Another Crashhawk is down in Iraq.

[afgeo4]

http://www.cnn.com/2007/WORLD/meast/08/22/iraq.main/index.html

No story on www.army.mil as of yet. Looks like they're only publishing the "feel good"s

Someone please tell me what the crash rates are for civillian versions of Sikorski's vs. the UH-60 models? I'm seriously worried about putting cadets on one of those things since so many crashes are blamed on MX.

[isuhawkeye]

dont forget the desert is increadibly harsh on airframes.  Your bound to have mechanical issues.

Dont write off the air frame becuase it has had issues in a desert combat environment. 


Id look at total air frame hours vs crash rate to get a truly objective comparison

[afgeo4]

dont forget the desert is increadibly harsh on airframes.  Your bound to have mechanical issues.

Dont write off the air frame becuase it has had issues in a desert combat environment. 


Id look at total air frame hours vs crash rate to get a truly objective comparison

Thanks... that's exactly what I'm looking for... the hours vs. crash rate on the civillian versions and military ones. I don't know if the services even publish such info, but they probably do, right?

I know that sand is hell on transmissions, engines, hydraulics and other systems. We didn't see these rates of failure during the first gulf war though. At least not that I know of. There were issues with the H-46 Sea Knight (now almost completely retired) for the Marines as well, but I'm not seeing many issues with the H-47 Chinook (which is in heavy operation), H-1 Iroquois (heavy ops with USMC) or any of the H-53 models. That and Sikorski losing out on many recent Pentagon contracts leads me to believe that they've been sub-par lately.

[Hawk200]

Night operations are tough in any environment, and those crews were probably flying with Night Vision Devices. Those make it all the more dangerous. And the temperatures over there are high even at night, another aspect that could have contributed.

If you're getting rides here in the States, they're probably going to be daytime only, VFR flights. There is virtually no unusual risk compared to the combat operations that are going on in the Sandbox.

[Flying Pig]

THereis nothing mechanically wrong with the UH-60.  Its the types of wartime missions that are flown that contribute to the crashes.  I know LA County Fire and several civilian fire contractors use the UH60 without incident.  8 years in the Infantry and I never had an issue in a military helicopter.

I had hydrolic fluid squirt me in the chest once.......but thats it.

[afgeo4]

THereis nothing mechanically wrong with the UH-60.  Its the types of wartime missions that are flown that contribute to the crashes.  I know LA County Fire and several civilian fire contractors use the UH60 without incident.  8 years in the Infantry and I never had an issue in a military helicopter.

I had hydrolic fluid squirt me in the chest once.......but thats it.

Sorry... but that's kinda like having chopper pilot comment on the reliability of the SAW ammo cans (they suck, a LOT). 

[Flying Pig]

Well, Im a helicopter pilot, and spent 8 years in the Infantry as a Machine gunner and am very familiar with the M249...

[afgeo4]

Didn't know you were a helo pilot. Makes sense now.

[NIN]

I spent 10 years in Army Aviation. CH-47 FE, UH-1, AH-1 & OH-58 CE, and an AH-64 mech.  IOW, nothing with a Sikorsky name on it.

Never been in a UH-60. Aim to keep it that way. Plucked waaay too many off of mountainsides and other odd locations. Its seldom MX, but in my day it was mechanical things that were known causes of issues. Oh, and pilot error.

26 years in a uniform w/o a ride on a Blackhawk Bus Bomber.  Not a coincidence or accident, either.

[MIKE]

I've flown in one once... I'm still alive.

[afgeo4]

I spent 10 years in Army Aviation. CH-47 FE, UH-1, AH-1 & OH-58 CE, and an AH-64 mech.  IOW, nothing with a Sikorsky name on it.

Never been in a UH-60. Aim to keep it that way. Plucked waaay too many off of mountainsides and other odd locations. Its seldom MX, but in my day it was mechanical things that were known causes of issues. Oh, and pilot error.

26 years in a uniform w/o a ride on a Blackhawk Bus Bomber.  Not a coincidence or accident, either.

When you say it's not MX, but mechanical, do you mean engineering defects?

[Skyray]

Did they ever find and solve the fly by wire control glitch?  We lost a Customs Blackhawk down in the Florida straights about ten years ago, and that was the probable cause, although the exact mechanics of it were never made public for OpSec considerations.

[NIN]

In the 1980s, UH-60s were raining from the skies.

One of the more well-publicized problems was that big honking whale-tail stabilator on the back.  As airspeed increases, the angle of incidence of the stabilator changes to help maintain good deck angle, among other things (Like speed trims in a Chinook, its there to help the aircraft stay more "streamlined" to the relative wind while the rotor system does its thing..).  The problem was, the actuator for the stabilator had this nasty tendency to drive the stabilator back to the "low speed" (trailing edge down) configuration when the helicopter was flying at a fairly "high speed."

Result? 

Uncommanded aircraft pitch down until the airframe meets with Mother Earth. 

No amount of aft cyclic could resolve it.  (this what I mean by "not MX." Maintenance problems, to me, are things like tools in the inlet or careless torquing or a failure to install a new engine when one is clearly needed.  Random "this thing gloms into the ground no matter what the pilot does" crap is a larger issue than pure maintenance)  The pilot could pull the stick all the way aft and depending on the airspeed, it would only change the speed and angle at which they hit the ground....

Consequently, UH-60s were limited to less than 80kts below 3000ft for the duration of my active duty enlistment.    That created a lot of problems with using UH-60s on multi-service AMTs and such, because everybody had to loiter to wait for the Crashhawks.

They eventually eliminated that problem, and others.

But I won't get on one.

[afgeo4]

I flew on an HH-60G once (USAF version) and uneventful except for the fact that my body wouldn't stop shaking for the rest of the day due to vibrations. Since then I've flown on HH-53's and UH-47 and they were cadillacs compared to the Hawk.

[Hawk200]

One of the more well-publicized problems was that big honking whale-tail stabilator on the back.  As airspeed increases, the angle of incidence of the stabilator changes to help maintain good deck angle, among other things .....The problem was, the actuator for the stabilator had this nasty tendency to drive the stabilator back to the "low speed" (trailing edge down) configuration when the helicopter was flying at a fairly "high speed."

Result? 

Uncommanded aircraft pitch down until the airframe meets with Mother Earth. 

No amount of aft cyclic could resolve it.  (this what I mean by "not MX." Maintenance problems, to me, are things like tools in the inlet or careless torquing or a failure to install a new engine when one is clearly needed.  Random "this thing gloms into the ground no matter what the pilot does" crap is a larger issue than pure maintenance)  The pilot could pull the stick all the way aft and depending on the airspeed, it would only change the speed and angle at which they hit the ground....

They eventually eliminated that problem, and others.

Learned about that in the schoolhouse at Eustiss. The stab actuator was prone to being activated by electrical interference. First fix was to shield the actuator, the second was to add a switch that was controlled off the cyclic. The SLEW switch returns it to an up position, and locks it into place. It works pretty well, but it's almost never needed now that the actuator is properly shielded.

[Sgt. Savage]

I don't think the Black Hawk is much different than most other military aircraft. It was designed to push the limits with calculated risks. Modifications have been made, as with all mil aircraft, to improve safety and function. None the less, in a combat arena, you'll have a higher failure rate for many reasons. Take into account that it's the most widely used vertical airframe in the Army and there you have it, higher malfunction occurrence.

JMHO

[NIN]

Learned about that in the schoolhouse at Eustiss. The stab actuator was prone to being activated by electrical interference. First fix was to shield the actuator, the second was to add a switch that was controlled off the cyclic. The SLEW switch returns it to an up position, and locks it into place. It works pretty well, but it's almost never needed now that the actuator is properly shielded.

Common Chinook crew taunt to the UH-60 guys was

"Hey, how can you get a Blackhawk to go faster than 80kts below 3000 ft?"

"Slingload it!"

[Skyray]

I almost never am comfortable in an aircraft that makes control movements on its own without my input.  In the early years we lost a number of Phantoms to uncontrollable nose down pitch right after take off.  Only after we recovered one of the pilots and analyzed his post mortem that the more he trimmed it nose up the more it pitched down did we look at the stabilator and find a bolt that would work loose and jam the actuator so that it moved in the opposite direction from the one selected.

[mikeylikey]

Saw on nightly news yesterday that one of the soldiers killed actually lost a brother a year before in a crash.  What is more disturbing is the chopper that was following had a soldier on board who was the third brother of the two deceased soldiers.  He had to watch his brother die.  He is now home and being discharged from the service.

[afgeo4]

Saw on nightly news yesterday that one of the soldiers killed actually lost a brother a year before in a crash.  What is more disturbing is the chopper that was following had a soldier on board who was the third brother of the two deceased soldiers.  He had to watch his brother die.  He is now home and being discharged from the service.

Wow... that's almost a "Saving Private Ryan" situation. Unbelievable and sad.