Apache crash in Afghanistan

[Dolomite_supafly]

I have watched this video over and over again. People are saying that they were hot dogging and caused the accident. But it seems like there should have been enough lift to keep it off the ground. But I am not a pilot so I don't know.

Maybe someone else with some knowledge might shed some light on it.

Maybe the air being thinner might have added to crash.

Dolomite

[Dolomite`s Breezy]

Horrid.. I hate seeing stuff like that...

[LI0NSFAN]

I saw this and was amazed they did not hit the building. I don't know a whole lot about military helicopters, my mother worked as an air rescue nurse so I asked her and she said it could happen in the right things align. She said if they banked to sharp up they would drop like turbulance in a plane. So if the air was thinner she said she could see it not regaining itself. She also added that the guys flying this should have known this and unless the were having trouble before they passed the building they should have never came in that low and tried to bank that sharp.

[scoutfsu]

They mushed the climb, the altitude made the air thin, and the snow threw off their depth perception. Notice when it hits, the rotor position is in a cone. They were pulling the #### out of the collective.....just a combination of environmental factors and pilot error. They are done as aviators and commissioned officers in the military. There's quite a thread about it over on LF which reactions all across the board.

[Erik88]

I'm no pilot but it definitely looks like they were being reckless.

[MattCary]

Not sure about the physics of it all...

but the guys on the ground shouting "Holy ####" and laughing seems to indicate that wasn't typical.

[QuietDan]

Did they survive?

[buck1032]

It looks to me like they were trying to do a rotor over at an insufficient atlitude and couldnt recover. With that said the video isnt good enough quality or stable enough to pick up any obvious problems, ie loss of tail rotor authority, etc.

[scoutfsu]

Did they survive?

Yep alive, unharmed, and facing serious fallout. Their initial impact also came close (5ish feet) to mushing a dude.

Generally pilots do this to give morale to the guys on the ground and to look cool. You see it quite a bit w/ Kiowas and Blackhawks, but especially the 58D's. I've got pictures of them at Stryker level. Unfortunately this one didn't turn out so well.

[Major Kong]

I hope it's not the case but it looks to me like they were doing a Vietnam-style simulated gun run and just ran out of collective at the bottom. I'm just glad no one was killed.

[TripleDigitRide]

Ah, it's only $20+ million dollars, let's just treat it like a $50 remote control toy. The tax payers go yo' back.

[peejman]

They mushed the climb, the altitude made the air thin, and the snow threw off their depth perception. Notice when it hits, the rotor position is in a cone. They were pulling the #### out of the collective.....just a combination of environmental factors and pilot error. They are done as aviators and commissioned officers in the military. There's quite a thread about it over on LF which reactions all across the board.

This.

Ah, it's only $20+ million dollars, let's just treat it like a $50 remote control toy. The tax payers go yo' back.

And this.

I've no issue with show-boating a bit and having a little fun. The boys have got to blow off some steam in a war zone however, way up in the mountains when it's cold and snowy was a poor choice of time and place.

[BigK]

It's rather lucky that Maverick and Goose didn't kill anyone.

[Dolomite`s Breezy]

I am glad they survived this...

[98SS1LWEE]

Ok, let me give some insight, as a Future Army Aviator headed to flight school and currently in an Apache unit. They started this flight in AF at over 9k feet altitude. These aircrafts are not great at high altitude. It takes a very skilled and knowledgeable pilot to fly that high. They do extensive high altitude training! EXTENSIVE! With that said, stall speed is around 40 knots at this altitude so not hot-dogging, just leaving form other side of base and didn't have the proper torque. He was scared he wouldn't clear the buildings and lost his brain and just yanked the cylic. This caused the aircraft to stall, forcing it to free fall. On the other hand, one of the two pilots has some mad skills to recover from the stall and level the aircraft before it nosed down! Props to one of them, and no experience and scared tactics to the other