Articles for category Helicopter Sectors
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Aug
29
2016
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Posted by Admin
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The fire started small on May Day 2016. However, the traditional May 1 holiday soon turned—and burned—into a distress call. Unfortunately, the winds were too high and the ground too dry. Within hours, more and more acres were devoured by flames with red-hot embers blowing ahead of the leading edge. In time, the fast moving fire grew too hot for firefighters to approach. So intense was its temperature that it even began creating its own heat lightning. Eventually, emergency personnel had another name for the Fort McMurray wildfire: The Beast.
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Categories:
Helicopter Sectors
Human Interest
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Aug
15
2016
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Posted by Admin
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I have just finished a day's contract flying and am now driving back home on a four-hour trip. I’m a little fatigued, but mostly just bored. I need new energy in the car. Fortunately, I have a phone interview scheduled to begin now with Don Wharton, REACH Air Medical Service’s director of business development. With both cruise control and phone speaker on, I start my phone's voice recorder and make the call. Wharton answers and his enthusiasm immediately comes flooding into my car—goodbye boredom!
I ask him, "In your own words, what's the Reach mission?" Without hesitation, Wharton replies, "Right across the ranks, it's our obsessive focus on safe and efficient transportation of our patients and always doing right by them in every situation. Depending on the situation, sometimes we substitute the word 'patient' with community, partner, or customer, but we are committed to the high-road process that produces the best result."
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Categories:
Company Profiles
Helicopter Sectors
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Jul
04
2016
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Posted by Admin
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Congratulations! You’ve graduated from owning a 30 year old, second-hand, twin-engine helicopter to a spanking new Airbus Helicopters H175, AgustaWestland AW189, Sikorsky S-76D, or some other next-generation rotorcraft equipped with the latest systems. Now that you own this machine, where are you going to have it serviced? Is the MRO that kept your aging helicopter flying able to do the same for your shiny new helicopter? If not, how can you find service before it’s too late?
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Categories:
Helicopter Sectors
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Jul
04
2016
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Posted by Admin
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RPMN: What is your current position?
I’ve just recently accepted the position of chief pilot at Sundance Helicopters in Las Vegas. This means I’m now responsible for the hiring, training, and scheduling of pilots under CFR part 135. We have anywhere between 35 and 60 pilots, depending on the time of year, which makes it a major challenge to balance the needs of the operation versus the needs of the human operating the helicopter. I work with a bunch of good people though, so I’m looking forward to leading the troops for the foreseeable future.
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Categories:
Human Interest
Training
Helicopter Sectors
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Jun
28
2016
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Posted by Admin
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If your answer to that question is “Yes,” but you are concerned about funding, or if the answer is “No,” but you want to turn that no into a yes, then this is the article for you.
Ever since helicopters first entered law enforcement in the 1940s, agencies have been facing the fiscal challenge of how to fund such capital-intensive assets. Agencies have historically—and in many cases, automatically—assumed that purchasing an aviation unit is the only way have one. This approach relies heavily upon a significant capital budget allocation that may only be available during periods characterized by: (1) a sound economy, (2) a growing population, and (3) a generally prosperous citizenship to absorb the requisite increase in taxes. Unfortunately, the timing that dictates the need for an air asset may not coincide with all of these conditions being met.
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Categories:
Helicopter Sectors
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Jun
21
2016
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Posted by Admin
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For several decades now, illegal immigration and security along the Mexican border has been a political hot potato for citizens and legislators alike. Politicians have thrown it back and forth, hoping the potato would cool. Well, thanks to a certain 2016 U.S. presidential candidate turning up the heat, it seems the illegal immigration issue is hotter than ever. The fall of 2015 found Donald J. Trump making statements like, “Not only will we (the U.S.) build a wall on the Mexican border, but Mexico will pay for it.” That, and many other soundbites, turned a political potato into a political fireball, and the issue is once again on the American public’s front burner.
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Categories:
Company Profiles
Helicopter Sectors
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Jun
13
2016
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Posted by Admin
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Last month, the Professional Helicopters Pilots Association put out a statement regarding the Los Angeles Area Helicopter Noise Coalition (LAAHNC) Ongoing Efforts to Solicit Complaints Against Helicopter Noise which read:
The Professional Helicopter Pilots Association is troubled with the LAAHNC’s ongoing efforts to solicit helicopter complaints from Los Angeles residents. Although we encourage people to utilize the Federal Aviation Administration’s automated helicopter noise complaint system when they are bothered by helicopter noise, it appears the LAAHNC may be encouraging people to “game” the system and make multiple complaints on single incidents or simply complain about any sort of noise and attribute that noise to helicopters. The LAAHNC also continues to proclaim that no progress with regard to helicopter noise has been made.
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Categories:
Regulatory
Helicopter Sectors
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Jun
06
2016
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Posted by Admin
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For the aerial firefighting industry, 2016 is evolving into a transitional year. Fleet modernization is accelerating along with retirements of aging, legacy aircraft.
Specifically, operators are focusing on technology which will enhance safety, reliability, and capabilities. To cite one example, Helimax Aviation is in the final assembly stages of a 2,500 gallon internal water tank installation on its former US Army CH-47D Chinooks, with FAA certification anticipated by June 15th of this year. Upon certification, the tank is to be installed in its two Chinooks for the 2016 fire season, with USFS approval.
The system will be capable of multiple drops of varying capacity on the same spot, drawing water from sources as shallow as 18 inches. Turnaround times will be reduced, given the greater volume of water compared to the 2,000 gallon bucket system currently used. Other advantages include less downtime attributed to bucket failures, and long-line problems.
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Categories:
Helicopter Sectors
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May
31
2016
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Posted by Admin
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Once the stuff of science fiction, unmanned helicopters are increasingly becoming a part of daily life. For instance, the U.S. Department of Defense’s Fire Scout unmanned helicopter program, using both the small MQ-8B and the Bell 407-derived MQ-8C, provides the Navy’s littoral combat ships (LCS) with eyes in the sky that enhance both situational awareness and precision targeting. Furthermore, the Lockheed Martin/Kaman Aerospace K-MAX unmanned helicopter has distinguished itself by flying unmanned cargo missions for the Marines in Afghanistan, and is also being configured to support civilian applications such as firefighting, forest management, humanitarian aid, and oil & gas industry support. Meanwhile, about 2,400 Yamaha RMAX remotely controlled helicopters are being employed for crop-dusting around the world. Yamaha is also teaming with Northrop Grumman to develop an autonomous RMAX for the military called the R-Bat (Rotary Bat) for intelligence gathering.These are just some of the unmanned helicopters in use today, with more in development.
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Categories:
Helicopter Sectors
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Feb
22
2016
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Posted by Admin
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Last year was difficult: stock market volatility, Eurozone volatility, financing volatility, and for those of us in the helicopter industry—oil price volatility. Just why is the price of oil so important to helicopter values? The answer goes back almost 70 years.
In 1948, oilmen and fur trappers in Louisiana were in a dispute about the oilmens’ marsh buggies (used to reach drill sites) trampling muskrat breeding grounds ... and in turn the trappers’ livelihood. A very young Bell Helicopters brought in a demonstrator to show how the oilmen could bypass the breeding grounds by replacing marsh buggies with helicopters. Bob Suggs took that idea and ran with it, forming Petroleum Helicopters Inc (PHI). From there, helicopters found full-time work in the oil fields. PHI still remains a strong presence in offshore oil & gas, although they have been surpassed in size in the intervening decades by Bristow Group and CHC Helicopters.
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Categories:
Helicopter Sectors