HELICOPTER A UTUMN 2009 / £3.99 LIFE www.helicopterlife.com Milk Tray Man HELICOPTER LIFEis theHIGH LIFE Autumn 2009 HELICOPTER LIFE COVER STORY Show & Tell Guide 4 Pakistan Army Aviation shows and conferences. Rescue 32 Rogier Westerhuis The Editor’s Letter 5 goes out to the Conway Saddle in Aerial Forum 6 & 10 the Karaktoum Mikhail Kazachkov on the state of Russian aviation Range in Pakistan and interviews the Letters to the Editor 7, 11 pilots who rescued the climber Tomaz Flying Crackers 8, 9 Humar from Nanga Parbat (Killer Mountain) World Air Games 12 Brantly B2B Brenda Nicoll Flight 40 reports on Caroline Thomas Skamljic Gough-Cooper and flies a Brantly David Monks B2B and looks at attempt to challenge the history behind the World Air this machine in Games Russian particular and champions Korotaev how it was rebuilt and Burov by its current owner Thomas New Technology 16 Wawrina. Updates on the Sikorsky X-2 and others Airbox Aerospace’s new moving map Flying without Wings 48 Georgina Hunter-Jones Cholmondeley Pageant of Power 18 flies the MT-O3 gyroplane at Chris Jones Georgina Hunter- Gyroplanes at Kirkbride in Cumbria and feels the Jones goes to fun of an open cockpit in the Lake District Cholmondeley to see how the event Mi26 in Afghanistan progressed, the cars Neil Walton 54 flew around the himself a fixed wing track and the heli - pilot and photogra - copters in the mili - pher from Canada tary games dropped flies with the Russian the fender built and owned Mil Mi-26T seeing how it What is the Risk? 22 flies while doing Ralph Arnesen on how to evaluate risk heavy lifting jobs in Afghanistan Paris Le Bourget 24 Helicopter Life Helicopters (and flyers) Past 62 visits Paris for Le Bourget Air Show and sees how Book Reviews 63 Bell Textron Helicopters are getting a new lease of Accident Reports 64 life and are fighting to regain their former place in House & Helicopter 66 the market HELICOPTER LIFE,Autumn 2009 3 SHOW & T ELL HELICOPTER G UIDE 16 September - 17 September 2009 LIFE PAVCON Police Aviation Conference Menzies Prince Regent AUTUMN 2009 Woodford Bridge, Essex UK HON. EDITORIAL BOARD Tel: + 44 (0)20 8144 1914 Captain Eric Brown, CBE, RN www.pavcon.org The Lord Glenarthur, DL Jennifer Murray 22 September - 24 September 2009 Michael J. H. Smith HELITECH 2009 Wing Cdr. Ken Wallis, MBE, RAF Duxford Airfield, Cambridge EDITOR-IN-CHIEF / PILOT England Georgina Hunter-Jones Contact Brandon Ward [email protected] Fax: +44 (0)20 8439 8853 CREATIVE DIRECTORS email: [email protected] [email protected] Website: www.helitech.co.uk COPY EDITORS Evangeline Hunter-Jones, JP John Wilson 29 September – 1 October , 2009 CONTRIBUTING EDITORS THE THIRD INTERNATIONAL Mikhail Kazachkov, Ralph Arnesen, Rogier HELICOPTER SAFETY SYMPOSIUM Westerhuis, Thomas Skamljic, Robin Dabrowa, Neil Walton, Brenda Nicoll, Gill Jenkins, Andy Zorin, Hotel Hilton Montréal Bonaventure, John Martin Montréal, Canada CONTRIBUTED PHOTOGRAPHY 450-971-6500 Ex 2787 Ralph Arnesen, Neil Walton, Rogier Westerhuis, Thomas Skamljic Andrey Zorin Robin Dabrowa, Email David Renzi [email protected] Brenda Nicoll, Milutsky Gennady, Gill Jenkins, http://www.hilton.com/en/hi/groups/personalized/Y Andrew Lysser ULBHHF-HEL-20090928/index.html. SPECIAL THANKS TO Dave Smith ATPL(H)IR, Robin Dabrowa 14 October – 16 October , 2009 ADVERTISING THE THIRD INTERNATIONAL BASIC Telephone: +44-(0)20-7430-2384 [email protected] RESEARCH ON ROTORCRAFT TECH SUBSCRIPTIONS Nanjing University of Aeronautics, Go to our website or turn to page 54 Nanjing, China [email protected] Contact: Professor GAO Aheng, NUAA, WEBSITE Tel. 86-25-84892120 www.helicopterlife.com email: [email protected] or COVER PHOTOGRAPH Professor Kenneth Brentner Mil Mi-171 with the TV3-117 VM engine Tel: (814) 865-6433 heavy lifting in Pakistan email: [email protected] by Rogier Westerhuis 21 February - 23 February 2010 HELICOPTER LIFE is published quarterly by FlyFizzi Ltd. HAI HELIExPO 2010 59 Great Ormond Street Houston, Texas London, WC 1N-3 HZ . Contact Helicopter Association International Copyright © FlyFizzi Ltd. 2009. ISSN 1743-1042. 1635 Prince Street, Alexandria, VA 22314 All rights reserved. Opinions expressed herein are not necessari - Phone: (703) 683-4646 Fax: (703) 683-4745 ly those of the pub lishers, the Editor or any of the editorial staff. [email protected] Reproduction in whole or in part, in any form whatever, is strict - ly prohibited without specific written permission of the Editor. 4 HELICOPTER LIFE, Autumn 2009 T HE EDITOR S LETTER s the credit crunch tightens, Super Sky Cycle, which is (appar - it seems that people are ently) almost ready to fly. The Alooking for many different Super Sky Cycle is produced in ways to keep flying, while also try - Boyd, Texas, and markets itself as ing to keep the price down. For the way to combine road transport some people this will mean switch - with a gyro. It says it is a flying ing from helicopters to aeroplanes, motorcycle, and it has a recom - for others it will mean changing mended maximum pilot weight of from a turbine helicopter to a piston 280lbs. The website is www.thebut - engine helicopter, for some it will terflyllc.com. mean moving across to try gyro - Then, just before we went to copters, and for others again it will press, a British family set the world involve looking at the increasing record for the longest solar-powered forms of ‘alternative aviation’, flight by a paramotor. including the flying car and the The Cardoza family and friends Flyke, the flying bike. flew from Monte Carlo to Morocco, time for gyros in any form, and so The flying car was at using four paramotors, three of the licences are national, and in the Cholmondeley giving a display. which were powered by bioethanol- UK that means the CAA. This particular model is made by fuelled engines, and one by lithium Coincidentally, I did a helicopter Parajet, has a car chassis, a pusher polymer batteries, which were PPL Skills Test on a pilot who had engine and a parachute-wing for charged in rotation using twelve been flying gyrocopters for twenty lift. It has recently flown from solar panels on top of the team’s years before he came to helicopters. London to Timbuktu in Africa. support vehicle. They wanted not Both he and his instructor said that Although most of the journey in only to show that this type of avia - he had a lot to unlearn: for example, Europe was actually done on the tion is viable, but also that it is quite in gyrocopters you keep your speed ground, once they were in Africa capable of being carbon neutral. up on landing, because allowing the they used the car’s flying capabili - All the flights also raised money speed to bleed off also kills off the ties more and more. for charity. lift. However, he thought it was eas - Parajet offer their own licences, The imagination and the drive to ier moving to helicopters from gyro - which can be done in Spain, get aviation entirely ‘clean’ as well copters than vice versa. although it is apparently possible to as useful is clearly there, but it still For Russians, used to the large get lessons in the UK. It is recom - needs time and money, both for size Mils and Kamovs, the mended, but not essential, that you research and for trials. Robinson family of helicopters pro - have a microlight licence. Although I didn’t get a chance to vides the smaller alternative, as we The Flyke, the flying bike, fly any of the more esoteric alterna - see from Mikhail Kazachkov’s arti - recently flew the full length of tives to helicopters, Chris Jones cle on the possible future develop - Britain with a schoolteacher, John Gyroplanes at Kirkbride in Cumbria ment of Russian aviation. He looks Carver, at the pedals. He flew from did invite me to fly the MT-O3 at how safe and cost effective the Land’s End to John O’Groats, and gyroplane. Robinson machines are, compares took eleven days to make the 800- It was a brilliant experience. I them with the development of cars, mile (1,300 km) journey. The Flyke really enjoyed flying the MT-O3, and urges the Russian authorities to is made in Germany, and accepted but I was surprised to find how dif - look again at how they might use all over the world, according to the ferent it was from helicopter flying: these machines to their advantage, website. The parachute wing can be in some situations your natural heli - and to that of their people. It is a stored when you are not flying, and copter instincts are actually the really enlightening article. the bike can then be ridden in the wrong thing to do in a gyrocopter, normal manner. The Fresh Breeze as you will see in the article. Flyke has a parachute-wing, but if One surprising thing about gyro - you want something more like an planes is that their licences are not autogyro then there is also the European. Apparently EASA had no HELICOPTER LIFE, Autumn 2009 5 A ERIAL FORUM New Philosophy of Helicopter Application Mikhail Kazachkov, Chairman of the Helicopter Industry Association of Russia, writes about the future choices for Helicopter flying in Russia he success or failure of a helicopter project is almost Robinsons had previously (64%) had nothing to do with avi - always directly related to the personality of its cre - ation. It wasn't the love of the sky per se that attracted them Tator. Thus, the appearance of Eurocopter, now one of into this new community, but other reasons that are no less the leaders in helicopters, became possible thanks to the worthy — they like to be free, and to have at their disposal felicitous tandem of Jean-Fracouis Bigay and Siegfried new possibilities for business management.