Why are helicopters always crashing?

'cuz someone tried to fly them, and we all know that's against the laws of physics. ;)
 
In college, I used to be afraid to fly in Helicopters.
Then I joined the Coast Guard, became an aircrewman, went to E City and learned all about helicopters and how they work.
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Now I'm afraid whenever one is flying overhead.

Just kidding of course. But as flying airplanes is to driving (in terms of attention to detail required and risks to manage), so is flying helicopters to flying airplanes.
 
A helicopter is a spinning collection of metal fatigue surrounding an oil leak.

Seriously, I don't think that actual rate of incidents with helicopters are higher than planes, but choppers have so much momentum that there probably is no such thing as a non-reportable incident.
You can gear-up a plane, or have an engine failure and put in in a field, and there's a good chance the incident will never meet reporting requirements for FAA or NTSB.

But with choppers, if anything goes out of plan, the chances are that the incident will rapidly be followed by dynamic disassembly of the rotorcraft.
 
Just from my small experience with helicopters I think there is a much greater exposure to having fender-bender type accidents which can result in more extensive damage than in an airplane. Hitting the wingtip on something while taxiing has fewer consequences than hitting the rotor or the tail. I don't know how normal this is, but during my training we frequently went to real confined areas, landed between trees and on hills. There's also the fact that you can move in any direction. In an airplane you usually don't need to worry about what is behind you except in the context of blowing it over.
 
Chuck Norris invented the helicopter. It was actually an airplane that was so afraid of him, it ripped its wings off and spun them around in an attempt to get out of his way.
 
denverpilot said:
Helicopters are thousands of broken parts hovering in loose formation around an oil leak.
Click to expand...

Fixed that for you.

Anyway, the real answer is because the helicopter pilots that crash are not keeping adequate separation between their aircraft and the hard objects with which they impact. :nono:
 
Reminds me of my college instructor (who WAS a helicopter pilot) who always said, "a helicopter is a collection of thousands of machine parts trying to commit suicide all at once--the pilot's job is to keep them from following through".:D
 
Why are helicopters always crashing?
















Because the pilot looked down. Duh, even Wile E. Coyote could tell you that. :crazy:
 
Because they don't file flight plans, of course.
 
My line has always been, "Thousands of spare parts, hovering in tight formation."
 
My grandpa has 5000 hrs in choppers. He flew Chinooks, Flying Banana's, and JetRangers in Vietnam, as well as a short stint flying people out to oil platform in Louisiana.

Just yesterday he was telling me he's "been to too many funerals" to ever step in a helo again. He said he was in Vietnam, on the chopper, ready to takeoff, when his commanding officer pulled up in a Jeep and was telling him to do something else (can't remember) and next day he heard the thing cam apart and everyone died. He's told me stories about factory new JetRanger tail booms falling off, and people being decapitated, in flight, by rotor blades.

Those would not be the first or last times he cheated death.
 
gcd89 said:
My grandpa has 5000 hrs in choppers. He flew Chinooks, Flying Banana's, and JetRangers in Vietnam, as well as a short stint flying people out to oil platform in Louisiana.

Just yesterday he was telling me he's "been to too many funerals" to ever step in a helo again. He said he was in Vietnam, on the chopper, ready to takeoff, when his commanding officer pulled up in a Jeep and was telling him to do something else (can't remember) and next day he heard the thing cam apart and everyone died. He's told me stories about factory new JetRanger tail booms falling off, and people being decapitated, in flight, by rotor blades.

Those would not be the first or last times he cheated death.
Click to expand...

Hart time buying that one...
 
Jaybird, it's entirely possible in an R22 or R44 if one gets way outside the normal envelope. Such a thing is possible in a low-G pushover (which is forbidden on Robbo's). The tailboom is most likely to get hit, but a cabin impact is possible. Check out Robinson's safety tips:

http://128.121.90.55/safety_tips.htm

Never push the cyclic forward to descend or to terminate a pull-up (as you would in an airplane). This may produce a low-G (near weightless) condition which can result in a main rotor blade striking the cabin. Always use the collective to initiate a descent.
Click to expand...
 
talk about biting the hand that feeds you....geez

I had no idea.
 
gcd89 said:
My grandpa has 5000 hrs in choppers. He flew Chinooks, Flying Banana's, and JetRangers in Vietnam, as well as a short stint flying people out to oil platform in Louisiana.

Just yesterday he was telling me he's "been to too many funerals" to ever step in a helo again. He said he was in Vietnam, on the chopper, ready to takeoff, when his commanding officer pulled up in a Jeep and was telling him to do something else (can't remember) and next day he heard the thing cam apart and everyone died. He's told me stories about factory new JetRanger tail booms falling off, and people being decapitated, in flight, by rotor blades.

Those would not be the first or last times he cheated death.
Click to expand...

First of all, a "chopper" is a motorbike.

Any machine misused and improperly operated can become dangerous. When in the hands of someone that respects their personal limits as well as the limits of the machine then they are both quite reliable.
 
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