plane, meet helicopter

I was sure this was gonna be another damn gyrocopter thread.....

 

Wait 9 months

 

We are gonna find out that this whole Washington DC thing was an elaborate stunt put on by a shadowy cabal of gyrocopter manufacturers who did it to raise awareness of gyrocopter industry and sell them to a new generation of cheapskate aviation enthusiasts.

 

That ^^^ is one of the more clever things I have read in awhile.

 

What does this quote mean... in the article?

"The plane, an Aero Commander 685 fixed wing multi-engine aircraft manufactured in 1974, had a registration status that indicated it “may not be suitable for operation,” according to the FAA’s website."

 

See https://www.faa.gov/licenses_certificates/aircraft_certification/aircraft_registry/registration_status/

It appears the ownership of the plane was transferred in October and the registration paperwork is still in process.

 

That's KTTV's (FOX11) chopper/and KCBS-KCAL's backup chopper. They have a sharing agreement... so I guess they're down to only one bird now. Not a good thing trying to cover all of Southern California.

 

I didn't think 685s were suitable for operation when they were new, let alone now. The good news is that it didn't catch fire, which is actually sort of remarkable for a 685.

 

Why so many cops?

 

Hadn't heard about that... have read about the wing spar fatigue issue (maybe that wasn't the 685).

 

Think of all the car chases that could go to waste.

 

Assuming that both were on the ground and the Commander was taxiing, how in the heck do you do that? It's not like he couldn't see the helo.....

 

690s have a wing spar issue. It's really a dissimilar metals issue. I don't know if the 685 has this or not, but it might.

The problem with the 685 are the geared engines, and their delicate nature and occasional tendency to burst into flames... which then spread through the wing. Sure, guys will tell you that if they're operated correctly, they're great, and I'm sure they are... until they're not.

I think the 685 may have had some issues with the routing of the fuel lines and the location of the turbochargers, but I don't recall exactly.

 

Doesn't look like the prop was turning, so I'm guessing it rolled away when no one was looking. Chalks $20 @ Sporty's...

 

Speaking of which, is Chalks still flying out of Miami down to the Islands?

 

Chocks= keep wheel from rolling
Chalk's Ocean Airways. No longer flying Grummans.

 

Iv'e slung many chocks around in my day and I saw a Chalks Fairchild 71 on floats in Miami in 1941. I have a picture of it somewhere.

 

I believe it was part of the mating ritual . . . to create a gyrocopter. There, I managed to find a way to work in the term "gyrocopter".

 

A vast [rotary] wing conspiracy...

 

Nice MV reference. I take the week off and this happens at my home town airport. Normally its Illegals running across the runway in the middle of the night that get the airport police in a tissy.

 

I'm still at a loss as to how that thing collected the helicopter, that's off Taxiway Bravo, in the area where the old (original) east/west runway was. You could hardly find a more open space on the airport if you tried.
Someone told me the pilot claimed "mechanical failure"... I wonder if that was before or after the collision...LOL