Helicopter Autorotation Emergency Training

Alabama Public Safety Trooper Aviation has provided numerous aerial assists on many film projects I've developed while with Auburn University Media Production Group. They've provided a professional and safe appoach whenever their aerial assistance was needed. I will forever feel grateful for their good natured steadfast participation and absolute concern for safety and of course, their remarkable piloting skills. My government projects from historical documentarys to highway safety TV spots were also projects Alabama Trooper Aviation felt were worthwhile and challenging. Those projects always paid for any jet fuel needed and they allowed the Troopers added air time to scan the forests along the way for abandoned autos, suspicious activity, and drug activity, etc on the flight trips to and from the filming sites. I give significant credit to Alabama Public Safety's Trooper Aviation's Chief Trooper Pilots - Chris Helton, David Contrad, Jerry Hatfield and to Billy Mitchell, Tropper Aviation's Chief of Maintenance for the success of those efforts!

These short video clips reveal just one of the emergency training exercises that Trooper Aviators must perform twice a year to keep each one fully prepared should an emergency engine failure occur that can save their lives as well as anyone else aborad the craft....The footage is a result of a phone call from me to inquire if there was anything we could do to assist the Alabama Public Safety Division. I was asked if we could help document some of the helicopter autorotation training to provide a learning tool for new Trooper Aviation pilots and for review by the pilots to review following their semi-annual autorotation emergency traning recertification.

MORE ABOUT AUTO ROTATION:

Autorotation
Autorotations are used to perform power off landings from altitude in the event of an engine failure. A JPEG or GIF sequence of photographs showing an autorotation is available.
Maneuver Description
An autorotation is used when the engine fails, or when a tail rotor failure requires the pilot to effectively shut down the engine. It is very similar to gliding in an airplane.
The entry
To enter the autorotation, the pilot lowers collective all the way down, simultaneously adding right pedal. Lowering the collective maintains RPM during the entry to autorotation, and keeps the AOA (angle of attack) at a normal value during the glide.
Adding the right pedal is necessary because in autorotation there is no torque. During power-on flight, the pilot was using a lot of left pedal to counter the torque being produced by the engine. Once the helicopter is autorotating, the engine disengages and produces no more torque.

While the collective is being lowered, the nose of the helicopter has a tendancy to pitch down. The pilot needs to use aft cyclic to prevent this. Allowing the nose to pitch down creates two problems: it tends to reduce RPM because it decreases the amount of airflow through the rotor disk, and it tends to increase airspeed, usually far above the range you want to use while autorotating.

More info about helicopter autorotation can be found at this link: http://ezinearticles.com/?A-Successful-Helicopter-Auto-Rotation-Could-Save-Yo...

Category:

Education

Tags:

• Alabama Trooper Aviation
• Helicopter autorotate

[adminaeg]

Curious. What kind of stress/damage is inflicted on a helicopter after continuous autorotation practicing. What type of post inspection or maintenance is required? Great video by the way! Thanks

[WarEagle122]

@motokid032 The problem is that grass is not a predictable landing surface. If one skid hits a soft spot or is uneven after you have committed, the result can be catastrophic. Asphalt is uniform, predictable, and a "known". At Ft. Rucker, for helos with skids, they have (or used to have) mountable shoes made of a very hard alloy for run-on landings that wore down for Auto training. The skid was saved from the excessive wear . I don't see them here but what outstanding flying! HOOAH!

[ShuRugal1]

woah, was that last one a vertical descent auto? Didn't think a full-scale could do that.

[TheFr3sh1]

@victorkapustin They are connected via driveshaft

[victorkapustin]

I understand that you can still use the main rotor with auto rotation but how does the tail rotor keep spinning?

[FTLDL21]

Wow Amazing !!!

[nipponhouseplayer]

If its Bell its swell!

[TheSwimcoach]

great stuff!

[edkressl]

Congratulation to Mr. Chris Helton.Must be a CW3 Warrant Officer ? Perfect Autorotation with the Jet Ranger. Best Wishes to Mr. Helton from Germany. Heli Ed.

[DMFK1981]

3:10 best auto out of the bunch.