Oil platform helicopter crashes in Norway; 13 dead-Final Report

a reply to: beansidhe

The Puma is an Airbus product, originally Eurocopter. Bell makes some really popular, and excellent helicopters. I'm hoping to catch one of the 525s flying on one of our trips through Amarillo.

originally posted by: JIMC5499
a reply to: Ivar_Karlsen

If that had happened the blade hubs would be bent from torque.

Like this?

a reply to: Ivar_Karlsen
No. Those blades look twisted because the stationary swash plate isn't there. There is nothing to hold them in pitch. If the main gear box would have locked up, the blades would be bent along their length in the plane of the rotor arc in the opposite direction of their travel.

I have a picture that shows this that I am trying to find to scan. It was a Navy SH-2F that had a gear box failure during a hover check. Thankfully no one was hurt.

originally posted by: JIMC5499
a reply to: Ivar_Karlsen
No. Those blades look twisted because the stationary swash plate isn't there. There is nothing to hold them in pitch. If the main gear box would have locked up, the blades would be bent along their length in the plane of the rotor arc in the opposite direction of their travel.

Well that picture us from the Bond G-REDL crash in 2009.

It crashed because the main gearbox suddenly locked up, and the main rotor departed the aircraft.

My son in law should have flown that trip, but didn't because his car refused to start.

a reply to: Ivar_Karlsen

Looks like the inertia in the rotor tore the gear box apart. Glad your son in law wasn't on board. I was in a Navy Sea King that had a tail rotor failure and got banged up pretty good. When I find the SH-2 picture I'll post it.

the rotor flying through the air, caught on video by someone;

a reply to: Zaphod58

I hope Bell have some ready to roll out because feelings are, understandably, high here.

A petition to remove the EC225 Super Puma helicopter from services, started by an oil worker following the crash, has now been signed by more than 5,000 people - some of them relatives killed in other incidents.

The petition calls on the CAA to "revoke the air worthiness certificates for this aircraft", claiming that failure to do this could result in "more needless deaths".

Commenting on the petition, the mother of 27-year-old oil rig worker Stuart Wood who died in a Super Puma crash in 2009, said all versions of the helicopter should be withdrawn.

BBC North East Scotland

I'm not sure what the response will be, but it will be interesting to see. I can't imagine any rig workers will be looking forwards to a flight any time soon.

a reply to: beansidhe

It'll be six months if they push. The third aircraft joined the test program, which is going rather well. There are interim options though. They need to remove the Pumas. They should have done it a few years ago.

The aircraft that crashed aborted a flight Tuesday when a warning light came on in the cockpit. The aircraft underwent maintenance and flew a test flight Wednesday, that it also aborted. It then flew six commercial flights Thursday with no problems. The warning light wasn't identified, but was said to be unconnected to the rotor system.

amp.theguardian.com...

a reply to: Zaphod58

It's difficult to comprehend that another group of families are grieving tonight because of failures in these helicopters. The Guardian article doesn't specify what the faults were, although at what point do you call it quits and not take the plane out? How many tests runs should be conducted? The North sea is no place to mess about over.

Anyway, I've signed their petition - it's the best I can do.

a reply to: beansidhe

It's a hard call to make. We had a jet that when taking off with a full fuel load had a fire warning light pop. We'd run it on the ground with nothing wrong, and it would take off with a light fuel load with no problems. That particular trip they got to where they'd pull the throttle back, get the light to go out, and advance it again, and continue the flight.

Long over water flights in a helicopter you don't mess around with warnings. But in this case, they flew seven flights without a warning. At some point you have to think that the problem is resolved or you'd never fly.

a reply to: Zaphod58

That is very true and there's no good in finger pointing. It's unfair and doesn't help anyone. The pilots knew what they were doing and no one could have anticipated that the rotors would come loose. I hope they never, ever use these planes again.

a reply to: beansidhe

They need to ground them and fix or redesign the gearbox. It's past time they did that. I suspect both Sikorsky and Bell will see an uptick in sales of medium helicopters to replace them, but if they get new aircraft they're going to have to either fly the Pumas until they are delivered or lease something else.

a reply to: Zaphod58

I hope they do lease something else, but things aren't going well with North Sea oil. There have been hundreds of redundancies already with a further 23,000 forecast.

The North Sea oil and gas industry is set suffer a net loss 23,000 jobs over the next five years – more than 4,000 a year every year to 2020 – with many of these expected to go in Aberdeen and Grampian areas.

www.scottishenergynews.com...

I just hope they don't try to make savings with the choppers.

a reply to: Zaphod58

Any rats on the helicopter?

How difficult would it be to add a couple of emergency chutes to a Helicopter. Please no Jokes about rotor blades getting it the way..You know what i'm talking about.

Two large Chutes could prevent Heli's from dropping from the sky in events like this one and i dont suppose the cost would be too expensive.

a reply to: Soloprotocol

As low as they were, even if they had them, it's doubtful they could have deployed in time.

originally posted by: Zaphod58
The aircraft that crashed aborted a flight Tuesday when a warning light came on in the cockpit. The aircraft underwent maintenance and flew a test flight Wednesday, that it also aborted. It then flew six commercial flights Thursday with no problems. The warning light wasn't identified, but was said to be unconnected to the rotor system.

amp.theguardian.com...

Probably a main gearbox chip light. Procedure is to remove the strainers, see what the chip is, drain the oil, replace the oil and do a hover check. If the light doesn't come back on you can return the aircraft to service.

I'm betting that there was a crack or partial failure in one of the gears. A piece broke loose and got caught in the strainer. They went through the checks and didn't find anything else. It flew the hover check, the commercial flights and then had a catastrophic failure.

a reply to: JIMC5499

That wouldn't surprise me. They seem to see a lot of those in oil field helicopters.

a reply to: Zaphod58

We had a chip light in a Sea King at AUTEC in 1987. I found two entire gear teeth. We had to replace the Main Gear Box. Two of us got stuck in the Bahamas while they barged a MGB to us. Took them ten days to get it there. Get up in the morning, go to Ops and ask if we were going to get it today, got told no and were on the beach by 9AM. Took us four days to replace it and then we rode it back to Jacksonville. A few years later I was talking to one of the Sikorsky engineers who told me that we could have probably flown it back with no problem.