61 Lessons From The Sky
Military Helicopters
Fletcher McKenzie
61 Lessons From The Sky
STORIES & LESSONS FROM
61 PILOTS & CREW FROM NINE MILITARIES
AROUND THE WORLD
RAF, RCAF, RAAF, UK ARMY
USAF, USCG, USN, USARMY, USMC
Copyright 2020 by Fletcher McKenzie
A catalogue record for this book is available from the National Library of New Zealand.
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems, without written permission from the publisher, except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.
First Edition
ISBN 978-0-9951421-38 (Paperback edition)
ISBN 978-0-9951421-21 (Ebook edition)
Published by Squabbling Sparrows Press
PO Box 26 126, Epsom, Auckland 1344
New Zealand
Also by Fletcher McKenzie
51 Lessons From The Sky (US Air Force)
61 Lessons From The Sky (Military Helicopters)
71 Lessons From The Sky (Civilian Helicopters)
72 Lessons From The Sky (Cessna 172)
81 Lessons From The Sky (General Aviation)
101 Lessons From The Sky (Commercial Aviation)
I dedicate this book to Ben Pryor and Scott McKenzie.
Thanks for being you.
Blue skies.
The fact that... helicopters are eagerly sought in large numbers by air forces, armies and navies all over the world serves to underscore their value.
Bill Gunston and Mike Spick
Modern Fighting Helicopters
1998
Contents
The combat frequency was to be kept clear of all but strategically essential messages, and all unenlightening comments were regarded as evidence of funk, of the wrong stuff. A Navy pilot (in legend, at any rate) began shouting, Ive got a MiG at zero! A MiG at zero!meaning that it had manoeuvred in behind him and was locked in on his tail. An irritated voice cut in and said, Shut up and die like an aviator.
Tom Wolfe The Right Stuff
Military aviators are, well, just different.
We try to constantly juggle the challenges and physics of flight itself with complex, hazardous and capacity sapping missions, often flying platforms with crippling workload issues due to lack of investment and invariably away from the comforts of home for extended deployments. Were also inheritors of a long and proud tradition of being taciturn and confident; the choice of that quote from The Right Stuff at the top of this forward is deliberate. As military aviators were supposed to be made of The Right Stuff, as fearless as a Bader, Olds or Steinhoff and as cocky and irreverent as a Pete Maverick Mitchell or a Kara Starbuck Thrace. Whether we like it or not, there is a public image of our trade which brings with it implied and perceived pressures. Its a caricature thats often difficult or even impossible to live up to.
Youre not pretty, but youre safe
Tony Muncer, QFI, on sending 17-year-old me solo
For the first half of my flying career, flying the CH-47 Chinook, I was guided by the senior shags on the squadron, invariably to be found in the crew room drinking coffee and reading a paper (or outside smoking). Aviators of comparatively junior rank who seemed implausibly old to still be flying operational sorties, had acquired deep reservoirs of knowledge and were either skilled or lucky simply because they were still here and not a name on a memorial wall. When they spoke, we listened. Often, they would make a semi-opaque reference to an accident or incident from which lessons could be extracted giving us tyros the opportunity to seek out and read the Accident Report. We contented ourselves with a well that wont happen to me! mentality, yet the same accidents seemed to keep happening
The second half of my military service saw a fundamental change. Firstly, the old and bold aviators disappeared from crew rooms with almost indecent haste. Many simply worn out by seemingly endless deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan. There came a tipping point where their love of the flying and the Service was overtaken by the needs of the self and the family. The value of these oracles has been recognised by the RAF, who now advertise for former aircrew to return as non-flying Squadron Uncles to advise the new crews, Junta, and middle/senior management, in the hope of passing down valuable lessons of the air, and, indeed, of the ground, as many have been Flight and Squadron commanders in their previous service.
Secondly, our approach to open reporting and a Just Culture has been transformed. In the late 90s, I learned about flying from boozy tales of near misses in the weekly Happy Hour in the Officers Mess loquacity being significantly enhanced after a few pints. The decline of the Drinking Culture has meant that these, often hushed, conversations are now rarer. Fortunately, the Open Reporting System has taken up much of this slack. Individuals are now inculcated during their flying training into the need to report honest mistakes, without fear of heavy censure unless they committed a deliberate nefarious act for personal gain.
And this is the rub.
Were not all Baders or Mavericks. Were just humans with human failings. As military aviators, in flight safety, as in combat, we should be watching each others sixes. We should put our hands up when we make an error, and not feel fear in calling out a dangerous trend, tendency or action if we see it. With fewer aircraft we simply cannot afford the attrition that previous generations grudgingly acknowledged as being part of the job. We can, and must, do better.
Fly and fight safe.
Paul Foo Kennard
Paul Kennard served 22 years in the Royal Air Force as a helicopter pilot, flying the CH-47 Chinook in Northern Ireland, Bosnia, Kosovo, Iraq and Afghanistan. He was a Qualified Helicopter Tactics Instructor (QHTI), Electronic Warfare Instructor (EWI) and served for 5 years on the Rotary Wing Operational Evaluation and Training Unit as both an Operational Test and Evaluation Pilot and Staff QHTI. He also served as a Capability Requirements Manager for the Chinook and as a Technology Manager for the Air Domain, specialising in Helicopter Degraded Visual Environment (DVE), Aircraft Survivability Equipment (ASE), UAV technology and aircrew protection systems. Upon leaving the RAF in 2015, he established Ascalon Defence Consultancy Ltd, where he provides specialist technical advice and project support into industry and assorted government and NATO agencies. He is a contributor to Forbes.com and contributing editor to the Heli-Ops family of magazines.
Prologue
Fletcher McKenzie
I am lucky enough to work with or on helicopters almost everyday of my life, mainly with machines based in the military or being ex military machines or parts from Allison M 250-C20b engines, Safran fuel injectors to overhauled Breeze Eastern winches. I also have been very lucky to be able to commercialise military technology and licence military design intellectual property, giving us the ability to add value and innovate these designs for various helicopters in service with militaries around the world. We have been able to innovate and market an ultra light armour floor for the NH90 and AW109 helicopters. I get to work with current and ex military helicopter pilots and engineers, one of which I asked him to do the introduction, thanks Foo. You can read more from him in HeliOps Magazine.
