So I dropped in and said, "Hi!" this morning.
I worked out that Erickson Air Cranes put out fires by expeditiously carrying this fire extinguisher to the site of the blaze. At least, I think that's how it works. That must be it, why else would a fire extinguisher be sitting on the grass in front of two turbine engines with exhausts big enough to raise a family in?
There's no beauty, subtlety, or finesse about the aircrane, unless you think about it in pure engineering terms -- which, of course, you must. 9000 hp twin turbine helicopter slurping 500 gph of Jet-A1 lifting up to 14,000 lb of cargo. The whole thing looks like a gantry with helicopter bits bolted to it, which is essentially an accurate observation.
Preflight involves a longish checklist, from warning annunciators through to running up the APU. Do it at the start of the day so you can be off quickly if there's a fire call. Two pilots, two mechanics, and a crew chief. Serious operation.
Checklist completed, and Rob had time to answer a bunch of stupid questions. I learned a lot. Especially about the gyro stability systems, which sound a lot like cheating to me. I approve.
This is what a fake helicopter pilot looks like. See the way he has his hands on the controls, as if he has even the slightest chance of doing anything useful with them? Idiot doesn't even have his seatbelt done up. Yeah, fake. That guy, dammit.
Here's what the real helicopter pilot looks like. He says his day job involves flying such a massive badass hardcore aircraft that it compensates for the fact that he flies a nosewheel RV. At least, I think that's what he said. Meh, details
Exterior shot, showing what a dwarf looks like next to a normal-size helicopter, scaled up.
Rob says they always have people coming through wanting a look, and a large part of the job involves giving tours. So I felt a bit less bad about being a distraction if there are lots of other people to dilute me.
I took one of the mechanics for a fly up the Bankstown VFR lane to the Northern Beaches and back. Cessna 152 pilot from Greece, mildly astonished at how far we went in such a short amount of time when he looked at the map afterwards, RV grin newly installed. No photos, they're on his camera, maybe I'll see them later.
Rob's returning to the US on Thursday. If you're an RV person in the Sydney basin, you know where to go.
- mark
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