Near Wire Miss

[lineworker]

I must say that the course Skully told me to take last year saved my life today.

 

There was some excellent material about hardware, and I should remember the name of the instructor but can't just now, it was held in Calgary last fall, at a pretentious hotel that had bad coffee.

 

Today we were flying in the late afternoon, and it was clouding, just as we began our descent over a mountain top, looking ahead for obstacles, some light rain began to fall, sun and cloud at the same time, moments before it was a beautiful day, I asked my co-pilot in Chinese, gau ya shin? (powerline?) as we were descending into some steep mountains and he said, 'mayo' (none)

I don't believe any valley space exists without powerlines anymore, I so I scanned the horizon, up and far far to the right, about 2 km away on the ridge top about 1200 ft up, and I saw a tower, a power line tower, I stopped the heli in a hover 350 ft on the rad alt above the valley floor, just starting up the adjacent mountain, and followed the tower with my eyes, down the mountain, one tower, two towers, three towers, four, five..

I couldn't believe my eyes, the last tower was maybe 300 meters to my one oclock, maybe up another 300 feet, the color was almost the same as the hillside, a rusty brown mixed with dull aluminum color and with the light rain and cloud, we barely made it out..

The wires were completely invisible 200 meters in front of us, suspended with no markers, I shouted YO GAU YA SHIN!

We flew home and cursed long shadows and went early for dinner. Gross.

Gracious Skully

[3BX2]

Bob Feerst from http://www.helicoptersafety.com/ ?? Good course, I learned a lot as well !

[Iceman]

Thanks for sharing that Lineworker. The flying the wires course as mentioned should be mandatory as part of the PDM.

[Heizenberg]

So you have a non English speaking co-pilot? Why is this the case when there are so many low time Canadian pilots looking for work?

[skullcap]

He's in China. And you are most welcome there Lineworker. Here is to another day!

[tin lizzie]

And good on you for learning Chinese! Or are you of Chinese heritage? If no, how long were you in country before you had passable language skills?

[sirlandsalot]

So you have a non English speaking co-pilot? Why is this the case when there are so many low time Canadian pilots looking for work?

 

 

No, He is a Candaian over seas's taking thier jobs. I wonder if they are acting like you? Or do they know that he is there to improve the level of saftey with the local pilots?

 

Back to the topic.....That course is excellent, I went into it thinking "oh boy, another course" and came out of it humbled and in amazment at how little I knew about "flying in the wires"

[lineworker]

Without the training to see the hardware/insulators, and know what they look like as they change direction, so as to know where the next tower is and so forth, we like to think we'd have just hovered there forever and not made the mistake to keep going.

 

Yes, I think it was Bob Feerst, as you said.

 

There are no markers on the lines here, the linemen I saw on construction towers aren't wearing harnesses. Neither do the crane limb swampers, there are so many.

 

I remember reading that during the world cup many of these people would fall asleep and some would fall 10 stories or more because they watched soccer all night.

 

Chinese is hard. Harder than Hindi to learn. Much harder than Spanish.

[Helilog56]

So you have a non English speaking co-pilot? Why is this the case when there are so many low time Canadian pilots looking for work?

 

Your really going to be a great contributor and make friends with your first post I see....!!!!

[helicopterjim]

Don't worry Bob ... he might just be a low time Canadian pilot looking for work and feels it is better to complain than to look for work.