a quickie will in my journal I had been keeping of the trip just in case something really happened since I had never made a will.  Not sure how legal it was but it was better than nothing I guess lol.

8:30 am

Well today was ahhh too much input.  Different ship, N906 today.  I got to fly it out from RotorWay to Memorial and it went ok.  Landing is a trick for sure, the flying is going to take me a bit to work on but landing is a total trick at this time.  Just prior to touchdown the ship sorta drops out of the air and you have to catch it by adding throttle and right pedal plus controlling descent with the collective, its not bad but going to take some practice for sure.  We did several take offs, flew the pattern and touch downs.  Did some hovering autos, that's a trick too.  Just as you roll off the throttle you hit left pedal to stop the right hand twist and the ship sets right down.  If your late in left pedal the ship twists to the right big time - whoah lol,  but as long as you set down straight you do ok.  Autorotations suck at this point big time.  2,000 feet on approach you drop collective and down you fall like a box of rocks,  can't imagine ever liking it.  You must maintain heading, air speed, and descent all the while maintaining rotor rpm.  Pull the collective too much and the rotor speed drops off big time and so does forward air speed and you loose the whole thing trying to make up for it.  AHHHHH!  Feeling very humbled again, typical second day training thus far.  Class time wasn't much better, by this time I was glad the flying was over until the flight planning started.  All the math is really killing me.  It isn't hard but I don't get the manual ECB thing nor my electronic one.  Came back and tried over and over but never got it.  Headed to bed frustrated lol.

Wednesday, October 17th

7am back in N906 again today and we were off.  Again I got to fly the ship from Stellar to Memorial and once we got there it was pretty busy and I had no idea where to go.  We had to circle and come in mid field due to my late decision.  We did take offs and landings for an hour or so.  When we got back to Stellar we did two slope landings which I did pretty well on.  Back out at about 10:15 or so and did more take offs, patterns, and landings, each time I'd do different things out of sync and most of the time completely wrong lol.  Flying, radio calls and the rest are very hard to get a grip on for me I would like to say I'm progressing but really can't because it's is still too much input <sigh>.  After that we did autos from 2,000 feet AHHHHH!  Hate em lol.  I got the keep the cabin level part on the last one, #6 I think, and that's about it.  Back in class at 1pm and we went over aerodynamics, radio calls, and a little more and stopped about 2:30pm.

Thursday, October 18th

Bill was late getting in the morning and we didn't get started till about noon or so.  New ship today, N904.  Bill let me fly out of Stellar to Memorial.  Our air speed wasn't reading, seems John O'Neil had replaced the rotor tach prior to this afternoons flight and forgot to hook it up.  No big deal but not knowing the air speed kinda freaked me out.  I was already nervous since this was our third different ship this week.  They just put a new engine in it and John O'Neil hovered and flew it for about an hour or so on Wednesday for the first time since I don't know when.  When we got to Memorial we set down on the runway and Bill bailed out and popped off the nose cover and hooked the hose back up and we were off again.  This time we did right hand patterns off runway 12.  Still mixing up my radio calls and todays flying wasn't that much better either.  I began pulling collective on takeoff and gaining altitude sooner than I should have allowing my air speed to get too fast and going on through 500 foot agl.  I was either too fast, too slow, too high, or over, or under power, hell lol just pick something I had it all wrong at one time or another, oh yeah I forgot out of trim too lol.  On landings I overshot the runway spot each and every time, at least four times, the last being my best but way too fast and late with left hand pedal but I got us down.  All I need is a 5,000 foot runway and I got it made lol.  I flew us back to Stellar and like normal came in too high, too fast and too steep.  Not a good flying day for me at all.  Even my landings from hover were hard set downs.

1:30pm

Class time for me!  The others had finished and left so Bill and I were all that was there.  We covered steep landings and liftoffs, penical landings and takeoffs, and settling with power.

6pm

Went and watched airplanes do patterns and touch and goes for an hour or so.  Called and talked to Donna until CSI came on the television and she tossed me aside for the show, sure love and miss her can't wait to get back home <sigh>.

Friday, October 19th

We started out early again eacept this time we headed out on a cross country trip, way kewl!

I lifted off and flew it out of Stellar.  First thing I screwed up is not looking to see what time lift off was, kinda important if one wants to see if he's where he thinks he is when he is supposed to be lol.  Second problem was how I laid out my stuff on the knee board.  I had the map on top covering my flight plan courses and leg times, not good but we made due because I worked on them so much I had them memorized.  The flight went great with no events except landing at Casa Grande Airport.

Steve and Ernie had landed centered on the helipad. As we came in there was a plane on final about the time we were going to cross the runway and he was just a little bit, a quarter of a mile or so, from touching down and Bill said to go for it because we had plenty of time, I didn't like it but but as you can see in the pic above I did it lol.

We came in and I hovered just short of them.  Bill said too close but it was either close to them or close to a big DC 3 type parked airplanes so I sat her down behind them but in a bad spot because if that big twin engine airplane fired up we would be in their prop wash and that wouldn't be good at all.

We used the facilities and took off for Stellar. We flew back at 2,000 feet and 80 mph just as we did coming down.  Steve and Ernie on the other hand flew high and low and had a ball.  They were taking pics of us as we flew along and at one time went right over the top of us, up close and personal like, that I didn't like too much because I'm known to gain altitude sporadically and often lol.  It all worked out and we had a great time and flight.

After we got back Bill and I took off again.  I flew to Memorial and we did takeoffs and landings and after that more of the dreaded autos.  I did much better today, I am still pulling too soon at the bottom.  Did real good keeping the cabin level on the way down except one time I pushed left pedal and then lowered the collective, not good but I recovered from it nicely.  After about ten of them it was back to Stellar.  I passed, but not by much.  My legs were toast as well as my feet, I was so stiff I think I gave myself permanent muscle damage lol.  I kept my legs locked the whole time and my feet would take turns going numb and going to sleep.  Tuesday through Thursday it was my left foot that had totally gone numb and today, Friday, it's my right one, go figure lol.

The Bad News!

They charged me for an extra 1.5 hours which I think they should have eaten big time.

Personally I think the last 1.5 hours of autos were more for Bill's benefit then mine. We didn't come down to well in Mondays little event and I think that had Bill a bit upset all week and it was his way of dealing with it all.

Monday's crash and three different machines sure didn't help me out any. 

Homeward Bound At Last

I left at noon, stopped at 10:30 pm east of Santa Rosa, New Mexico, until 6 am Saturday morning and arrived at John Spurling's place Saturday at 4 pm Tulsa time.  The weather was pretty bad, super high winds predicted for the next few days, so flying with John was out.  I stuck around that night and Sunday morning loaded up my heli and headed back to Knoxville.

Heres some pictures I got at RotorWay of the golden oldies out back in the parking lot.
Its pretty neat to get to see them but at the same time its a shame to see them sitting there rotting away.