Added: 4 years ago
From: MightyQuinn57
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  • I was a couple of Km away from the home base at RAF Valley. I'm used to seeing them flying overhead, but looked up as it passed overhead a few moments before the crash and said "Someones in trouble" to a workmate. He later freaked out, when he'd heard what had happened.

  • I remember this well.

    I was an Air cadet at RAF Kinloss in 1993 when this happened.

    The padre pulled us all into the hall and told us about it.

    Terrible accident

  • Llanberis100 the mountain is called yr wyddfa and as all you english can't understand welsh for you it called learn welsh

  • stupid air cadets. it sucks anyway. join the army cadets. make your mark.

  • Autorrotation??? with a tail rotor failure it's not an option. Due to Disconnect coupling disengagement, tail rotor wasn't turning. I'm an Engineer and a Crewman of HC Mk2 myself.

  • @comptur #1 learn to spell "autorotation". #2 autorotations are perfectly possible with a tail rotor failure, due to the engine not applying torque to the main rotor to cause uncontrollable yaw, tail rotor inputs are not needed. every student pilot learns this. #3 you're clearly not an engineer/ airman of any sort if you don't know the basic workings of a helicopter.

  • @dropkickmurphy01 #1, I'm sorry but my mastering of Spanish (my native language) made me wrong. #2 again, I'm sorry, I was thinking on entering A/R (just in case of a misspelling) ONLY BECAUSE OF THE T/R, but it's possible as you say. #3 For 22 years I've been an engineer and crewman on UH-1B, UH-1H, B-212 (Griffen), HC Mk2 and AS-365 (Dauphin) this for only a short time. Now I'm retired, as well as our Mk2's, but only after a very rich life here in the south. Beautiful machine to fly.

  • @comptur about the rich life I refer to the Old Ladies, as RAF people refered.

  • Beautiful aircraft, shame they aren't used anymore. It's a bit boring watching the Sea Kings and Lynxs around these parts (Wiltshire btw lol) but the EH101 Merlins are making things nice...flying over the house at 3am and clipping the oak tress in the forest did make me chuckle:)

  • How about some more training?

  • I was oneof the people that rescued the crew & passenger of this crash. Due to the fact that the crash site was surrounded with trees & outside of that a town with houses, I feel that the pilot made a good decision to spin the aicraft into the lake as he did. Disclaimer - I am an ex RAF airraft technician of some 26 years experience. I have limited piloting experience in helicopters but this guy had no room to go anywhere else in the time available. BTW - it was very cold in that lake!

  • Looks like pilot error.. the TR clearly failed but the pilot did not enter autorotation. He tried to keep flying but did not have enough forward airspeed to weather vane the tail, so he slowed and started rotating. Should have reduced power (not all the way), dropped the collective and tried to reach the shore through the auto descent. Even a poor autorotation will put you in the water safely. A real tragedy.

  • He could have hit a village!

  • Bad form Forkmeister, to blame the pilot. Autorotations are fine, when you are prepared for them, during training, and you can do a running landing at your home field, but easy for you to say, sitting at your computer.

  • As a commercial helicopter pilot with 15 years of flight experience, I stand by my assessment of the accident video. The pilot did not enter autorotation properly, although he had sufficient altitude to both enter and execute a proper auto-rotative descent. I have executed autorotations with both engine and tail rotor failures, and know that under some circumstances controlled flight may continue with a failed TR, if you maintain sufficient forward speed and limit MR torque.

  • im not bothered if you have flown for however many of years, i stand by what i said....bad form to criticise the pilot, and it is fine you sitting here, and probably the only autorotations you have done have been practice ones, knowing, that in a few seconds, you will cut the power etc, and you are prepared for that. It is different, when you have an emergency, and you have seconds to process what failure it is. I wonder how YOU, will perform, when it comes to a similar emergency?

  • Like I said, I have landed both failed engine (1) and TR (1) in Bell JetRanger and Hughes 500 and walked away from both with no injuries or aircraft damage. If any pilot can't perform under actual circumstances, he shouldn't be at the controls. Accidents do happen and people do make mistakes, but this pilot did not enter autorotation properly. With sufficient altitude autos into water (assuming good weather) should be easiest, since you do not have to maneuver to a specific touch down point.

  • oh........and before you slag me off........ten years on wessex, Lynx and Seakings.

  • Then you must be an experienced military pilot... Thanks for your aviation service. Hope you were not at the controls on this one... All accidents are unfortunate. I read every single FAA accident report trying to learn from others mistakes. Things do happen very quickly up there and we have to be on our toes, ready to react at any time... Especially when performing difficult or hazardous missions. (which choppers most often do)

  • very true, yes you can get the fuse to weathercock and prevent corkscrewing, but to transition to a good enough speed of say, 60 knots, you would drop about a 100 feet. Wessex, were notorious for fuel computers freezing.....i think with this one ( the vid i mean).......its a case ( for both of us!)....of......"there but for the grace of God, go i!" I actually feel safer in helicopters though, than a large passenger aircraft......ALL those people!!!!!! lol

  • You have a RW licence and Wessex hours do you?

    Arm chair experts (who aren't) insult the professionalism of these Aircrew, some of the worlds best. I'm sure these people did all that was able to be done to let the aircraft down under control. Problem is, they had none.

  • We all have a right to our opinion. Although I am not an air crash investigator, my comments are based solely from the video footage provided. After reading the recent post from MERVINGLAN, who claims he rescued the crew and knows the local terrain... I should amend my comments to say the pilot failed to enter a 180 degree autorotation... for touchdown into the lake. This would give the pilot a more controlled approach to land (preferably) near the shore... and would have reduced injuries.

  • @Forkmeister Why would it need to be a 180 degree autorotation as opposed to a straight in?

  • @aligerous Assuming the pilot was flying with sufficient altitude, a 180 degree auto (or some variation thereof..) should have allowed the pilot to properly enter autorotation without touching down in a crowded area. (like the town) Personally I would have tried to hit the water, just a few feet offshore. But it sounds like these were experienced military pilots, so these discussions are all speculative anyway. Things happen quickly when the bird loses its tail...

  • @Forkmeister I was just wondering why turning the aircraft 180 degrees would be better than a straight in. If the only acceptable area to terminate an auto was behind the helicopter, a 180 makes perfect sense. Without having any idea if the best LZ was in front of, beside or behind the helicopter, I was just wondering why you thought a 180 was appropriate. Obviously an auto can be entered in any direction. Thoughts? Are you a helicopter pilot? Hours?

  • @aligerous Please read all my previous posts (in this thread). If the pilot saw a small town ahead and wanted to avoid it, just after crossing a lake. (which is my understanding here...) then a 180 would be appropriate to put the aircraft into the water. Obviously, any variation would work based on the circumstances at the time of the TR failure...but spinning the AC to touchdown would NOT be a suitable option for me. ALL RC INSTRUCTORS teach reduce torque to manage TR (or anti torque) failure.

  • @Forkmeister Got it. You're right. I failed to read back far enough to see where you were coming from. Nicely done. Additionally, I think I would opt not to spin as well.

  • they stopped using the Wessex after this incident.

  • Actually the RAF stopped operating the Wessex in 2003 - ten years later.

  • That 'nail in the coffin' lasted over 10 years!!

    This didn't stop them flying where i lived..

  • That looked like tail rotor failure. Not a lot you can do to oppose rotor torque then... The only way out is to chop the rpm and hope to perform the best autorotation you can. Leave the power on and the machine will whip itself to death in faster and faster pirouettes.

  • Hi live in llanberis and remenmber the day well. Are the RAF still not changing the fleet of helicopters. Well if it happens again who is to be blamed?? We all now they do a great job but it was only this year 1 of your helicopter had problems while rescuing somone at snowdonia mountain and had to land in nant peris as you had hilrolics problems. We locals have to live in llanberis and see these helicopters every week it about time to change them ???? !!!!! Or you are to be blamed

  • The Wessex aircraft has been replaced by the Sea King...... in the mid nineties!! Helicopters and indeed many other aircraft have to make routine diversionary landings for both emergency and precautionary reasons. I'd land too if I had "hilrolics problems" too!!

  • When did you last see a wessex over Llanberis?

  • Live in Llanberis the mountain's called Snowdon not Snowdonia!!!!!!!

  • lol, no the moutain range is called snowdonia fool...

  • The mountain range is called the Cambrian mountains the national park is Snowdonia!

  • Get a grip. I'm sure you'll be grateful enough when they are dropping supplies when you get cut off by snow.

  • i swear i saw a stormtrooper at 2:59

  • very sad

  • Ohh yeaaaaah ;] I Live like Up the road from there xD

  • proof :D

  • I was in Llanberis last week

  • since that it's puma's all the way...

  • Sea Kings my friend, Sea Kings.

  • dam that is the worst thing that could happen to a pilot tail rotor goes your going down

  • East lancashire wing.

  • wow, nothing usually happens in Wales xd

  • Nothing Happens in Wales ?? If that where the case ? you where not aware of Real Sense Of Self Wales Invokes , but is has to be "felt from Within " mate . Unfortunate incident I remember well. Good people doing Fantasic Work up there. Bieng a biker, I KNOW how valuble these guys are. Keep fying guys forever :) In our hearts you NEVER DIE. :)

  • Scares the hell out of me, my God Father is a winchman on 22 SQD and i knew one of the crew who survived this.

  • I was only one years old when i saw the incident. I was a baby on a pram!! Time has flown!!

  • I was watching this helicopter flying above llanberis where i live moments before it crashed, my partner is one of the firefighters carrying the cadets from the wreakage. Terrible thing to happen and will never be forgotten in Llanberis RIP

  • Its been years since I last saw footage of this accident. Untill now I hadn't noticed seeing the tail rotor fail, from that moment the helicopter was uncontrolable and doomed to crash. Very sad indeed.

  • I remember that day,and always will,it was a very sad day! remember going there to put flowers down with my sis! and as my friend manzme said it has terrified me 2!

  • omg.. i remember this i was a cadet camping at RAF base in south of wales at the time.. we were supposed to go out in a chopper but it was cancelled cos of this accident.. had to phone our parents to let em know it wasnt us..

  • I just found this by accident whilst looking for rc chopper vids. I was at that base too with the ATC but it was a few years later. We went up in a Sea King, I never even knew this had happened till watching this vid. Suppose it's not the type of thing they would tell us just before going up!

  • From what I remenber, this was on the last day of an annual camp. 162 sqn, 55 sqn and 1196 were there the week after, all chopper flights cancelled. 162 was at Raf Valley, but didn't fly that week.

  • do u no wot wing these sqns are located?

  • i was 9 years old when this helicopter flew over my house and to this day i'm terrified of them

  • Taken by helicopter to the hospital.....i bet they felt REAAALLL comfortable during that flight O.o

  • lmao

  • how are you supposed to deal with that when the helicopter has just broken? that was best case senario as if they hit solid groud they would all be dead for sure

  • lol. i bet

  • thats kinda ironic they just crashed on a helicopter i think the last thing they want to do at that moment is go on helicopter to the hospital haha

  • Grow up!

  • imsasquath,...wot its australian made ??....i didnt know we made helicopter designs....

  • It wasn't the design or where it was built. It was discovered after these reports that it was improper material usage during maintenance.

    P.S. Germans suck

  • Yeah, but improper material would've never been used in Germany!!

    P.S. YOU suck

  • You started it, you invaded Poland!!

  • lmao

  • Lol... USA or UK made is both crap. Made in germany is the only real thing. ^^

  • news reporter is an idiot rear propeller? Its a tail rotor

  • I was going to say the exact same thing.

  • yes but the common man cant tell te differnce, elevator or nose up rudder people would just nick theyr heads.

  • Good greif

  • Couldn't some of them dive into the water before the crash, thereby reducing their deceleration rate?

  • and accelerate their own descent? hahaha

    probably after droping from the heli they would be topped over by it.

  • Well it isn't the rate of descent that injures them, it's the spike in the rate of deceleration when the large surface area of the fuselage strikes the water. Diving in would offer little resistance and prolong the duration of deceleration.

  • made in USA

  • The original design is American, but this model was Australian. By the way, your own technology is crap, too.

  • Um. Designed in USA, made in UK. But anyway.

  • Lucky that lake was there lol. Wessex crafts are garbage. That tail rotor just stopped, how odd.. a 30 year old craft has a failure? Glad their okay.

    The Sarge

  • 30 year old chopper = no autorotation.  They need an upgrade...

  • you know why we, intelligent people cannot read comments from youtubers like you ?

    because we are fed up hearing you stupid morons saying everything is garbage..

    helicopters are very complex machines.. so, compared to you, YOU are the garbage, moron.. thats all..

  • Well said!

  • i saw wat happened its not funny its devastating

  • thts funny isnt it... helicopter crash so they take em to hospital in another helicopter

  • i woudnt say thats funny but the funny things is that your a wanker!!

  • It's the only realistic way from that area, with the roads winding through the mountains. They were a long way from the A5, and nowhere near the A55 - the only two reasonable quality routes in the north west.

    I used to watch the rescue craft fly over Bangor regularly on their way from Valley to the hospital and beyond.

  • "Rear Propeller"... It's a tail rotor... IDIOT !

  • LMAO! "they were taking by helicopter to the hospital" who would've resist lol

  • The tail rotor obviously failed and the pilot lost lift, not a good thing in those old Wessex crafts.

  • Hows that Nice? two people were killed you fucking knob

  • @provo6767 wasnt it two cadets?

  • @rhysybum yes thats right.

  • Damn that Westland chopper is YEARS old!!

  • Training... FAILED!

  • That's not training- that's old junk! Some things just shouldn't carry extra people.

  • agreed XD

  • wow i dident kno that the rear rotar made that much of a difference

  • dust6y ur sick! There was some Air cadets in there, i am a member of the Air Training Corps, and it was not a nice crash!!! sum of my m8's mates died there so fink bout what you say!

  • its kinda weird that alot of helicopter crashers happen during training missions

  • Those wessex airframes are so old, upgraded, but old. Used before the huey in Nam. Kutos to the pilot who landed that well.

    Atleast they now use new the cyclone.

  • How so? Its old aircraft that are usually used for training, and its a new pilot...

  • ATLguy you moron, go practice your emer. proceedures for a TH-67 somewhere else. And its at speeds below approx. 50kts not 40.

  • I never flew one of those. I think that's the new initial trainer. I first started in the -55s twenty something years ago. You're quite the jerk aren't you? Personal insults, always the sign of a person of character. I posted those comments for a particular person.

  • Dusty6y,i'll at to your comment...very nice crash...

  • Nice Crash

  • Children die horrifically, and some twunt thinks 'lol' is an appropriate response! A tail rotor failure is generally considered a 'zero survivability' incident. Bravo to the pilot for saving 4 lives. Shame on anyone who finds this catastrophe amusing. Per Adua ad Astra.

  • yes kun laittaa urpoja rattiin hehe

  • All parts that break off from this helicopter are of the finest British manufacture!

  • WHY DO PEOPLE COMMENT SO MUCH?

  • What a stupid comment to make! Do you have any concept of the gyroscopic and torque moments involved in helicopters? If the tail rotor fail you loose the main force which counterbalances the engine torque and the net result is loss of lift. I would say the pilot did a superb job of ditching. The helicopter was not spinning wildly and it hit at a relatively low vertical velocity. I would suggest you obviously have no idea...

  • You're right on. The only thing that I would add is that the pilot should have executed a run on landing at the closest airport. The higher airspeed provides weather-vaning.

  • AtlGuy516, this happened in the mountains of Snowdonia, the nearest airport/airfield was the home base around twenty miles away. The water was the safest place to set down anyway.

  • 9-19. COMPLETE LOSS OF TAIL ROTOR THRUST.

    a. Powered flight. (1) Indications: (a) Pedal input has no effect on helicopter trim. (b) Nose of the helicopter turns to the right (left sideslip). (c) Left roll of fuselage along the longitudinal axis. Degree of roll and sideslip may be varied by varying throttle and/or collective. (At a/s below 40 knots, the sideslip may become uncontrollable, and the helicopter will begin to spin on the vertical axis.

  • (2) Procedures:

     (a) If safe landing area is not immediately available, continue powered flight to suitable landing area at or above minimum rate of descent autorotational airspeed. (b) When landing area is reached, make an autorotative landing. (c) Use airspeed above minimum rate of descent airspeed.

  • Yup. Powered FLIGHT. The guy was in the hover. You can't get forward speed on with no tail rotor from the hover. Try it, if you like (but I wouldn't recommend it!)

  • (d) If landing area is suitable for run-on landing, touch down above effective translational lift.

    (e) If run-on landing is not possible, start to decelerate from about 75feet altitude, so that forward ground speed is at a minimum when the helicopter reaches 1 0 to 20 feet. Execute the touchdown with a rapid collective pull just prior to touchdown in a level attitude with minimum ground speed.

  • Sorry for the multiple entries but they limit you to 500 characters. I think that the pilot probably didn't know what the problem was until he got too slow. He probably could have flown it to an airfield but he still did a good job nontheless.

  • One would think all available safety engineering techniques would be applied before any critical part is cleared for installation. All it takes is just one distraction to the QCI for a coincidence to occur. The defective part was overlooked at that time. That's just like the laws of probility.

  • poor people.RIP

  • I was a Navy aircraft and trained on the Wessex Mk V.

    The drive shaft failure was called by something we called coke canning, the shafts were hollow.

    If you take an empty aluminium drink can and twist it, the can will sheer.

  • what so the mean cadets?

  • Cadets in the uk are a secret crack team of men and women. Be that search and rescue, spy missions, If its danger and all else fails they send in the "cadets" ...DO NOT MESS WITH THE UK CADETS.

  • -_- i emant what cadets!Air, sea, marines, army

  • lol!

  • lmao

  • I'd love to meet you (chefmax1) and kick the crap out of you you insenstive twat. Average age of the fatalities was around 15 years old.

  • I was laughing at someone elses comment you jobsworth, and please call me max darling.

    Im aware of the seriousnous of the crash (trajic), this aint jerry springer, it's youtube.And as far as 'kickin the crap out me'....well, good luck.

  • when did this happen?

  • We are and thats the end of it, this video is about remembering people who died in a tragedy. If you have a shred of sense and dignity respect them. RIP ...Nuff Said on the matter!

  • If you really believe what you just said, then you are indeed a retard. Nuff said.

  • Is that really the best you can do use my own comments. You lack imagination and any comeback. I am a peace activist and sponsor greenpeace and many other well known charities!! People like me are trying to save the planet RETARD !!

  • he could have auto'd with enough forward airspeed, you can actually auto when you loose the tail rotor, its just alot harder to regain control when your low and dont have much airspeed, if he had been higher, and had a greater airspeed he would have been able to auto.

  • Yeah...good call. I was thinking the same exact thing....but it seems that most of these helo crashes the pilots never got a chance to auto-rotate down. I'm getting the impression that an auto-rotated controlled helo crash is a rare thing.

  • Yeah, most helis that autorotate because of say - engine failure, tail rotor failure, the landings are not always perfect landings, most helis normally loose the tail, or roll over :( and alot more structual damage can happen due to stress ans tension on the fuselage.

  • Wow the pilot seemed to do the best job he could to keep it under control not enough altitude to manuever though nice job by the pilot

  • zacatetas you are a sick and racist bastard and I hope you die slow and painfully I'm sure you won't be missed. This is NOT funny people died you sick twisted loser how dare you joke about something like this.

  • should have jumped out first the helicopter creates a vortex that pulls them down but thats easy for me to say

  • tail rotor failure ? wouldn't a auto-rotation prevent from spinning?

  • auto-rotation only works it its the main rotor that fails if the tail rotor fails your a goner

  • Not the best aerodynamic shape for autorotation I suppose. Shame about the deaths and shame about those who thought it was funny.

  • taken to hospital IN A HELICOPTER.....just what they want to get back into....lol

  • lol

  • fucking bastard, rot in hell.

  • what is whauher?

  • I think thats what the britsh call having to brush their teeth

  • sorry 'most' pilots get caught up in.....

  • you still have 'vertical' ,,, pay attention to it. Moat get caught up in the panic of the spin... watch your collective and pay attention to your enemy. THE GROUND!

  • freaking loose your tail rotor and what do you have as options? Increase your forward air speed to 'tube' your craft ayrodynamically and go in skidding. When your in a non forward momentum as this? lol get down fast but soft.

  • RIP  - very sad story.

  • hhahah..i bet that did suck getting right back into a helicopter..haha..but i feel bad for the kids tho..

  • You idiots, shut up if you can't say anything good.

    local children from my hometown died in that accident

  • bullsitthull (1 week ago)

    just as your name, you are truely shit. fuck your mother!!!!!!!

  • ha ha ha! they were taken to a hospital by helicopter. i'm sure they were excited to get into another chopper asap

  • really though, 'great!!!'

  • poor maintenance cause accident... but i like british girl the way they talk.. lovely

  • ...except there is a "T" in water. It's not woo-aww, it's wah-terr. I still wouldn't kick out her out of bed for eating crackers, mind...

  • shes a kid you fucking paedo

    and if u wanna talk about water and wa.a check out ur spelling of aluminium and how you pronounce it "aluminum"

  • You are correct, aluminium and aluminum are SPELLED and PRONOUNCED differently.

    Is pedo spelled with an "A"...dunno.

  • it certainly is my man. spelt with an A.

    nice to have that one cleared up...

  • omg, i hate the whay that girl talks, fuckin ugly, was it ¨water¨ she said? she said like ¨wa'a¨ shit, thats just so fucked up.

  • Are you American?

  • bad helicopter... :(

  • The report on this crash is in CAA Report 2003/1 Helicopter Tail Rotor Failures - P203. The tail fold disconnect coupling had not been properly engaged for some time. OK for normal flight, but prior to the film starting, a manouvre put extra TR force on the aircraft. The strain opened the coupling losing TR thrust. The coupling then re-engaged but failed due to the sudden excess load.

  • 0:58 i like this language, i had understood nothing but i like it

  • y u showing a crash from 93 and its 07