Today my lesson was started with ground school. We addressed the emergency procedures for , ground resonance, stuck or inoperable anti torque pedals, settling with power and loss of tail rotor effectiveness. As with most emergency procedures with helicopters it is best to learn what can cause these emergency situations and stop the problem before it becomes a problem. The main nugget of knowledge that I gleaned from todays ground class was that the tail rotors only job is to counteract the torque from the main rotor. So if you have an problem at all with the tail rotor and your heading starts to change undesirably just remove the torque of the main rotor system by letting off on the throttle. And if all else fails autorotation!!!
For todays flight lesson high altitude reconnaissance, and maintaining flight speed during climb and decent and maintaing altitude while varying speed. I also continued to review and practice all the things I've so far. For start up I performed the whole task, then executed a lift off to hover, a hover taxi to pad six and running take off. Today we flew out east of Auburn on top of the ridge to introduce high altitude reconnaissance. This is maneuver that is performed 500 ft above ground level (AGL) and consists of making a right hand turn in a circle around an object such as a potential landing spot so that the pilot can stair out of his window and take in an pertinent information about the spot. I practice 2 full circles around 2 different spots before heading back to Boeing Field. On the way back I have done the coolest thing in my life to date. Just west of the white river amphitheater we dropped down to the white river river bed and buzzed the river for a good 2 miles. This stuff is better than Xbox!!! It was such a blast cruising along at about 50 knots having to dodge trees that where sticking out of the bank and winding with the river toattly getting to feel the helicopter respond to your every input in a confined space....I was in heaven!:) So after the little adrenaline ride it was back to straight and level flight back to Boeing Field where I performed a normal approach to a hover over pad six, a hover taxi back to my landing spot and a set down from hover.
Due to my work schedule I will not fly again until the 6th of november. I am a little bummed because I feel as though I am getting the hang of fly and am enjoying it immensely!
