As part of
my accident forensics studies in particular the course on real world
investigation I have been asked observe the world around me and reflect on a
personal or news event unfolding.
The items I
have to reflect on are:
·
The contextual Lens myself and others wear;
·
The influence this may have on how the situation
is perceived by various parties
·
How these factors might ultimately influence the
outcome of the event.
Me and
reflecting on things don’t really go together let alone reflecting on a personal
issues. So maybe it’s time to give it a go.
I was having
a few issues trying to come up with a simple event to base my blog on. As luck
should have it (Well I was fairly lucky I guess) I was involved in an aviation
incident late yesterday afternoon.
We were
conducting an ordinary helicopter flight, finishing up our day we had to
complete a Refuel. The refuelling went without problem and we were set to
depart 15 minutes prior to last light. We lifted and started to depart
following the runway. Three Quarters down the runway we receive a Master
Caution Light for a Rotor Brake Activation. A rotor brake is similar to your
hand brake on your car however in a helicopter it is used to slow the main
rotor down once the engines are shut off. Luckily there were still a few
minutes of daylight left and we were able to abort the take-off at the end of
the runway and quickly land the helicopter.
The problem
with getting a rotor brake activation in flight is it has the potential to slow
down the only thing keeping you in the air the main rotor and also the friction
caused is likely to start a fire.
Had this
occurred at night we would have had to take the problem into the air and take
several minutes to get back onto the ground. Even worse if this happened over
the open ocean and we did experience the speed of the main rotor decreasing or
a fire warning we would have had to have ditched the aircraft into the water at
night.
That would
have been worse case scenario luckily the fault was only found to be a problem
with the switch in the rotor brake handle and not actually the rotor brake
coming on in flight.
Now there
were two people directly involved in this incident. The helicopter pilot and
the crewman (Me). There were several other people not directly involved in this
incident the Air Traffic Controller in Brisbane and our company flight
monitoring staff in Canberra.
I’ll start
with my actual lens:
Being fairly
new to the helicopter side of Aviation I did not realise the issues associated
with this kind of problem. Also to add to my complacency we quite often had
problems with the rotor brake light on the ground after doing a rotor brake
test. Every time the engineers would come out and fix something and the problem
would go away for a few weeks.
So my lens
when this incident was occurring and my though process involved
·
Master Caution Light this must be serious
·
Rotor Brake Light ahh that’s nothing it happens
all the time on the ground
·
It’s been a big day let’s just go home.
·
The captain is turning around it must be serious.
·
If something does go wrong what do I have to do?
The Captain this day was an experienced
ex-military helicopter pilot with thousands of hours on helicopters.
His possible
lens and thoughts.
·
What’s the Master Caution for?
·
Rotor Brake Light is this an indication error or
is it a real issue?
·
Do I take this problem into the air and sort it
out?
·
Is there any secondary indications?
·
How much daylight do I have left?
·
Is the helicopter secure?
·
If I have to force land where?
·
Where is the wind?
·
What is the cloud base?
·
What available emergency services are there?
Air Traffic
Control & Company Flight tracking were other parties not directly involved
in the event but were still monitoring out flight path. These guys and girls
are stuck in a location not able to physically see the aircraft but are
monitoring every move we make to ensure we are safe and if something does go
wrong they know where to come look for us.
From their
end all they may have possibly seen is the helicopter marker on their computer
screen and the helicopter taking off and making a sharp descending turn back to
the aerodrome. The ATC controller received a brief radio call stating that we
were returning to the airport and that was all. From this radio call the
controller may have thought
·
They forgot something they are just going back
·
Having seen the helicopter perform a sharp
descending turn may have though that the helicopter had gone into an
uncontrolled spin, Fire on board, Hijacking?? The list goes on.
All this from a simple radio call and
a dot on a computer screen.
All these
different lenses had the opportunity to ultimately affect the outcome of the
event.
My Lens:
· It’s just an
indication error let’s keep going… What if it wasn’t just an indication error?
I’d probably be floating around in the ocean somewhere.
The Captains
Lens:
· Let’s turn around and land just in case. May
have ultimately saved the crew and the airframe.
