Category: From the Old Server

Helicopters that are descending with a fair amount of power produce an annoying sound called “blade slap”.  Beginners are cautioned to avoid this condition because it leads to people on the ground complaining to the FAA about “those damned helicopters.”  (One can avoid blade slap by lower the collective to descend more positively rather than drifting slightly down.)  A big turbine-powered helicopter flew over Harvard Square the other day, slapping away.  I was with a friend, call her “K”, who hasn’t spent much time in the work force.  I asked her whether she found the sound annoying.

“Helicopter noise doesn’t bother me,” K responded.  “I assume that it is a traffic helicopter or some sort of medical emergency.  What I really hate is airplane noise.”

Why?

“Whenever I hear a big commercial jet overhead I think about companies sending their employees out for ridiculous meetings with each other where they will show vacuous PowerPoint presentations and have meaningless conversations.”

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According to this summary of a GAO report (links to the full PDF on gao.gov), “Development of the GPS-enhancing Wide Area Augmentation System took six years longer and cost $1.5 billion more than it should have, the GAO said, largely due to ineffective coordination among various offices of the FAA that were working on the program”.

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I’m considering a trip to the South Pacific in late December/January.  Never having been there I would appreciate advice from those who have (you can use the comment section below).  Here are some things that I would like to be able to do there:  snorkeling over coral reefs that grow up very close to the surface in calm water; beginner surfing lessons; bicycle riding on quiet roads and/or mountain biking on not-very-technical trails (not super hilly); meeting interesting well-educated locals and/or tourists; renting and flying a small plane or helicopter with an instructor; reading a book on a balcony or deck overlooking the water.

As far as practicalities go, I’d like to stay 3-5 days in any one place and not spend too much time transferring from island to island.  It would be good to find some places with enough infrastructure to support comfortable mid-range hotels.  I don’t want to slum it with the backpackers but I don’t want to spend $1000/day to sit on a beach either.  From my cursory reading of the guidebook it seems that a lot of these islands are so underdeveloped that creating a Western-style hotel environment is very expensive.

Where to start, then, amidst the millions of square miles of the South Pacific?

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Last Friday I took a checkride to add a Private helicopter rating to my Commercial pilot’s certificate.  The Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) will, in theory, examine applicants for this rating but in practice prefers that you pay a Designated Examiner.  The fun started at 9:00 am in Nashua, NH at CR Helicopters with Joe Brigham, a retired legend in the cranberry bogs of New England.  The oral portion of the exam lasted until nearly 11:00 am at which point the winds had picked up from calm to a typically unpleasant New England 10 knots gusting 15.  When the objective is to hold the helicopter steady within a foot or two of a reference point on the ground these kinds of winds make life tricky, especially in the Robinson R22, one of the world’s lightest helicopters.

Running the startup checklist on the R22 takes about 4 minutes during which one tests the engine’s dual independent ignition systems, the carb heat, the sprag clutch that enables the rotors to freewheel if the engine quits, and the low RPM warning horn that sounds if the blades begin to slow down.  The test complete, I called Nashua Tower to ask for clearance to a grassy area east of the paved 5500′-long runway.  Once we got across the runway Joe asked to see a sideways hover taxi then a backwards hover taxi.  These are done with the skids of the helicopter 3-5 feet off the ground.  I set the helicopter back on the grass and Joe asked me to pick it back up.  When we were 2′ from the ground he twisted the throttle on his side of the ship to idle, simulating an engine failure.  The helicopter immediately started a yaw to the left.  I pushed the right antitorque pedal to bring the nose back to where it had been pointed.  As the R22 settled towards the ground I pulled the collective pitch control to use some of the rotational energy of the blades to cushion the impact.  Every time you pull more collective the helicopter wants to yaw to the right so I had to step on the left pedal.  We thumped down on the ground about 1 second after Joe had closed the throttle, reasonably smoothly and within about 5 degrees of where we’d started on the heading.  The standard for a Private rating is 10 percent and Joe declared that I had demonstrated a hovering autorotation.

The next maneuver was the Quickstop, simulating an attempt to take off and then an abort due to failure to clear trees or the appearance of an obstacle.  We had to get over to the side of a small hill about 1000′ away.  I accelerated the helicopter to about 40 knots and 40′ above the ground and then pulled sharply back on the cyclic to flare off the speed while simultaneously lowering collective to prevent the helicopter from ballooning up in altitude and using the antitorque pedals to prevent yaw.  At the end of the Quickstop Joe asked for a running landing to simulate bringing the helicopter down at a high altitude in which the machine lacks sufficient power to hover.  We slid into the grass.

We were near the hill at this point so it was time to demonstrate slope operations.  One approaches the slope at a 45-degree angle with the helicopter yawed so that the skids are parallel to the slope at all times.  You hover so that the upslope skid is about 2-3′ above the ground and then gradually lower the ship until the upslope skid touches.  At that point you push the cyclic into the slope to lock the skid against the slope while simultaneously adjusting collective pitch to hold a level attitude.  After pausing in that position for a moment I lowered the collective to bring the downslope skid into contact with the ground while simultaneously adding addition cyclic towards the upslope to keep that skid locked.

Slope operations complete we started with a normal takeoff and normal approach.  Unless you are all by yourself in a Blackhawk you don’t take off straight up in a helicopter.  You bring the ship up into a hover and then push the cyclic forward until the helicopter is flying fast enough that the blades are biting into fresh undisturbed air.  This is called “Effective Translational Lift” (ETL) and the helicopter rapidly picks up speed and then altitude beyond this point.  The normal approach and landing is a reasonably shallow angle coming down toward some traffic cones abeam the Nashua windsock.  Once back on the ground Joe asked for a maximum performance takeoff in which one does try to depart as nearly vertical as is possible.  This involves spending some time under the R22’s “deadman’s curve”, a combination of having a low airspeed and a low altitude such that it would be impossible to make a smooth landing in the event of an engine failure.  Joe asked for a steep approach to the cones.  This is not straight down as you might think but rather just steep enough that you could clear the trees around a mid-size field before landing on someone’s helipad.

Next up was an autorotation.  This involves closing the throttle about 700′ above the ground and gliding down at about 65 knots and 1500′-per-minute descent rate.  Starting roughly 40′ above the ground I began to pull back on the cyclic to slow our forward speed and reduce the descent rate.  When the forward speed was just about gone I leveled the ship with the cyclic so that the tail did not strike the ground and began to let the R22 sink towards the ground with just a bit of forward speed.  At the last minute I pulled the collective to cushion the final impact with energy from the rotating blades.

The final part of the checkride was escaping from a vortex ring state.  Joe took the controls and slowed the helicopter down so that we had lost almost all forward speed.  Then he lowered the collective to start a 500 foot-per-minute descent from our 700′ altitude.  The helicopter began “settling with power” into its own disturbed air, falling suddenly much faster than the initial descent rate established by Joe.  The controls became mushy just as he said “You have the controls”.  The way to escape from a vortex ring state is by pushing the cyclic forward to try to fly the helicopter forward out of the disturbed air while simultaneously lowering the collective so that the helicopter isn’t beating the air so hard.  Once I had recovered some flying speed I pulled on the collective to resume a climb.

That was it.  What can one do with a Private helicopter rating?  Take friends for rides, basically, and that’s about it.  I’ll be starting work on my Commercial rating next week.

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Last night four of us walked over to Passim, the legendary folk music club in Harvard Square, to hear Arlo Guthrie perform.  Passim is a basement room furnished with spectacularly uncomfortable cast-off folding chairs.  Vegetarian food is available.  The chairs and the food immediately raise the question of, if folk music is supposed to represent the struggle of working-class Americans how come Passim doesn’t serve food that these folks would actually like (e.g., hamburgers) and chairs that would accomodate the typically obese frames of the poor.  Most of the time artists at Passim speak out from the stage against U.S. oppression of Iraqis, against George W. Bush, against Republicans, etc.  These protests elicit universal applause from the audience, all of whom apparently can agree on these points and all of whom are apparently rather irritated.  A true protest at Passim, one that would challenge the prevailing beliefs in the room, would be a leaflet arguing in favor of eating steak, touting its anemia-fighting and mood-mellowing properties.  Not to mention the fact that steak encourages the consumption of red wine, which is known to have many health benefits.

Guthrie came on stage after a warm-up by Alastair Moock, whose songs are heavily laced with the modern vocabulary of recovery.  The audience was awed by Guthrie’s impressive guitar playing, songwriting, and storytelling.  The guy has been on the road for most of his 57 years!

Arlo Guthrie is a lot less bitter about the American political situation than the average performer at Passim and the average audience member.  He pointed out that there is only one guy in the White House and lots of folks outside the White House.  Guthrie further noted that if the world were truly full of peace and love like all the folk singers wanted and if everyone were in perfect health then it would be awfully hard to accomplish any positive changed.  By contrast, “in a world as fucked us as this one it has never been possible to do so little little and achieve so much good.”

Guthrie drew a lot of strength from the final words of “Ma” in Grapes of Wrath:  “we will always be here, because we’re the people”, explaining that politicians come and go but the people remain to do the work and therefore can’t be ignored.  It occurred to me that perhaps this idea is obsolete in an age of offshoring.  In the old days there was always work for unskilled uneducated American labor.  Now that Mexico, India, and China are tied to us with Internet and container ships is that still true?

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The headline in this article says it all… “Britain leads the world in giving out anti-depressants”

Who would have predicted that bad weather, congested roads, and an absurdly high cost of living would lead to unhappiness?

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Despite widespread dissatisfaction with George W. Bush the Democrats managed to lose the 2004 election.  The U.S. has a population growth rate of 0.92% (source: CIA Factbook) and our population is forecast to reach 450 million by mid-century.  Thus economic (GDP) growth and job creation are essential if Americans are to enjoy a constant or rising standard of living.  Bush and Cheney weren’t our most successful business managers but they at least did work in the business world, attempting to produce economic growth and jobs.  The Democrats picked challengers who spent their entire lives working for the government or suing medical doctors for causing cerebral palsy.  These are activities that may redistribute the pie but won’t grow it.  Edwards might have been a particular weakness on this score because of the studies showing that lawyers reduce GDP.

Does anyone know of a governor or national Democratic politician who previously had a successful career in business?

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Inspired by David Letterman’s bringing a dentist from New Jersey to review the epic film “Reds”, here is an airplane nerd’s review of “The Incredibles”:

Elastigirl is flying an airplane right at the top of a cloud layer, more or less in and out of the clouds, and calls an air traffic control facility saying that she is “VFR on top”.  Visual Flight Rules would generally require at least 1000′ of clearance above the top of any cloud and 2000′ horizontally from clouds.

[The dentist’s sole comments on Reds related to the fact that the dental work visible on screen was anachronistic and not representative of what dental care would actually have been like in early 20th century Russia.  If you do see the Incredibles, look for a scene in which the wife is upset at the idea that her husband is cheating on her and then gets slapped a few times by a fashion designer.  This scene was animated by my cousin Doug Frankel.]

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In Oaxaca, as in most of the places that I’ve visited in and out of the U.S., it was nearly impossible to find someone who admits to favoring George W. Bush.  Yet the guy won 51% of the popular vote.  Even here in Massachusetts fully 37 percent of voters supposedly chose Bush.  Perhaps voting for Bush is like being a consumer of online porn.  Statistics show that it is popular but nobody will admit to doing it.

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People in Cambridge and Berkeley should be happier for the next four years than if Kerry had won because whenever anything bad happens they can blame George W.  Contrast with Nice Guy Jimmy Carter’s administration.  Things were going horribly for Americans with 18% inflation, high unemployment, our embassy staff taken hostage by Iranians, and the Soviets crushing our Muslim allies in Afghanistan.  Amidst all of this depressing news there was seemingly no one to blame and therefore people could only get depressed.  I’ve met quite a few Cantabrigians who seem to have enjoyed their anger at W. for the last four years.  For most people it would appear that anger is preferable to despair.

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