Damien Evans
Up The Irons
The post above would be laughable if it weren't so pathetic.
Ed Helicopter Crashes into Glasgow Pub
- Thread starter Cylinder
- Start date
-
- Tags
- scotland incidents
I don't think Rolfe's claiming to be an engineer, and there's nothing that I can see written in this thread that will stop you from finding solutions to the problems that may have caused this tragedy.
The version that's on IPlayer here, and which is identical to the one I saw on "BBC London" last night, is narrated by Samantha Poling, an "award-winning Scottish investigative journalist, currently working for BBC Scotland."
You can see and hear her in this "Scotland Investigates" programme on YouTube.
Gerrymandering?!?
In any event, I'd be rather more convinced by your righteous outrage if you hadn't already stated unequivocally on another thread that you believed the Scots to be dispropportionately represented in the media.
Last edited:
The "deem to be acceptable within your political bent" is a giveaway. But I agree that this is not the occasion for political point scoring. And to be fair, I don't think any of the parties are abusing the tragedy in this way.
catsmate
No longer the 1
- Joined
- Apr 9, 2007
- Messages
- 34,767
No-one wanted to give McGonagall another excuse?
Rolfe
Adult human female
In that case I was totally out of line, and I apologise. Her dulcet tones really grated when I listened to the documentary on my computer, and I hadn't noticed when the sound was coming from the TV. (I hadn't been paying 100% attention at the time, which was partly why I watched the London re-broadcast.)
I did suspect I might have been mistaken, because a number of Scottish TV and radio announcers have acquired weird pseudo-English accents, most notably Jackie Bird. I over-reacted, sorry.
Rolfe.
Darth Rotor
Salted Sith Cynic
- Joined
- Aug 4, 2006
- Messages
- 38,527
Somebody a few pages back made a list of four likely causes.
Your choice to lead with "pilot error" is ill considered. .
I've taken the opportunity to read a very long discussion on this accident on a pilot forum, including people who knew this pilot. (PPRuNe). Even though there is a lot unknown, and there seems to be no FDR to help reconstruct the last minute of that flight, one cannot arrive at "pilot error" as a root cause in this accident. Not even close. Not only that, but the chances of "ran out of fuel" are remote in the extreme. As I am not at all knowledgeable on the EC-135, on that forum is an interesting explanation of how the fuel system in that aircraft works. It's a novel design, which leads to a "graceful degradation" mode insofar as fuel supply limitations are concerned.
Your knee jerk there isn't a very good effort.
I do not envy the AAIB their job, given the difficulty in reconstructing the last minute of that flight, and the further damage to the helicopter while it was being removed from the pub.
Your choice to lead with "pilot error" is ill considered. .
I've taken the opportunity to read a very long discussion on this accident on a pilot forum, including people who knew this pilot. (PPRuNe). Even though there is a lot unknown, and there seems to be no FDR to help reconstruct the last minute of that flight, one cannot arrive at "pilot error" as a root cause in this accident. Not even close. Not only that, but the chances of "ran out of fuel" are remote in the extreme. As I am not at all knowledgeable on the EC-135, on that forum is an interesting explanation of how the fuel system in that aircraft works. It's a novel design, which leads to a "graceful degradation" mode insofar as fuel supply limitations are concerned.
Your knee jerk there isn't a very good effort.
I do not envy the AAIB their job, given the difficulty in reconstructing the last minute of that flight, and the further damage to the helicopter while it was being removed from the pub.
Last edited:
Your knee jerk to rule out anything, including pilot error, without additional info is ill considered IMO. If you have additional info post it up. The list I made is simply a list of possibilities. If you have ruled some of these out then state your reasoning and post evidence. I can certainly post evidence on why I chose the list I did in terms of historical data.
http://www.helicoptersafety.org/commonaccidents.asp
In addition you have left out a fairly important part of my post:
I am making no concrete claims. Only listing possible causes. To take pilot error off the table for emotional reasons would be a mistake. If and when it is ruled out...then it is ruled out.
Last edited:
BenBurch
Gatekeeper of The Left
It is probably not possible to exclude pilot error, but we have no reason at all to suspect it in this case.
geni
Anti-homeopathy illuminati member
- Joined
- Oct 14, 2003
- Messages
- 28,209
LondonJohn
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- May 12, 2010
- Messages
- 21,162
Well....... the AAIB has just released an interim report that suggests that there was no problem with any element of the engine or drivetrain, and that there was adequate fuel. The report states that neither the main rotor nor the tail rotor was turning under power at the time of impact.
So we appear to have a situation where all power to BOTH rotors was cut off, and where there was no apparent problem with fuel, engine, gearbox or shafts.
I hate to say it, but this interim report can only increase the possibility that some sort of pilot input was involved. It's of course still eminently possible that some mechanical/electrical/hydraulic fault was the primary cause, so let's hope that the AAIB can drill down further into these areas.
LondonJohn
Penultimate Amazing
- Joined
- May 12, 2010
- Messages
- 21,162
Well it's much more than "no obvious cause yet", unfortunately.
The AAIB would absolutely definitely not have released statements that there was no apparent mechanical fault in the engine, gearbox or shafts if they were not very confident that this was accurate and correct. Similarly, they must be highly confident that neither the main nor tail rotors were under power at impact, and of course they can be certain that there was adequate fuel.
The one thing that DOES seem to be possible is that there was a catastrophic total failure somewhere in the fuel delivery system - perhaps a broken fuel pump or severed fuel line. But on the other hand I would have thought it was a virtual certainty that there would be redundancy built into every element of the fuel delivery system (given the obvious seriousness of a failure to deliver fuel to the engines). I am guessing that this will be an ongoing area of investigation for the AAIB.
Skwinty
Philosopher
- Joined
- Jun 16, 2008
- Messages
- 5,593
I see that the headline in the BBC report "Clutha helicopter crash: AAIB finds 'no evidence' of mechanical fault" omits the Initial bit.
Nitpick, the AAIB released a special bulletin and not an interim report.
Special Bulletin: S9/2013 - Eurocopter EC135 T2+, G-SPAO
http://www.aaib.gov.uk/cms_resources.cfm?file=/S9-2013 G-SPAO v2.pdf
Initial examination was carried out at the site, before the
helicopter was transported to the AAIB’s headquarters.
Examination continued on its arrival at Farnborough,
Hampshire, where it was confirmed that all significant
components were present at the time of impact. Initial
assessment provided no evidence of major mechanical
disruption of either engine and indicated that the main
rotor gearbox was capable of providing drive from the
No 2 engine power turbine to the main rotor and to the
fenestron drive shaft. Clear impact distortion of the
structure had caused a splined shaft on the drive train
from the No 1 engine to disengage, preventing a similar
continuity check
Nitpick, the AAIB released a special bulletin and not an interim report.
Special Bulletin: S9/2013 - Eurocopter EC135 T2+, G-SPAO
http://www.aaib.gov.uk/cms_resources.cfm?file=/S9-2013 G-SPAO v2.pdf
Initial examination was carried out at the site, before the
helicopter was transported to the AAIB’s headquarters.
Examination continued on its arrival at Farnborough,
Hampshire, where it was confirmed that all significant
components were present at the time of impact. Initial
assessment provided no evidence of major mechanical
disruption of either engine and indicated that the main
rotor gearbox was capable of providing drive from the
No 2 engine power turbine to the main rotor and to the
fenestron drive shaft. Clear impact distortion of the
structure had caused a splined shaft on the drive train
from the No 1 engine to disengage, preventing a similar
continuity check
I dont think they made any such statement did they? They simply stated how much fuel was drained. When operating at the lower end of the fuel load, especially in various helos that have multiple tanks, fuel management, flight parameters, remaining unusable fuel and related fuel component failure can make for difficult scenarios.
Last edited:
Rolfe
Adult human female
The BBC has stated that 95 litres was drained off, which would have been sufficient for the copter to return to base.
The AAIB seem to be saying that they haven't found any fault so far. They said the rotor blades were all attached but not turning. They also said they could only exclude a "major" fault in one engine, as the other was too badly damaged by the crash to be able to tell at this stage. Nevertheless I believe the helicopter should have been capable of remaining airborne and manoeuvering on one engine.
Rolfe.
The AAIB seem to be saying that they haven't found any fault so far. They said the rotor blades were all attached but not turning. They also said they could only exclude a "major" fault in one engine, as the other was too badly damaged by the crash to be able to tell at this stage. Nevertheless I believe the helicopter should have been capable of remaining airborne and manoeuvering on one engine.
Rolfe.
The BBC said that. Did the report state that?
What tanks was that 95 liters found in? What amount of fuel is unusable in this helo? Is the unusable fuel the same in hover attitude vs fwd flight? What happens to unusable fuel if pump X is inop?
These are probably the things the investigation team is going over now. Pump switch positions, pump operation, fuel transfer configurations etc etc.