Light Icing

[Skids Up]

A hundred years ago, (and the memory starts to fade) Okanagan had a jet ranger, I believe, in Norman Wells coming home and picked up some ice. then picked up a vibration, then landed, (all in quick order) then found that 3 of the 4 lugs on the TR gearbox were broken off and the 4th one cracked. :shock: :shock:

 

Something like that - as I said the memory fades..... Maybe someone knows the 'rest of the story' :blur:

 

Sometimes we push a bit farther than we should, sometimes we get caught, sometimes we don't. No times should we go and try to make a living in it. :down:

 

There are a lot better ways to be the "nice guy" on any job. Besides, you make me look like a wuss for not doing it...

[VERTICAL REF]

Hey Treetopper,

 

Could u email me that picture of the snow covered 61 dash. In 20 years of aviation that is one of the most amazing pictures I have seen yet! Gotta be a great story behind that one .

 

Tks.

[Jet B]

About 8 years ago I was swinging bags up near Zama Lake, Alberta -35'C. Staging was about 5 minutes from where I was bagging and some ice fog started to roll in fast.

 

I headed right back because I knew what was happening on my blades even though the visibility was about a mile still and I had no ice on the windows. I had a full load of bags too, which I was getting ready to pickle if I started losing power.

 

Staging was also camp on this job and when I was about 20 seconds away I started to require more power to maintain altitude, I greased the bags down in staging and landed then went and changed my shorts.

 

The lesson I learned from this is that the ice building at first from the inboard end is only destroying your autorotative ability, you won't notice any loss of power in normal flight until the last 2 feet of the blade get the ice. You will also start losing power amazingly fast once it hits your vital area. (In a Hughes 500 anyway). There are so many small factors that decide when and how fast it sticks that it's just best to stay out of any fog at all below 0'C. Also don't forget your engine anti-ice even if it's above 0'C...

 

I only had about a half inch of clear ice on the leading edge of the blade all the way from root to tip, but I'm sure if it took any longer it would have been more.

 

I made sure to leave myself a mental option of what I will do in case... I had decided to try for staging and if I noticed a power loss I would ditch my bags, land and build a fire and wait for a ski-doo ride back to camp.

[arctic_front]

here is a story on a similar line: pilots, who shall remain nameless. and a total bonehead, had been told by other pilots more familiar with local weather conditions....( Inuvik ) that the weather was crappy, icing ect....nobody else was flying. This bonehead decides to 'go anyway'....flies a 206 with 4 pax to Herschal Is. on the arctic coast. pilot is dressed for a windy fall day in T.O. passengers are smart enough to dress warm. they are close to destination, but machinme begins to shake and fly like crap. pilots makes destination, shuts down and discovers blades are iced up big-time, ( no big surprise ) and while he is trying to chip it off, three polar bears arrive on scene and staret licking their lips at the smorg awaiting them in that little tin box. passengers sat scared out of their wits inside the machine, pilot dressed in summer clothes outside trying to clean blades...watching bears over shoulder.....sounds like fun, eh? TRUE STORY!

 

needless to say, the passengers were not impressed!

 

Icing?...why bother? why risk it?...polar bear snack?...not ME!

 

I'm sure AOG will never do it again, right?

[Helilog56]

So......AOG.....Did you "learn" anything from all this?

[cap]

A.O.G --------"Mr. A.O.G., would you please share with this court your reasons and justifcation for proceeding as you did? I caution you first though, that there are expert authorities in your profession in attendance in this courtroom".

 

If you got a ready answer that you honestly believe would be accepted by that court or any court and jury, then proceed with your plans. If you don't have that ready answer, then find it. If you can't find it.......

 

 

Reference: Carswell's "Canadian Case Law" and Treetopflyer.

[A.O.G]

Hello boyz, It's me the dumb ***

 

First off I read everyone of the posts THANK YOU.

 

Sorry that I havn't been online to justifiy my actions. But THANK YOU EVERYBODY for passing on your experiences and ramifacations of flyin in icing conditions!! There all welcome thats why we're here. As much as we would (or I might think) we do not know it all! There is always somthing to learn right? One quoet that has always stuck in my mind is "when the time comes that you think you know it all it's time to shut her down" (By my farther god bless him!). Even he would be shaking at me, as well probablly give me a back hand up side the head!

 

Cap, I could write down everything that lead up to the chain of events that took place at this time but it would take alot of paragraphs ... no I can't justifiy the reasons for the actions that i took that would find me inoccent in this court, i could go into all the detaials of how the A/C was picking up ice (when I say light I mean light...powerlines wern't on this prospect) .

 

56 the answer is yes...but i'm glad that I brought it up,where else would you get feedback like this?

 

Personally I thought that this was a very good learning tool and once again thank you everybody for sharing your thoughts. When it comes down to it X amount of people have read this post (some replied and some did not and some said you stupid #*@#) but we've all learn't somthing, (don't post stupid #### you've done on the internet sorry cp's don't hold it against me).

 

anyways, she's late and I must get some sleep.

 

A.O.G

[RDM]

I beleive he just said that he &%¤#ed up.

 

Takes a good man to admit a mistake like that, especially in front of this crew.

[Reddog]

I think he is also saying he has taken enough of a beating and I think he's right. He has taken a **** of a pasting and is still in good humour and I'll bet he won't try to emulate the errors of others anymore.

[DGP]

Hey there treetopflyer...that picture of the 61 full of snow reminded me of a 205 we had in pickle lake in the early 90's...after a 5 day blizzard.I spent the whole day getting snow out of the inside,the hellhole was packed solid,as was the inside of the tailboom.The picture of the gazelle reminded me of the 206 a buddy of mine flew in to Pickle from Red lake after I had warned him not to come over...he spent the better part of two days getting the ice off the blades.I also have had lots to do with ice...lets stay out of it....scares the bejesus out of me.