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As soon as that tail rotor hits ANYTHING, it's all over.
As an aside nice camera work by the OP. Thankfully I saw it muted. Second watch was with sound so I could hear the chopper. French screaming confirmed.
I'm not exactly a helicopter guy, but I think that might have been what they call settling woth power. Vortecies on the rotor kill the lift when you decend through your own rotor wash.
I've flown helicopters before, and that's exactly what I thought as well. Either that, or a serious misjudgement by the pilot.
Yeah, also not an expert, but you can see the weird acceleration & how suddenly it got lift again.
Is there a reason why the scoop has to be attached so close to the helicopter? Feels like just a couple of meters of slack could make a difference in performing that maneuver. Of course I'm not sure about the physics of it; extra weight, extra points of failure, but if it could save the helicopter and potentially lives of crew, surely it's better for the scoop/attachments to fail so they can fight fires another day?
I'm not any kind of expert, but it seems to me the longer the line the more the bucket will act like a pendulum, especially when it's full.
I get that could be an issue but I've seen helicopters with much longer scoops flying about. Granted they were mostly military or fire rescue with similar design clearly meant to lift much more weight - hence why my thoughts went the route of weight limitations.
Not a pilot, but I feel that might make takeoff and landing more risky though. Long ropes and helicopter rotors dont mix well.
Heli-nerd here. Long lining is actually very common and the recommended way of doing heli lifts. Long lines can vary between 25 feet and 400 feet.
Damn, I wonder how the pilot got caught up on that? Here in California, a firefighting helicopter dipping like that happens a hundred times a day in the summer and there has never been such a crash.
Edit: it looks like the error happened just before/right when the video starts. The pilot dropped waaaay too fast and didn’t give enough time for the ground effect to reduce before going in for a dip. There was no saving that crash like 10 seconds before it happened.
Not an expert, but I suspect they descended into their own vortex, and went into a vortex ring state, and subsequently lost lift.
Wow. Really puts into perspective how risky that maneuver is in the first place. It's probably worth the risk if it's effective at fighting fires, but you have to get the height just right to scoop the water without crashing.
More the angle of approach & hope for normal crosswinds.
Edit - Whoops wasn't meant to be a response to you
that two little birds on the bottom..
Crazy fucking video !
this post was submitted on 25 Aug 2025
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